AGE-SEX DISTRIBUTION A model used in population geography that describes the ages and numbers of males and females within a given population; also called a population pyramid.

AGRICULTURAL DENSITY The number of farmers per unit area of farmland.

ARITHMETIC DENSITY The number of people living in a given unit area.

BABY BOOM A cohort of individuals born in the United States between 1946 and 1964, which was just after World War II in a time of relative peace and prosperity. These conditions allowed for better education and job opportunities, encouraging high rates of both marriage and fertility.

BABY BUST Period during the 1960s and 1970s when fertility rates in the United States dropped as large numbers of women from the baby boom generation sought higher levels of education and more competitive jobs, causing them to marry later in life. As such, the fertility rate dropped considerably, in contrast to the baby boom, in which fertility rates were quite high.

CARRYING CAPACITY The largest number of people that the environment of a particular area can sustainably support.

CHAIN MIGRATION The migration event in which individuals follow the migratory path of preceding friends or family members to an existing community.

CHILD MORTALITY RATE Number of deaths per thousand children within the first five years of life.

COHORT A population group unified by a specific common characteristic, such as age, and subsequently treated as a statistical unit.

COTTON BELT The term by which the American South used to be known, as cotton historically dominated the agricultural economy of the region. The same area is now known as the New South or Sun Belt because people have migrated here from older cities in the industrial north for a better climate and new job opportunities.

CRUDE BIRTH RATE The number of live births per year per thousand people.

CRUDE DEATH RATE The number of deaths per year per thousand people.

DEMOGRAPHIC ACCOUNTING EQUATION An equation that summarizes the amount of growth or decline in a population within a country during a particular time period, taking into account both natural increase and net migration.

DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION MODEL A sequence of demographic changes in which a country moves from high birth and death rates to low birth and death rates through time.

DEMOGRAPHY The study of human populations, including their temporal and spatial dynamics.

DEPENDENCY RATIO The ratio of the number of people who are either too old or too young to provide for themselves to the number of people who must support them through their own labor. This is usually expressed in the form n:100, where n equals the number of dependents.

DOUBLING TIME Time period required for a population experiencing exponential growth to double in size completely.

EMIGRATION The process of moving out of a particular country, usually the individual person’s country of origin.

EPIDEMIOLOGICAL TRANSITION Sudden population growth as a result of improved food security and health care, followed by a plateau in growth because of subsequent declines in fertility rates.

EXPONENTIAL GROWTH Growth that occurs when a fixed percentage of new people is added to a population each year. Exponential growth is compound because the fixed growth rate applies to an ever-increasing population.

FORCED MIGRATION The migration event in which individuals are forced to leave a country against their will.

GENERATION X A term coined by artist and author Douglas Coupland to describe people born in the United States between the years 1965 and 1980. This post–baby boom generation will have to support the baby boom cohort as they head into their retirement years.

GEODEMOGRAPHY See POPULATION GEOGRAPHY.

IMMIGRATION The process of individuals moving into a new country with the intention of remaining there.

INFANT MORTALITY RATE The percentage of children who die before their first birthday within a particular area or country.

INTERNAL MIGRATION The permanent or semipermanent movement of individuals within a particular country.

INTERVENING OBSTACLES Any forces or factors that may limit human migration.

INVOLUNTARY MIGRATION See FORCED MIGRATION.

LIFE EXPECTANCY The average age individuals are expected to live, which varies across space, between genders, and even between races.

THOMAS MALTHUS Author of Essay on the Principle of Population (1798) who claimed that population grows at an exponential rate while food production increases arithmetically, and thereby that, eventually, population growth would outpace food production.

MATERNAL MORTALITY RATE Number of deaths per thousand of women giving birth.

MIGRATION A long-term move of a person from one political jurisdiction to another.

NATURAL INCREASE RATE The difference between the number of births and number of deaths within a particular country.

NEO-MALTHUSIAN Advocacy of population-control programs to ensure enough resources for current and future populations.

