The study of the form and growth of urban and regional Systems is hindered by the difficulty that researchers have in resolving the form-process dichotomy. This dichotomy blurs the distinction between physical, biological and social Systems ; it also makes difficult the transition from attributional languages to locational languages ; and it is largely responsible for the theoretical shortcomings of such notions as homogeneous and polarized regions. The theory of allometric growth offers solutions to these problems. Its structuralist philosophical foundations suggest that form and growth are respectively the projection in space and time of social forces ; and its systemic methodological foundations offer an operational approach for performing this projection. The allometric paradigm also helps in formulating new questions concerning, for instance, social and regional disparities, and the relative share, in history, of cyclical and cumulative effects.