AP Human Geography Vocab 1

Political Geography

a branch of human geography concerned with the spatial analysis of political phenomena

Nation

a politically organized body of people under a single government

State

a nation or territory considered as an organized political community under one government.

Nation State

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

Multinational State

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.

Multi-Ethnic State

A state that contains more than one ethnicity

Multistate Nation

nation that transcends the borders of two or more states

Stateless Nation

A nationality that is not represented by a state.

city-state

a city that with its surrounding territory forms an independent state.

Territory

an area of land under the jurisdiction of a ruler or state.

Territoriality

In political geography, a country's or more local community's sense of property and attachment toward its territory, as expressed by its determination to keep it inviolable and strongly defended.

Sovereignty

Ability of a state to govern its territory free from control of its internal affairs by other states.

Territorial Integrity

the right of a state to defend sovereign territory against incursion from other states

Mercantilism

An economic policy under which nations sought to increase their wealth and power by obtaining large amounts of gold and silver and by selling more goods than they bought

Peace of Westphalia

the peace treaty that ended the Thirty Years' War in 1648

Self-Determination

Concept that ethnicities have the right to govern themselves

Irredentism

a policy of cultural extension and potential political expansion by a country aimed at a group of its nationals living in a neighboring country

Devolution

the transfer of powers and responsibilities from the federal government to the states

Autocracy

a system of government by one person with absolute power.

Democracy

A political system in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them

Theocracy

A government controlled by religious leaders

Anocracy

A country that is not fully democratic or fully autocratic, but rather displays a mix of the two types.

Colonialism and decolonization

Colonialism: a political, economic, and social system in which one group of people, the core or dominant group, controls the political and economic lives of another group of people, the peripheral or dominated group. (Native Americans)

Decolonization: process by which colonies become independent of the colonizing country (Africa)

World Systems Theory

Importance of world as a unit, dividing world into CORE (Western Europe/US), PERIPHERY (Latin America, Africa), and SEMI-PERIPHERY (India, Brazil)

Capitalism

An economic system based on private ownership of capital

Communism

A theory or system of social organization based on the holding of all property in common, actual ownership being ascribed to the community as a whole or to the state.

Socialism

a political and economic theory of social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.

Commodifcation

the process through which something is given monetary value

Core-Periphery Model

A model of the spatial structure of development in which underdeveloped countries are defined by their dependence on a developed core region.

Balkanization

Process by which a state breaks down through conflicts among its ethnicities

Buffer States

a country that separates two politcal enemies

Satellite States

a country that is economically and politically dependent on another country

Centripetal/Centrifugal Forces

An attitude that tends to unify people and enhance support for a state

Unitary Government

A centralized government in which all government powers belong to a single, central agency.

Federal Government

A form of government in which powers are divided between a central government and several local governments.

States' Rights

the rights and powers held by individual US states rather than by the federal government.

Devolution*

The process whereby regions within a state demand and gain political strength and growing autonomy at the expense of the central government.

Suffrage

the right to vote in political elections

Territorial

Pertaining to the domain over which a sovereign state exercises jurisdiction.

Reapportionment/Redistricting

when boundaries separating legislative districts in the United States and other countries have to be redrawn from time to time in order to account for changing population.

Electoral College

A group of people named by each state legislature to select the president and vice president

electoral vote

the official vote for president and vice president by electors in each state

popular vote

the votes cast by individual voters in a presidential election, as opposed to the electoral vote

Majority-Minority Districts

Drawing district boundaries to give a minority group a majority

Gerrymandering

the drawing of legislative district boundaries to benefit a party, group, or incumbent

Boundary disputes

Conflicts over the location, size, and extent of borders between nations.

Boundary Orgin

Boundaries often originated from old tribal lands and lands won in war. They were meant to establish claims to land and were often smaller historically.

Boundary Process

when borders are claimed, negotiated, or captured

Border Type

Physical: natural boundaries - rivers, lakes, oceans, mountains, or deserts

Cultural: estimated boundaries between nations, ethnic groups, or tribes

Geometric: boundaries surveyed mostly along lines of latitude and longitude

Borderlands

areas of land on or near the borders between countries, colonies, or regions

Frontier

A zone separating two states in which neither state exercises political control.

Confrence of Berlin (1884)

a pivotal meeting of European powers that formalized the "Scramble for Africa". It aimed to regulate European colonization and trade in Africa during the New Imperialism period.

Landlocked State

A state that does not have a direct outlet to the sea.

Microstate

A state or territory that is small in both size and population.

Territorial Morphology

A state's geographical shape, which can affect its spatial cohension and political viability.

Enclaves/Exclaves

exclaves: small bits of territory that lie on coasts separated from the state by the territory of another state; enclaves: landlocked within another country, so that the country totally surrounds it

heartland-rimland theory

Halford Mackinder's theory that the country that dominated the landmass of Eurasia (heartland) would eventually rule the world (rimland)

Geopolitics

The study of the relationship between geography and politics

Unilateralism

taking independent action without consulting other countries; avoiding entangling alliances or treaties

Supranational Organizations

cooperating groups of nations that operate on either a regional or international level.

European Union

An international organization of European countries formed after World War II to reduce trade barriers and increase cooperation among its members.

United Nations

an organization of independent states formed in 1945 to promote international peace and security

North Atlantic Free Trade

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was implemented in order to promote trade between the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. The agreement, which eliminated most tariffs on trade between the three countries, went into effect on January 1, 1994.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization

an international organization created in 1949 by the North Atlantic Treaty for purposes of collective security

Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)

an organization enabling the co-operation of leading oil-producing and oil-dependent countries in order to collectively influence the global oil market and maximize profit.

Deterritorialization

The movement of economic, social and cultural processes out of the hands of states.

Reterritorialization

when people within a place start to produce an aspect of popular culture themselves, doing so in the context of their local culture and making it their own

Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)

established rights and responsibilities of states concerning ownership/use of oceans/seas and their resources as developed by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea

Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ)

as established in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, a zone of exploitation extending 200 nautical miles seaward from the a coastal state that has exclusive mineral and fishing rights over it

Cold War

A conflict that was between the US and the Soviet Union. The nations never directly confronted each other on the battlefield but deadly threats went on for years.

Domino Theory

A theory that if one nation comes under Communist control, then neighboring nations will also come under Communist control.

Balance of Power

Condition of roughly equal strength between opposing countries or alliances of countries.

Terrorism

Acts of violence designed to promote a specific ideology or agenda by creating panic among an enemy population