OVERPOPULATION A value judgment based on the notion that the resources of a particular area are not great enough to support that area’s current population.

PHYSIOLOGIC DENSITY A ratio of human population to the area of cropland, used in less-developed countries dominated by subsistence agriculture.

POPULATION DENSITY A measurement of the number of persons per unit of land area.

POPULATION GEOGRAPHY A division of human geography concerned with spatial variations in distribution, composition, growth, and movements of population.

POPULATION PYRAMID A model used in population geography to show the age and sex distribution of a particular population.

PULL FACTORS Attractions that draw migrants to a certain place, such as a pleasant climate and employment or educational opportunities.

PUSH FACTORS Incentives for potential migrants to leave a place, such as a harsh climate, economic recession, or political turmoil.

REFUGEES People who leave their home because they are forced out, but not because they are being officially relocated or enslaved.

RUST BELT The northern industrial states of the United States, including Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, in which heavy industry was once the dominant economic activity. In the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, these states lost much of their economic base to economically attractive regions of the United States and to countries where labor was cheaper, leaving old machinery to rust in the moist northern climate.

SUN BELT US region, mostly comprising southeastern and southwestern states, which has grown most dramatically since World War II.

TOTAL FERTILITY RATE The average number of children born to a woman during her childbearing years.

VOLUNTARY MIGRATION Movement of an individual who consciously and voluntarily decides to locate to a new area—the opposite of forced migration.

ZERO POPULATION GROWTH Proposal to end population growth through a variety of official and nongovernmental family-planning programs.

ABSOLUTE DISTANCE A distance that can be measured with a standard unit of length, such as a mile or kilometer.

ABSOLUTE LOCATION The exact position of an object or place, measured within the spatial coordinates of a grid system.

ACCESSIBILITY The relative ease with which a destination may be reached from some other place.

AGGREGATION To come together into a mass, sum, or whole.

AZIMUTHAL PROJECTION A map projection in which the plane is the most developable surface.

BREAKING POINT The outer edge of a city’s sphere of influence, used in the law of retail gravitation to describe the area of a city’s hinterlands that depend on that city for its retail supplies.

CARTOGRAMS A type of thematic map that transforms space such that the political unit with the greatest value for some type of data is represented by the largest relative area.

CARTOGRAPHY The theory and practice of making visual representations of Earth’s surface in the form of maps.

CHOROPLETH MAP A thematic map that uses tones or colors to represent spatial data as average values per unit area.

COGNITIVE MAP An image of a portion of Earth’s surface that an individual creates in his or her mind. Cognitive maps can include knowledge of actual locations and relationships among locations as well as personal perceptions and preferences of particular places.

COMPLEMENTARITY The actual or potential relationship between two places, usually referring to economic interactions.

CONNECTIVITY The degree of economic, social, cultural, or political connection between two places.

CONTAGIOUS DIFFUSION The spread of a disease, an innovation, or cultural traits through direct contact with another person or another place.

COORDINATE SYSTEM A standard grid, composed of lines of latitude and longitude, used to determine the absolute location of any object, place, or feature on Earth’s surface.

CULTURAL ECOLOGY Also called nature-society geography, the study of the interactions between societies and the natural environments in which they live.

CULTURAL LANDSCAPE The human-modified natural landscape specifically containing the imprint of a particular culture or society.

DISTANCE DECAY EFFECT The decrease in interaction between two phenomena, places, or people as the distance between them increases.

DOT MAPS Thematic maps that use points to show the precise locations of specific observations or occurrences, such as crimes, car accidents, or births.

ENVIRONMENTAL GEOGRAPHY The intersection between human and physical geography, which explores the spatial impacts humans have on the physical environment and vice versa.

EXPANSION DIFFUSION The spread of ideas, innovations, fashion, or other phenomena to surrounding areas through contact and exchange.

FORMAL REGION Definition of regions based on common themes such as similarities in language, climate, land use, etc.

