Unit IV: Political Organization of Space

Mrs. Vazquez

Political Geography

• organization & distribution of political phenomena

Territory

• effort to control land

• world divided by borders– countries (or “states”)

Sovereignty

• From your textbook define

I. States

1. independent political unit

2. w/ defined territory

3. must be recognized by others

World States

• 195 recognized by UN

What happened to state size?

Issues defining states

• some territories not recognized:

– Taiwan– Tibet

II. Nations

• A cultural unit bound by sense of shared beliefs/customs

For example— Native Americans who never gave up their land to white settlers — are mainly in the harshly Arctic north of Canada and Alaska. They have sovereignty over their lands, but their population is only around 300,000.

Remember garreau 9 nations quiz???

“Stateless Nations”

• Nations without a country

– Palestinians– Kurds – Basques

Multinational State

The Former Yugoslavia

A State with more than one nation.State that contains two or more ethnic groups with traditions of self-determination that agree to coexist peacefully by recognizing each other as distinct nationalities.

A multinational state is defined as a state which contains several different ethnic groups yet their members identify themselves with the state, irrespective of which ethnic group they come from. Bosnia is classed as an multinational state, yet the ethnic groups of Bosnia often associate with other identities than Bosnian. This is primarily down to the geopolitical locations of several provinces within Bosnia: Republika Srpska and Herzegovina. Republika Srpska has a large Serb population and Herzegovina has a large Croat population.

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Africa:Most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa are former colonies and as such not drawn along national lines, making them truly multinational states. Thus, the largest nation in Nigeria is formed by the Hausa-Fulani, with 29% of the population; similarly, the largest nation in Kenya are the Kikuyu with 22% of the population.

Multinational State

• The United Kingdom is an exceptional example of a nation state, due to its "countries within a country" status. The United Kingdom which is formed by the union of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, is a unitary state formed initially by the merger of two independent kingdoms, the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, but the Treaty of Union (1707) that set out the agreed terms has ensured the continuation of distinct features of each state, including separate legal systems and separate national churches.

The Nation-State• a nation & a State (country w/ homogenous

culture)

• A state whose territory corresponds to that occupied by a particular ethnicity that has been transformed into a nationality

• about 20 countries

Exs: Iceland, Portugal, Poland, Japan, Albania, Belarus, Sweden, Italy, Israel, Iran

Nation State-Israel

• Israel's definition of a nation state differs from other countries as its concept of a nation state is based on the Ethnoreligious group (Judaism) rather than solely on ethnicity, while the ancient mother language of the Jews, Hebrew, was revived as a unifying bond between them as a national and official language.

• Israel was founded as a Jewish state in 1948, and the country's Basic Laws describe it as both a Jewish and a democratic state. According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, 75.7% of Israel's population is Jewish.[26] Large numbers of Jews continue to emigrate to Israel. Arabs, who make up 20.4% of the population, are the largest ethnic minority in Israel. Israel also has very small communities of Armenians, Circassians, Assyrians, Samaritans, and persons of some Jewish heritage. There are also some non-Jewish spouses of Israeli Jews. However, these communities are very small, and usually number only in the hundreds or thousands.

Pakistan-Nation State• Pakistan, even being an ethnically diverse country and

officially a federation, is regarded as a nation state due to its ideological basis on which it got independence from British India as a separate nation rather than as a unified India. Different ethnic groups in Pakistan are strongly bonded by their common Muslim identity, common cultural and social values, common historical heritage, a national Lingua franca (Urdu) and joint political, strategic and economic interests

Part nation State

• when a nation overlaps the boundaries of multiple States/you have multiple nations states the same nation (Arabia)

• Arabs in North Africa

d. Stateless nation

Types of Relationships Between “states” & “nations”

a. nation-State

b. multi-national State (Cyprus)

c. part-nation State (Arab)

Spatial Characteristics of States

• Smallest:• Vatican City

City-states:• Singapore, Monaco, San Marino

Microstates: Andorra, The Vatican

• Largest: Russia

5 basic shapes:

– Compact (Uruguay, Zimbabwe, Poland)

– Prorupt (extension out; Thailand)

– Elongated (Chile)

– Fragmented (difficult to defend; Philippines, Indonesia)

– Perforated (country that surrounds another; South Africa

A

C

B

E

D

Relative Location

• size and shape matter!

