The 32 Key Models and
Theories of the Course
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1. Thompson’s Demographic Transition Model is a model used to represent the process of explaining the transformation of
countries from high birth rates and high death rates to low birth rates and low death rates as part of the economic development
of a country from a pre-industrial to an industrialized economy. It has 5 stages though some texts still list only 4.
32. Hotelling’s Model of Locational Interdependence: A industries locational choices are strongly influenced by the location of
their chief competitor and related industries. Industries should not make isolated decisions about where to locate without first
considering where other, related industries exist.
Both Ice Cream venders
should locate at B.
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16. Latin American City Model: The Latin American City Model
combines elements of Latin American Culture and globalization
by combining radial sectors and concentric zones. Includes a
thriving CBD with a commercial spine. The quality of houses
decreases as one moves outward away from the CBD, and the
areas of worse housing occurs in the disamenity sectors.
17. Regions (Formal, Functional, Vernacular):
Formal: an area that can be identified by its homogeneous cultural or physical
characteristics
Functional: an area in which there is a center from which social or economic activities
spread
Vernacular: an area not defined by any set of physical data, but by human conception
of the area
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9. Hoyt Sector Model: The sector model also known as the Hoyt model was proposed in 1939 by economist Homer Hoyt.
It is a model of urban land use and modified the concentric zone model of city development. The benefits of the
application of this model include the fact it allows for an outward progression of growth however, like all models of urban
form its validity is limited.
24. Economic Sectors:
Primary Sector: agricultural and extractive activities. Relied upon by many developing nations.
Secondary Sector: processing activities—manufacturing, construction and power production. Many developing
countries support secondary activities with lower labor costs than developed countries.
Tertiary Sector: service activities. Many developed countries’ economies are dominated by tertiary sector jobs.
Quaternary Sector: informational activities.
Quinary Sector: a new theoretical sector of high level management jobs.
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8. Multiple Nuclei Model: The model describes the layout of a city. It notes
that while a city may have started with a central business district, similar
industries with common land-use and financial requirements are established
near each other. These groupings influence their immediate neighborhood.
Hotels and restaurants spring up around airports, for example. The number
and kinds of nuclei mark a city's growth. The theory was formed based on
the idea that people have greater movement due to increased car
ownership. This increase of movement allows for the specialization of
regional centers (e.g. heavy industry, business park). There is no clear CBD
(Central Business District) in this type of model.
25. Epidemiologic Transition Model: This model tracks disease and death the same way the 5 stages of Rostow’s growth
does except it is showing the changes of what kills humans.
Stage 1: Parasitic and infectious diseases, animal attacks.
Stage 2: better medical knowledge and conditions save some of the people (the wealthier).
Stage 3: a decrease in infectious disease death but a rise in disorders of aging.
Stage 4: death from the aging disorders (heart problems, cancer) are prolonged by better medical treatment.
Stage 5: Possible stage 5 comes from: 1. increases travel brings a person in contact with new bacteria. 2. New strains of
old diseases become stronger and 3. Poverty causes people to not afford the medicine used to cure old diseases.
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4. Population Pyramids: says that the relationship where the Rich (developed) countries control the poor (developing) countries
is just temporary and that both will become equal partners in the future.
The MDC’s and the LDC’s are just at different
29. Sustainable Development is a pattern of resource use that aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so
that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for future generations to come. The term was used by the
Brundtland Commission which coined what has become the most often-quoted definition of sustainable development as
development that "meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own
needs.
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13. 5 Themes of Geography
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Location (Absolute and Relative)
Place (Physical Characteristics and Human Characteristics)
Human Environment Interaction
Movement
Regions
20. Primate City: A country’s leading city is always disproportionately large and excessively
expressive of national capacity and feeling (culture). The primate city is commonly at least
twice as large as the next largest city and more than twice as significant. (New York,
London, Paris)
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12. Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration
1.
2.
3.
4.
Most migration is over short distance
Migration occurs in steps
Long-range migrants usually move to urban areas
Each migration produces a movement in the opposite direction (although not
necessarily of the same volume).
5. Rural dwellers are more migratory than urban dwellers.
6. Within their own country, females are more migratory than males, but males make more
long distance migrations.
7. Most migrants are adults
8. Large towns grow more by migration than by childbirth increase
9. Migration increases with economic development
10. Migration is mostly due to economic causes.
21. Rank-Size Rule: nth largest settlement is 1/n the population of the largest settlement.
In other words, 2nd largest is ½ the size of the largest. Works best in MDCs that have a full
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distribution of services.
