Political Geography
Political Geography
Political Geography
By: Sierra and Nya
Organizing Space
• Political Geography- the spatial analysis of political
phenomena and processes.
• State- has a defined territory, a permanent population, a
government, and is recognized by other states.
• Territoriality- a country’s or more local community’s sense of
property and attachment towards its territory.
• Sovereignty- a principle of international relations that holds
that final authority over social, economic, and political matters
should rest with the legitimate rulers of independent states
Organizing Space- Nations and More
• Nation- a term encompassing all the citizens of a state; a
tightly knit group of people possessing bonds of language,
ethnicity, religion, etc.
• Nation-State- a recognized member of the modern state
system possessing formal sovereignty and occupied by a
people who see themselves as a single, united nation.
• Multistate Nation- a nation that stretches across borders and
across states . Example: Romania and Hungary, and the
Transylvania region.
• Stateless Nation- a nation that does not have a state. Example:
The Palestians.
Multinational State- a state with more than one
nation within its borders. Nearly every state in
the world is a multinational state. Example: the
former Yugoslavia
Organizing Space…Continued
• Colonialism- rule by an
autonomous power over a
subordinate and alien people
and place.
• The imperial powers exercised
ruthless control over their
domains and organized them
for maximum economic
exploitation
• Example: Africa
Organizing Space…Continued
• World System Theory- theory originated by Immanuel
Wallerstein and illuminated by his three-tier structure
– Capitalism- economic model wherein people, corporations,
and states produce goods and exchange them on the world
market, with the goal of achieving profit
– World Economy
– Core- processes that incorporate higher levels of education,
higher salaries, and more technology
– Periphery- processes that incorporate lower levels of
education, lower salaries, and less technology
– Semi-Periphery- Places where core and periphery processes
are both occurring
Organizing Governments
• Centripetal Forces- forces that tend to unify a country.
• Centrifugal Forces- forces that tend to divide a country.
• Example for both: war
• Forms of Government:
– Unitary- a centralized government and administration that
exercises power equally over all parts of the state
– Federal- a central government represents the various
entities within a nation-state where they have common
interests yet allow these various entities to retain their own
identities and to have their own laws, policies, and customs
in certain spheres
Devolution
• Devolution- the process whereby regions within a
state demand and gain political strength and growing
autonomy at the expense of the central government;
the movement of power from the central government
to regional governments within the state
– Economic
– Ethnocultural
Example: most of Europe’s devolutionary
movements came from nations within a state that
defines themselves as distinct ethnically,
linguistically, or religiously.
– Spatial
Electoral Geography
• Electoral college- a certain number of electors
from each state proportional to and seemingly
representative of that state’s population.
• Reapportionment- process by which
representative districts are switched according
to population shifts, so that each district
encompasses approximately the same number
of people.
Electoral College Continued
• Gerrymanderingused to describe
redistricting for
advantage.
Types of States
• Compact State- a state that possesses a roughly
circular, oval, or rectangular territory in which the
distance from the geometric center is relatively
equal in all directions.
• Elongated State- a state whose territory is long
and narrow in shape.
• Fragmented State- a state that is not a
contiguous whole but rather separated parts.
Types of States Continued
compact
fragmented
elongated
Boundaries- Types
• Geometric- when boundaries are drawn using
grid systems such as latitude and longitude or
township and range. Example: the boundary
between Canada and the U.S. delineated by the
line of latitude west of the Great Lakes.
• Physical-Political (natural-political)- political
boundary defined and delimited by a prominent
physical feature in the natural landscape.
Example: the Rio Grande river between the U.S.
and Mexico.
Boundary Disputes
• Definitional- focus on the legal language of
the boundary agreement.
• Locational- center on the delimitation and
demarcation of the boundary.
• Operational- involve neighbors who differ
over the way their border should function.
• Allocational- involve international boundaries
at sea and other water bodies.
Geopolitics
• Geopolitics- the study of the interplay between
political relations and the territorial context in
which they occur.
• Critical Geopolitics- the concept that
intellectuals of statecraft construct ideas about
places, these ideas influence and reinforce
their political behaviors and policy choices,
and these ideas affect how we, the people,
process our own notions of places and politics.
Geopolitics Continued
• Friedrich Ratzel- postulated that the state
resembles a biological organism whose life
cycle extends from birth through maturity
and, ultimately, decline and death.
• Halford Mackinder (Heartland theory)a hypothesis that held that any political
power based in the heart of Eurasia could
gain enough strength to eventually
dominate the world.
Heartland Theory
Supranational Organizations
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Supranational Organizations- are ventures involving
three or more nation-states involving formal political,
economic, and/or cultural cooperation to promote shared
objectives.
League of Nations
United Nations- a global supranational organization
established at the end of WWII to foster international
security and cooperation.
European Union- an international organization
comprised of Western European countries to promote free
trade among members.
Benelux- the union of Belgium, the Netherlands, and
Luxembourg for economic purposes.
Supranational Organizations
• WHO- World Health Organization
• WTO- World Trade Organization
• NATO- North Atlantic Treaty Organization, an
international organization that has joined
together for military purposes.
• NAFTA- the North American Free Trade
Agreement was signed on January 1, 1994,
that allows the opening of borders between the
U.S., Canada, and Mexico.
Supranational Organizations:
Affecting the World Community
• Treaties reduce tariffs and import restrictions: ease
the flow of commerce
• Foreign relations
• Domestic policies
• Military policies
• Proliferation of nuclear weapons
• Economic globalization
• Increasing connectedness among people and cultures
• Terrorism perpetrated in the name of religion
• The state’s traditional position is being eroded by the
globalization of social and cultural relations