FRICTION OF DISTANCE A measure of how much absolute distance affects the interaction between two places.

FULLER PROJECTION A type of map projection that maintains the accurate size and shape of landmasses but completely rearranges direction such that the four cardinal directions—north, south, east, and west—no longer have any meaning.

FUNCTIONAL REGION Definition of regions based on common interaction (or function)—for example, a boundary line drawn around the circulation of a particular newspaper.

GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION SYSTEMS (GIS) A set of computer tools used to capture, store, transform, analyze, and display geographic data.

GEOGRAPHIC SCALE The scale at which a geographer analyzes a particular phenomenon—for example, global, national, census tract, neighborhood, etc. Generally, the finer the scale of analysis, the richer the level of detail in the findings.

GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEM (GPS) A set of satellites used to help determine location anywhere on Earth’s surface with a portable electronic device.

GRAVITY MODEL A mathematical formula that describes the level of interaction between two places, based on the size of their populations and their distance from each other.

HIERARCHICAL DIFFUSION A type of diffusion in which something is transmitted between places because of a physical or cultural community between those places.

HUMAN GEOGRAPHY The study of the spatial variation in the patterns and processes related to human activity.

INTERNATIONAL DATE LINE The line of longitude that marks where each new day begins, centered on the 180th meridian.

INTERVENING OPPORTUNITY If one place has a demand for some good or service and two places have a supply of equal price and quality, the supplier closer to the buyer will represent an intervening opportunity, thereby blocking the third from being able to share its supply of goods or services. Intervening opportunities are frequently used because transportation costs usually decrease with proximity.

ISOLINE A map line that connects points of equal or very similar values.

LARGE SCALE A relatively small ratio between map units and ground units. Large-scale maps usually have higher resolution and cover much smaller regions than small-scale maps.

LATITUDE The angular distance north or south of the equator, defined by lines of latitude or parallels.

LAW OF RETAIL GRAVITATION A law stating that people will be drawn to larger cities to conduct their business since larger cities have a wider influence on the surrounding hinterlands.

LOCATION CHART On a map, a chart or graph that gives specific statistical information about a particular political unit or jurisdiction.

LONGITUDE The angular distance east or west of the prime meridian, defined by lines of longitude, or meridians.

MAP PROJECTION A mathematical method that involves transferring Earth’s sphere onto a flat surface. This term can also be used to describe the type of map that results from the process of projecting. All map projections have distortions in area, direction, distance, or shape.

MAP SCALE The ratio between the size of an area on a map and the actual size of that same area on Earth’s surface.

MERCATOR PROJECTION A true conformal cylindrical map projection, the Mercator projection is particularly useful for navigation since it maintains accurate direction. Mercator projections are famous for their distortion in area that makes landmasses at the poles appear oversized.

MERIDIAN A line of longitude that runs north-south. All lines of longitude are equal in length and intersect at the poles.

NATURAL LANDSCAPE The physical landscape or environment that has not been affected by human activities.

NATURE-SOCIETY Also called nature-society geography, the study of the interactions between societies and the natural environments in which they live.

PARALLEL An east-west line of latitude that runs parallel to the equator and that marks distance north or south of the equator.

W. D. PATTISON Geographer who claimed that geography drew from four distinct traditions: the earth-science tradition, the culture-environment tradition, the locational tradition, and the area-analysis tradition.

PERCEPTUAL REGION Highly individualized definition of regions based on perceived commonalities in culture and landscape.

PETERS PROJECTION An equal-area projection purposely centered on Africa in an attempt to treat all regions of Earth equally.

PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY The realm of geography that studies the structures, processes, distributions, and changes through time of the natural phenomena of Earth’s surface.

PREFERENCE MAP A map that displays individual preferences for certain places.

PRIME MERIDIAN An imaginary line passing through the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, England, that marks the 0° line of longitude.

PROJECTION The system used to transfer locations from Earth’s surface to a flat map.