5. Rostow’s 5 Stages of Growth: The model postulates that economic modernization occurs in five basic stages, of
varying length.
1. Traditional society
2. Preconditions for take-off
3. Take-off
4. Drive to maturity
5. Age of High mass consumption
Over time a society can develop from a limited
Traditional society to a fully developed mass
consumption society.
28. Heartland and Rimland Theories (Mackinder’s): The Heartland theory from 1919 says that control of the
European area from Poland to Asia provides control over the world. The Rimland theory from 1950 says that by
controlling the coastal areas around the Heartland, you contain whoever controls the Heartland. This became the key
to US foreign policy in the Cold War period as by controlling the rim of the Heartland the Soviet Union and China
could be contained. This explains the US involvement in Vietnam and the strong US commitment to Japan, Europe
and the Middle East.
The Heartland
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The Rimland
2. Christaller’s Central Place Theory: is a geographical theory that seeks to explain the number, size and location of
human settlements in an urban system. The theory was created by the German geographer Walter Christaller, who
asserted that settlements simply functioned as 'central places' providing services to surrounding areas.
The largest settlement (G) will attract
customers from the entire node (hex)
because it has more goods and services
to offer. G has a much larger range.
Each smaller place has its own node
(smaller hex) which has a smaller range
of goods and services. People will travel
a shorter distance to shop at B and even
shorter to shop at K, A and M.
31. Ratzel’s Organic theory of countries: States are organic and growing, with borders representing only a temporary
stop of their movement. The state is not the organism, but the land is a spiritual bond with the people who draw
sustenance from it. The expanse of a state’s borders is the reflection of the health of the nation.
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15. Urban Realms Model: Each realm (or edge city) is a separate
economic, social and political entity that is linked together to form a
larger metro framework.
Main issue to note with this model is that the city has been
decentralized and that edge cities are now the center of realms
which surround the city. The main CBD is no longer as influential
as it once was. Know what an edge city is to fully understand this
model.
18. Subsistence Agriculture: the growing of crops in order to sustain oneself.
•Shifting cultivation
•Pastoral Nomadism
•Intensive subsistence wet rice dominant
•Intensive subsistence non wet rice dominant
•Plantation farming
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10. Concentric zone (Burgess) Model: The Concentric zone model, also known as the Burgess model, is
one of the earliest theoretical models to explain urban social structures. It was created by sociologist
Ernest Burgess in 1925.
The zones identified are:
1. The center was the CBD
2. The transition zone of mixed residential and commercial uses
3. Low-class residential homes (Inner Suburbs), in later decades called inner city
4. Better quality middle-class homes (Outer Suburbs)
5. Commuters zone
23. Environmental Determinism and Possibilism also known as climatic determinism or
geographical determinism, is the view that the physical environment, rather than social conditions,
determines culture. The fundamental argument of the environmental determinists was that aspects
of physical geography, particularly climate, influenced the psychological mind-set of individuals,
which in turn defined the behavior and culture of the society that those individuals formed.
Possibilism in cultural geography is the theory that the environment sets certain constraints or
limitations, but culture is otherwise determined by man's actions. In Cultural ecology Marshall
Sahlins used this concept in order to develop alternative approaches to the environmental 12
determinism dominant at that time in ecological studies.
7. Thomas Malthus’ Malthusian Population Theory: Theory from the 1700’s which said that the
population of the Earth would grow beyond its ability to produce food and there would be world wide
starvation by the 1850’s. The mass production capabilities of the Industrial Revolution prevented (or
postponed) the success of Malthus’s prediction.
26. Bid-Rent Theory is a geographical economic theory that refers to how the price and demand on real estate changes as
the distance towards the Central Business District (CBD) increases. It states that different land users will compete with one
another for land close to the city center. This is based upon the idea that retail establishments wish to maximize their
profitability, so they are much more willing to pay more money for land close to the CBD and less for land further away from
this area. This theory is based upon the reasoning that the more accessible an area, the more profitable. This is much like
Von Thunen’s Model
The closer a business wants to be to the
CBD the higher they will pay for renting
or owning the property.
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3. Wallerstein's Core Periphery Model: This model says that the economic
world is divided among powerful core countries who use the periphery
(poor/weak countries for an economic benefit. Simi-periphery countries
are not under the complete control of the core countries but play a role
between the core and periphery countries.
