State Structures & Theories
GEOPOLITICS
the interplay among geography, power,
politics, and international relations.
Classical Geopolitics
• German School
– eg. Ratzel’s organic state theory
• British / American School
– eg. Mackinder’s Heartland Theory
Friedrich Ratzel’s Organic Theory
• A nation is in essence
an organism
– If confined it will
atrophy
– Needs lebensraum
• The ‘nourishment’ of
weaker people’s
territories
• Territory is the state’s
life giving force.
• Adopted by Nazis
Mackinder’s Heartland Theory
(Whoever controls Pivot Area can control the world)
The “Great Game” between Britain and Russia, 1800s-1900s
Mackinder’s Heartland Theory:
“Who rules East Europe commands the Heartland
Who rules the Heartland commands the World Island
Who rules the World Island commands the world”
Rimland Theory
• Nicholas Spykman’s book The Geography of
Peace
– He who controls the Eurasian rim holds the key to
global power
• China, Korea, Japan, Southeast Asia, Arabian Peninsula,
and Europe
The heartland theory
• In Mackinder’s view, a unified heartland
power could probe into the coastlands
– Eventually maritime countries could be conquered
– Sea power could then be turned against outlying
continents and islands until the whole world was
subject to the heartland
– Mackinder predicted Russian conquest of the
world
The heartland theory
• His second environmental region was the
rimland
– Densely populated coastal fringes of Eurasia in the
east, south, and west
– After the communist revolution in 1917, leaders of
rimland empires and the United States employed
a policy of containment
– These countries fortified the rimland and fought
numerous wars against outward probes by
heartland-based communism
Fallacies of the heartland theory
• Overestimation of the power potential of the thinly
settled Eurasian interior, which is largely frozen
tundra, parched desert, and extensive forests
– Failed to anticipate the role of airborne warfare and
ballistic missiles
– Failed to recognize the economic weakness of the Marxist
system
• Heartland theory belongs to the discredited doctrine
of environmental determinism
Critical Geopolitics
• The idea 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.
Us versus Them
Terrorists “come from diverse
places but share a hatred
for democracy, a fanatical
glorification of violence, and
a horrible distortion of their
religion, to justify the
murder of innocents. They
have made the United
States their adversary
precisely because of what
we stand for and what we
stand against.”
“They [the terrorists] stand
against us because we stand
in their way.”
“I’ve said in the past that
nations are either with us
or against us in the war on
terror.”
Us versus Them
Terrorists “come from diverse
places but share a hatred
for democracy, a fanatical
glorification of violence, and
a horrible distortion of their
religion, to justify the
murder of innocents. They
have made the United
States their adversary
precisely because of what
we stand for and what we
stand against.”
“They [the terrorists] stand
against us because we stand
in their way.”
President George W. Bush
“I’ve said in the past that
nations are either with us
or against us in the war on
terror.”
President George W. Bush
President William J. Clinton
Geopolitical World Order
Temporary periods of stability in how politics are
conducted at the global scale.
• bi-polar
• multi-polar
• unilateralism
Will individual states remain the dominant
actors in a future geopolitical world order?
Geopolitical Phrases
• Ronald Reagan’s Evil
Empire of the Soviet
Union
Axis of Evil
Geopolitical issues around the world
breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991
split of Czechoslovakia in 1993
ongoing Québec separatist movement
reunification of Germany in 1990
ongoing Taiwan-China relationship
independence of East Timor in 2002
Hutu-Tutsi conflict in Rwanda in 1994
Political Geography terminology
state
vs.
nation
independent
based on Latin natio
defined boundaries
common ancestry
(mythical or actual)
internationally recognized
sovereignty over land and
people within boundaries
common religion (usually)
and language
accepted ways of behavior
gray areas, including colonies
political consciousness
existence of a homeland
Centrifugal and centripetal forces
• How many independent countries should
there be?
– We live in a time of new country proliferation
• Former Soviet Union disintegrated into 15 new
countries
• Yugoslavia became 5
• Czechoslovakia became 2
– What centrifugal and centripetal forces influence
the number of countries/states in the world?
Country building as diffusion
• Some countries sprang full-grown into the
world
• Most countries diffused outward from a small
nucleus called a core area
– Don’t get this confused with core-periphery model
here
Country development from a core area
• Generally possess an attractive set of
resources for human life and culture
– Often possesses some measure of natural defense
that attracts people
• Denser population may produce enough
wealth to support a large army as a base for
further expansion and relocation diffusion
Country development from a core area
• During expansion, the core area usually
remains the country’s most important district
– Houses the capital city
– Contains the cultural and economic heart of the
country
– Serves as the node of a functional culture region
– France expanded to its present size from around
Paris
Country development from a core area
• During expansion, the core area usually
remains the country’s most important district
– China diffused from a nucleus in the northeast
– Russia originated in the principality of Moscow
– The United States grew westward from a core
between Massachusetts and Virginia
Country development from a core area
• Diffusion of independent countries in this
manner produces the core/periphery
configuration
– Peripheral areas generally display self-conscious
regionalism, and occasionally provide settings for
secession movements
• Generally countries created this way are more
stable
Countries created to fill a void
• Absence of a core area can leave a country’s
national identity blurred
• Have no national heartland
• Make it easier for provinces to develop strong
local or even foreign allegiances
• Belgium and Democratic Republic of Congo
(Zaire) are example of countries without
political core areas
Spread of political independence in
Africa
• In 1914, only Liberia and Ethiopia were
independent of European colonial rule
• Movement for independence by Arabs of
North Africa gained momentum in the 1950s
• Movement swept southward across most of
the continent between 1960 and 1965
• By 1994 independence had swept the
continent