PROPORTIONAL SYMBOLS MAP A thematic map in which the size of a chosen symbol—such as a circle or triangle—indicates the relative magnitude of some statistical value for a given geographic region.

PTOLEMY Roman geographer-astronomer, author of Guide to Geography, which included maps containing a grid system of latitude and longitude.

QUALITATIVE DATA Data associated with a more humanistic approach to geography, often collected through interviews, empirical observations, or the interpretation of texts, artwork, old maps, and other archives.

QUANTITATIVE DATA Data associated with mathematical models and statistical techniques used to analyze spatial location and association.

REFERENCE MAP A map type that shows reference information for a particular place, making it useful for finding landmarks and for navigation.

REGION A territory that encompasses many places that share similar physical and/or cultural attributes.

REGIONAL GEOGRAPHY The study of geographic regions.

RELATIVE DISTANCE A measure of distance that includes the costs of overcoming the friction of absolute distance separating two places. Relative distance often describes the amount of social, cultural, or economic connectivity between two places.

RELATIVE LOCATION The position of a place relative to the places around it.

RELOCATION DIFFUSION The diffusion of ideas, innovations, behaviors, and so on from one place to another through migration.

REMOTE SENSING The observation and mathematical measurement of Earth’s surface using aircraft and satellites. The sensors include photographic images, thermal images, multispectral scanners, and radar images.

RESOLUTION A map’s smallest discernable unit. If, for example, an object has to be one kilometer long in order to show up on a map, that map’s resolution is one kilometer.

ROBINSON PROJECTION A projection that attempts to balance several possible projection errors. It does not maintain area, shape, distance, or direction completely accurately, but it minimizes errors in each.

CARL SAUER Geographer from the University of California at Berkeley who defined the concept of cultural landscape as the fundamental unit of geographical analysis. This landscape results from the interaction between humans and the physical environment. Sauer argued that virtually no landscape has escaped alteration by human activities.

SCALE OF ANALYSIS This is the geographic unit at which one investigates various patterns or processes; e.g., county vs. nation vs. globe.

SENSE OF PLACE Feelings evoked by people as a result of certain experiences and memories associated with a particular place.

SITE The absolute location of a place, described by local relief, landforms, and other cultural or physical characteristics.

SITUATION The relative location of a place in relation to the physical and cultural characteristics of the surrounding area and the connections and interdependencies within that system; a place’s spatial context.

SMALL SCALE A map scale ratio in which the ratio of units on the map to units on Earth is quite small. Small-scale maps usually depict large areas.

SPATIAL DIFFUSION The ways in which phenomena, such as technological innovations, cultural trends, or even outbreaks of disease, travel over space.

SPATIAL PERSPECTIVE An intellectual framework that looks at the particular locations of a specific phenomenon, how and why that phenomenon is where it is, and, finally, how it is spatially related to phenomena in other places.

SUSTAINABILITY The concept of using Earth’s resources in such a way that they provide for people’s needs in the present without diminishing Earth’s ability to provide for future generations.

THEMATIC LAYERS Individual maps of specific features that are overlaid on one another in a Geographic Information System to understand and analyze a spatial relationship.

THEMATIC MAP A type of map that displays one or more variables—such as population or income level—within a specific area.

TIME-SPACE CONVERGENCE The idea that distance between some places is actually shrinking as technology enables more rapid communication and increased interaction among those places.

TOPOGRAPHIC MAPS Maps that use isolines to represent constant elevations. If you took a topographic map out into the field and walked exactly along the path of an isoline on your map, you would always stay at the same elevation.

TRANSFERABILITY The costs involved in moving goods from one place to another.

VISUALIZATION Use of sophisticated software to create dynamic computer maps, some of which are three dimensional or interactive.

ACCULTURATION The adoption of cultural traits, such as language, by one group under the influence of another.

ANIMISM Most prevalent in Africa and the Americas, doctrine in which the world is seen as being infused with spiritual and even supernatural powers.

ARTIFACT Any item that represents a material aspect of culture.

BUDDHISM System of belief that seeks to explain ultimate realities for all people—such as the nature of suffering and the path toward self-realization.

CASTE SYSTEM System in India that gives every Indian a particular place in the social hierarchy from birth. Individuals may improve the position they inherit in the caste system in their next life through their actions, or karma. After many lives of good karma, they may be relieved from the cycle of life and win their place in heaven.

CHRISTIANITY The world’s most widespread religion. Christianity is a monotheistic, universal religion that uses missionaries to expand its members worldwide. The three major categories of Christianity are Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Eastern Orthodox.

CREOLE A pidgin language that evolves to the point at which it becomes the primary language of the people who speak it.

CULTURAL COMPLEX The group of traits that define a particular culture.

CULTURAL EXTINCTION Obliteration of an entire culture by war, disease, acculturation, or a combination of the three.

CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY The subfield of human geography that looks at how cultures vary over space.

CULTURAL HEARTHS Locations on the earth’s surface where specific cultures first arose.

CULTURAL IMPERIALISM The dominance of one culture over another.

CULTURAL RELATIVISM Understanding a culture on its own terms rather than judging it by the standards or customs of one’s own culture.

CULTURAL TRAITS The specific customs that are part of the everyday life of a particular culture, such as language, religion, ethnicity, social institutions, and aspects of popular culture.

CULTURE A total way of life held in common by a group of people, including learned features such as language, ideology, behavior, technology, and government.

CUSTOMS Practices followed by the people of a particular cultural group.

DENOMINATION A particular religious group, usually associated with differing Protestant belief systems.

DIALECTS Geographically distinct versions of a single language that vary somewhat from the parent form.

DIASPORA People who come from a common ethnic background but who live in different regions outside of the home of their ethnicity.

ECUMENE The proportion of the earth inhabited by humans.

ENVIRONMENTAL DETERMINISM A doctrine that claims that cultural traits are formed and controlled by environmental conditions.

ESPERANTO A constructed international auxiliary language incorporating aspects of numerous linguistic traditions to create a universal means of communication.

ETHNIC CLEANSING The systematic attempt to remove all people of a particular ethnicity from a country or region either by forced migration or genocide.

ETHNIC NEIGHBORHOOD An area within a city containing members of the same ethnic background.

ETHNIC RELIGION Religion that is identified with a particular ethnic or tribal group and that does not seek new converts.

ETHNICITY Refers to a group of people who share a common identity.

ETHNOCENTRISM An evaluation of other cultures according to preconceptions of one’s own cultural standards and traditions.

EVANGELICAL RELIGION Religion in which an effort is made to spread a particular belief system.

FUNDAMENTALISM The strict adherence to a particular doctrine.

GENDER INEQUALITY INDEX A United Nations index, introduced in 2010, which measures a country’s loss of achievement due to gender inequality, based on reproductive health, employment, and general empowerment.

GENOCIDE A premeditated effort to kill everyone from a particular ethnic group.

GHETTO A segregated ethnic area within a city.

GLOBAL RELIGION Religion in which members are numerous and widespread and whose doctrines might appeal to different people from any region of the globe.

HINDUISM A cohesive and unique society, most prevalent in India, that integrates spiritual beliefs with daily practices and official institutions such as the caste system.

INDIGENOUS CULTURE Refers to a constellation of cultural practices that form the sights, smells, sounds, and rituals of everyday existence in the traditional societies in which they developed.

INDO-EUROPEAN Language family containing the Germanic and Romance languages that includes languages spoken by about 50% of the world’s people.

ISLAM A monotheistic religion based on the belief that there is one God, Allah, and that Muhammad was Allah’s prophet. Islam is based in the ancient city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Muhammad.

ISOGLOSSES Geographical boundary lines where different linguistic features meet.

JUDAISM The first major monotheistic religion. It is based on a sense of ethnic identity, and its adherents tend to form tight-knit communities wherever they live.

LANGUAGE EXTINCTION This occurs when a language is no longer in use by any living people. Thousands of languages have become extinct over the eons since language first developed, but the process of language extinction has accelerated greatly during the past 300 years.

LANGUAGE FAMILY A collection of many languages, all of which came from the same original tongue long ago, that have since evolved different characteristics.

LANGUAGE GROUP A set of languages with a relatively recent common origin and many similar characteristics.

LITERACY The ability to read and write.

LOCAL CULTURE A set of common experiences or customs that shapes the identity of a place and the people who live there. Local cultures are often the subjects of preservation or economic development efforts.

LOCAL RELIGIONS Religions that are spiritually bound to particular regions.

MINORITY A racial or ethnic group smaller than and differing from the majority race or ethnicity in a particular area or region.

MISSIONARY A person of a particular faith who travels in order to recruit new members into the faith represented.

MONOTHEISM The worship of only one god.

MULTICULTURAL Having to do with many cultures.

OFFICIAL LANGUAGE Language in which all government business occurs in a country.

PIDGIN Language that may develop when two groups of people with different languages meet. The pidgin has some characteristics of each language.

PILGRIMAGE A journey to a place of religious importance.

POLYGLOT A multilingual state.

POLYTHEISM The worship of more than one god.

POP CULTURE (OR POPULAR CULTURE) Dynamic culture based in large, heterogeneous societies permitting considerable individualism, innovation, and change; having a money-based economy, division of labor into professions, secular institutions of control, and weak interpersonal ties; and producing and consuming machine-made goods.

RACE A group of human beings distinguished by physical traits, blood types, genetic code patterns, or genetically inherited characteristics.

ROMANCE LANGUAGES Any of the languages derived from Latin, including Italian, Spanish, French, and Romanian.

SINO-TIBETAN Language area that spreads through most of Southeast Asia and China and comprises Chinese, Burmese, Tibetan, Japanese, and Korean.

STIMULUS DIFFUSION When a specific cultural element is diffused to another culture that gives it a new and unique form.

SYNCRETIC Traditions that borrow from both the past and present.

TOPONYMS Place names given to certain features on the land, such as settlements, terrain features, and streams.

TRADITION A cohesive collection of customs within a cultural group.

TRANSCULTURATION The expansion of cultural traits through diffusion, adoption, and other related processes.

UNIVERSALIZING RELIGION Religion that seeks to unite people from all over the globe.

ANTECEDENT BOUNDARY A boundary line established before an area is populated.

BALKANIZATION The contentious political process by which a state may break up into smaller countries.

BUFFER STATE A relatively small country sandwiched between two larger powers. The existence of buffer states may help to prevent dangerous conflicts between powerful countries.

CENTRIFUGAL FORCES Forces that tend to divide a country.

CENTRIPETAL FORCES Forces that tend to unite or bind a country together.

COLONIALISM The expansion and perpetuation of an empire.

COMMONWEALTH OF INDEPENDENT STATES Confederacy of independent states of the former Soviet Union that have united because of their common economic and administrative needs.

CONFEDERATION A form of an international organization that brings several autonomous states together for a common purpose.

DEMOCRATIZATION The process of establishing representative and accountable forms of government led by popularly elected officials.

DEVOLUTION The delegation of legal authority from a central government to lower levels of political organization, such as a state or country.

DOMINO THEORY The idea that political destabilization in one country can lead to collapse of political stability in neighboring countries, starting a chain reaction of collapse.

EAST/WEST DIVIDE Geographic separation between the largely democratic and free-market countries of Western Europe and the Americas from the communist and socialist countries of Eastern Europe and Asia.

ELECTORAL COLLEGE A certain number of electors from each state proportional to and seemingly representative of that state’s population. Each elector chooses a candidate, believing they are representing their constituency’s choice.

ELECTORAL VOTE The choice expressed collectively by the electoral college to determine the president and vice-president of the United States.

