Supply-chain infrastructure as architecture
A case study of Amazon in Darlington, UK
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5716892 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Joel Maddock-James (York St John University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 20 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 986-1001 |
| Publication date | 2025-09-03 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Mobilities (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1745-0101 • E-ISSN: 1745-011X |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/17450101.2025.2477173 |
| OpenAlex | W4408489276 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 32 |
Using its ‘fulfilment centre’ in Darlington in the North East of England as a case study, this article first assesses Amazon’s existing arrangement in the UK economy, pointing to the spatial concentration of distribution centres that makes up its fulfilment network in this area. It frames Amazon’s decade-long growth as an expansionary fix to the problems of saturation and congestion that inundate the Golden Triangle of industrial logistics elsewhere in the country. It then illuminates the business of logistics by documenting the economic arrangements brokered by multiple actors that propelled the development into motion. It recognises Amazon as the ultimate beneficiaries of recent economic turmoil by investigating how platform power allowed them to ride out recession in becoming providers of last-mile delivery services. Finally, once the various scales of governance that need to be leveraged for the space-making to occur have been established, it finishes by returning to the town of Darlington to grapple with the construction of Amazon’s fulfilment centre there. Altogether, this article argues that through its logistical network Amazon is erecting a supply-chain infrastructure as architecture, which establishes the importance of mobile horizontality to the dominance of vertical enterprises like this logistics and e-commerce giant
Amazon rainforest · Business · Economics · Economy · Geography · Operations management · Process management · Regional science · Supply chain · Telecommunications · Computer Science · Engineering · Transportation and Mobility Innovations · Urban and Freight Transport Logistics · Architecture · Marketing
The Deadly Life of Logistics
Uneven Development
Postmodern geographies
The Geopolitics of Capitalism
Territory, Authority, Rights
Five theses on understanding logistics as power
Planetary Mine. Territories of Extraction under Late Capitalism
Infrastructure studies meet platform studies in the age of Google and Facebook
The post‐city being prepared on the site of the ex‐city’
Impersonal subjectivation from platforms to infrastructures
The injuries of platform logistics
Visibly Mute
The condition of postmodernity
Extrastatecraft
The Mobilities of Ships and Shipped Mobilities
The New Mobilities Paradigm
Dissolving Bologna
Between Fixity and Motion
Capital's logistical fix
The Spatio-temporality of Capitalism
Regional Development and the Production of Space
From 'Growth Centre' to 'Cluster
Just-in-Time Imperialism
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |