This collection is an elaboration of a special issue of that contained essays by June Nash, Jack Goody, Helen Safa and Max Kirsch. The special issue addressed concerns that have become prominent not only in anthropology but in the wider social sciences and humanities. The reader focuses on the conceptual divisions among the constructs of space and place, indigenous strategies for autonomy, polity and global planning mechanisms, and the role of trans-national corporations in community disintegrations and resistance.