The Lure of the island: A spatial analysis of power relations

Abstract Islands – especially small ones – are now, unwittingly, the objects of what may be the most lavish, global and consistent branding exercise in human history. This paper draws on a post-structuralist perspective to propose an understanding of “the island lure” by disentangling and unpacking four, inter-related, constituent components of ‘islandness’. These components are themselves borrowed and adapted from a spatial analysis of power and power relations, and especially from Henri Lefebvre’s treatise on spaces of production. In its ontological approach, the paper offers a different critique of the representation of islands and island life.