• absolute & relative location matter!Ex: Singapore, Switzerland

• Landlocked countries usually at disadvantage– Bolivia

They can be grouped in contiguous groups as follows:Central Asian cluster (6): Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan

European cluster (9): Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Kosovo (partially recognized), Liechtenstein, Macedonia, Serbia, Slovakia and Switzerland

Central and East African cluster (10): Burkina Faso, Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Mali, Niger, Rwanda, Uganda, Ethiopia, South Sudan

South African cluster (4): Botswana, Malawi, Zambia, ZimbabweCaucasian cluster (3): Armenia, Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh (unrecognized)South American cluster (2): Bolivia, Paraguay

Boundary Types

1. Physical: mountains, rivers, lakes

2. Geometric: lines of latitude/longitude

3. Cultural: separated by language/religion – India & Pakistan

Boundary Origins

1. Antecedent: border before populated boundary that was created before the present

day cultural landscape developedEx: U.S.

2. Subsequent: border drawn after2 types:

• Consequent (Ireland & N. Ireland)

• Superimposed (British India)

– Ireland & N. Ireland

Consequent

3. Relict/relic Boundary: historical boundary, no longer valid. Great wall of China, Berlin Wall

U.N. Convention of the Law of the Sea

• Territorial waters: 12 NM out• Exclusive Economic ZoneExclusive Economic Zone: 200 NM (fish, mineral resources)

a sea zone over which a state has special rights over the exploration and use of marine resources stretching 200 nautical miles from the coast. The country that controls the EEZ has rights to the fishing, whaling, etc., as well as the raw material resources.-Median-line principle: in situations where there is less than 400 nautical miles

Types of Boundary Disputes

1. Positional: over border

2. Functional: over policies (immigration)

3. Resource (oil)

4. Territorial- irredentism

Capital Cities:

• usually centralized (“core” area)

Primate City: dominates economic activity

• some capitals relocated:

– Forward Thrust Capital (Abuja, Brazilia, Canberra, Islamabad)

Nigeria - Abuja

Nigeria - Abuja

Geopolitics

Ratzel’s Organic Theory: countries are living organisms

Mackinder Heartland Theory:

land-based power (pivot area Europe)

Spykman Rimland Theory:

naval power

Forms of Government

Unitary: centralized gov’t (strong capital)

Federal: gov’t organized by territories

Nigeria’s Federal Government: Allows states within the state to determine whether to have Shari’a Laws

Centripetal Forces

• promote cohesion

• nationalism

• unify

• better transportation/communication

Centrifugal Forces

• challenges to the state

• ethno-nationalism

• devolution (autonomous regional gov’t); regionalism

• inequality

Ethnocultural Devolutionary Movements

Eastern Europedevolutionary forces since the fall of communism

Economic Devolutionary

Movements

Catalonia, Spain

Barcelona is the center of banking and commerce in Spain and the region is much wealthier than the rest of Spain.

Electoral Geography

Gerrymandering: redrawing of voting districts to benefit 1 political party

• protects minority districts

Supranational Organizations:

3 or more states form an alliance

- military (NATO)

- economic (EU, NAFTA)

-political (UN)

Supranationalism• Supranationalism: a venture of three or more states (sometimes two or more) involving formal economic,

political, and/or cultural cooperation to promote shared objectives. Some examples …• -United Nations (UN): established at the end of WWII to foster international security and cooperation (192

member states); precursor was the League of Nations that went defunct at the beginning of WWII. Has many subsidiaries such as the Security Council, World Health Organization (WHO), …).

• -European Union (EU): union of 27 democratic member states of Europe; began with the formation of Benelux by the end of WWII, then with the formation of the European Economic Community (EEC) years later. The EU's activities cover most areas of public policy, from economic policy to foreign affairs, defense, agriculture and trade. The European Union is the largest political and economic entity on the European continent, with over 500 million people and an estimated GDP of >US$18 trillion (2008).

• -North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO): a military alliance of western democracies begun in 1949 with 28 member states today; its members agree to mutual defense in response to an attack by any external party.

• -North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA): a trilateral trade bloc in North America created by the governments of the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Poverty rates have fallen and real incomes have risen in Mexico, but farmers haven’t fared well due to cheaper food from US agribusiness; also US manufacturing workers have lost jobs to maquiladora plants in Mexico (mostly due to cheaper labor costs).

• -Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS): confederacy of states of the former Soviet Union; it possesses coordinating powers in the realm of trade, finance, lawmaking, and security; also promotes cooperation on democratization and cross-border crime prevention. Some states are considered to be part of the “near-abroad”, referring to states (e.g., Baltic states – Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania) with strong Russian ties linguistically and politically

Global Scale – The United Nations

Regional Scale – The European Union

**How many points?

Domino theory: the idea that if one land in a region came under the influence of Communists, then more would follow in a domino effect. A resulting policy out of the Truman Doctrine that promoted containment of communism, the domino theory was used by successive United States administrations during the Cold War to justify American intervention around the world.New World Order: commonly refers to the post-Cold War era vision in which world affairs would not be dominated by the competition between the two nuclear superpowers; a positive and hopeful vision for the future.