30. Hartshorne’s Evolution of boundaries: (Antecedent, Superimposed, Subsequent, Relic) Boundaries can be
classified because their evolution relates to the cultural landscapes they traverse. Richard Hartshorne (1899-1992)
proposed a four-level genetic boundary classification:
Antecedent boundaries are boundaries defined and delimited before the present-day human landscape developed.
An example of this boundary type is between Malaysia and Indonesia at Borneo island's sparsely inhabited
rainforest.
Subsequent boundaries evolved as the cultural landscape of an area took shape, part of the ongoing process of
accommodation. A good example of this boundary type is the Vietnam/China border. It has been continually adjusted
and modified for centuries.
Superimposed boundaries are drawn forcibly across a unified, or at least homogeneous, cultural landscape without
regard for existing institutions. The island of New Guinea was divided by colonial powers without permission of the
natives, and is good example of a superimposed boundary.
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Relict boundaries form a border that has ceased to function, but whose imprints are still evident in the cultural
landscape. The southern states that once were the Confederacy, but whose borders as a country has been gone
since 1865, are a good example of a relict border.
14. Zenlinsky Model of Migration Transition: People become increasingly mobile as industrialization develops.
Phase one (“Premodern traditional society”): This is before the onset of the urbanization, and there is very little migration.
Natural increase rates are about zero.
Phase two (“Early transitional society”): There is “massive movement from countryside to cities... as a community
experiences the process of modernization”. There is “rapid rate of natural increase”.
Phase three (“Late transitional society”): This phase corresponds to the “critical rung...of the mobility transition” where urbanto-urban migration surpasses the rural-to-urban migration, where rural-to-urban migration “continues but at waning absolute
or relative rates”, and a “complex migrational and circulatory movements within the urban network, from city to city or within a
single metropolitan region” increased, non-economic migration and circulation began to emerge.
Phase four (“Advanced society”): The “movement from countryside to city continues but is further reduced in absolute and
relative terms, vigorous movement of migrants from city to city and within individual urban agglomerations...especially within
a highly elaborated lattice of major and minor metropolises” is observed. There is “slight to moderate rate of natural increase
or none at all”.
Phase five (“Future super advanced society”): “Nearly all residential migration may be of the interurban and intraurban
variety….No plausible predictions of fertility behavior,...a stable mortality pattern slightly below present levels”.
19. Commercial Agriculture: farming in order to sell yields for profit
•Mixed crop and livestock
•Dairying
•Grain
•Ranching
•Mediterranean
•Commercial Gardening
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11. Weber’s Model of Industrial Location (least – cost theory): Alfred Weber formulated a least cost theory of
industrial location which tries to explain and predict the locational pattern of the industry at a macro-scale. It
emphasizes that firms seek a site of minimum transport and labor cost. It looks at 3 factors: the cost of
transporting goods, cost of labor and cost of capital.
1) Transportation: the site chosen must entail the lowest possible cost of A) moving raw materials to the
factory, and B) finished products to the market. This, according to Weber, is the most important. 2) Labor:
higher labor costs reduce profits, so a factory might do better farther from raw materials and markets if
cheap labor is available (e.g. China – today) 3) Agglomeration: when a large number of enterprises cluster
(agglomerate) in the same area (e.g. city), they can provide assistance to each other through shared talents,
services, and facilities (e.g. manufacturing plants need office furniture)
22. Boserup’s Rural Land theory: Population growth forces subsistence farmers to consider
new farming methods in order to produce enough food to feed the additional people. She
disagrees with Malthus by saying that food shortages forces humans to find more ways to
produce more food.
In other words: As a population increases, the necessity will be met using technology.
Population growth forces an increase in the farming industry.
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6. Von Thunen’s Agricultural Model: Von Thünen concluded that the cultivation of a crop is only worthwhile within certain
distances from the city: beyond that, either the cost of the land becomes too high, with increasing distances transport costs
also increase, or, if there is another product having greater yield or lower transport costs. After a distance from the market
(the city) the production of a crop becomes unprofitable, either because its profits drop to zero or the profits earned by
other crops are higher, as von Thünen calculated them for products having different intensities (cattle, wood, grain, eggs,
milk, etc.): For each product there is a certain distance from the city where its production would be worthwhile.
27. Gravity Model: For decades, social scientists have been using a modified version of Isaac Newton’s Law of
Gravitation, to predict movement of people, information, and commodities between cities and even continents. The
relative strength of a bond between two places is determined by multiplying the population of city A by the population of
city B and then dividing the product by the distance between the two cities squared.
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