Is an urban perspective enough? Rethinking global infrastructure through infrastructural regionalism

Abstract

This commentary responds to Vegliò et al. (2025)’s advocacy for a shift from infrastructure-led development to infrastructure-led urbanization. While I applaud for their thoughtful and provocative propositions linking the Belt and Road Initiative, global infrastructure network, and accelerated urbanization, I would like to supplement a broader and more inclusive perspective of infrastructural regionalism that takes into account the vast countryside and socio-ecological systems, as well as the dynamic of infrastructuring mobilities that serves as an enabler for cross-boundary flows of capital, people, goods, and information. This commentary concludes with brief remarks on the evolving networked infrastructural regionalism connecting these two key points, while paying attention to the informal sphere, less visible locales, changing core-periphery dynamics, and the temporal dimension.