ENCLAVE Any small and relatively homogeneous group or region surrounded by another larger and different group or region.

EUROPEAN UNION International organization comprising Western European countries to promote free trade among members.

EXCLAVE A bounded territory that is part of a particular state but is separated from it by the territory of a different state.

FEDERALISM A system of government in which power is distributed among certain geographical territories rather than concentrated within a central government.

FRONTIER An area where borders are shifting and weak and where peoples of different cultures or nationalities meet and lay claim to the land.

GEOMETRIC BOUNDARIES Political boundaries that are defined and delimited by straight lines.

GEOPOLITICS The study of the interplay between political relations and the territorial context in which they occur.

GERRYMANDERING The designation of voting districts so as to favor a particular political party or candidate.

HEARTLAND THEORY Hypothesis proposed by Halford Mackinder that held that any political power based in the heart of Eurasia could gain enough strength to eventually dominate the world.

IMPERIALISM The perpetuation of a colonial empire even after it is no longer politically sovereign.

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION An alliance of two or more countries seeking cooperation with each other without giving up either’s autonomy or self-determination.

IRREDENTISM A policy of advocating for the return of a territory to a country it formerly belonged to.

LANDLOCKED STATE A state that is completely surrounded by the land of other states, which gives it a disadvantage in terms of accessibility to and from international trade routes.

LAW OF THE SEA Law establishing states’ rights and responsibilities concerning the ownership and use of the earth’s seas and oceans and their resources.

LEBENSRAUM Hitler’s expansionist theory based on a drive to acquire “living space” for the German people.

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

NATION Tightly knit group of individuals sharing a common language, ethnicity, religion, and other cultural attributes.

NATIONALISM A sense of national pride to such an extent of exalting one nation above all others.

NATION-STATE A country whose population possesses a substantial degree of cultural homogeneity and unity.

NORTH AMERICAN FREE TRADE AGREEMENT Agreement signed on January 1, 1994, that allowed the opening of borders between the United States, Mexico, and Canada.

NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION An international organization of member states that have joined together for military purposes.

NORTH/SOUTH DIVIDE The economic division between the wealthy countries of Europe and North America, Japan, and Australia and the generally poorer countries of Asia, Africa, and Latin America.

ORGANIC THEORY The view that states resemble biological organisms with life cycles that include stages of youth, maturity, and old age.

ORGANIZATION OF PETROLEUM EXPORTING COUNTRIES An international economic organization whose member countries all produce and export oil.

PHYSICAL BOUNDARIES Political boundaries that correspond with prominent physical features such as mountain ranges or rivers.

POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY The spatial analysis of political phenomena and processes.

POPULAR VOTE The tally of each individual’s vote within a given geographic area.

PRORUPTED STATE A state that exhibits a narrow, elongated land extension leading away from the main territory.

REAPPORTIONMENT The process of a reallocation of electoral seats to defined territories.

REDISTRICTING The drawing of new electoral district boundary lines in response to population changes.

RELIC BOUNDARIES Old political boundaries that no longer exist as international borders, but that have left an enduring mark on the local cultural or environmental geography.

RIMLAND THEORY Nicholas Spykman’s theory that the domination of the coastal fringes of Eurasia would provide the base for world conquest.

SELF-DETERMINATION The right of a nation to govern itself autonomously.

SHATTERBELT A region of persistent political fragmentation due to devolution and centrifugal forces.

STATE A politically organized territory that is administered by a sovereign government and is recognized by the international community.

STATELESS NATION A group of people with a common political identity who do not have a territorially defined, sovereign country of their own.

STATES’ RIGHTS Rights and powers believed to be in the authority of the states rather than the federal government.

SUBSEQUENT BOUNDARY Boundary line established after an area has been settled that considers the social and cultural characteristics of the area.

SUPERIMPOSED BOUNDARY Boundary line drawn in an area ignoring the existing cultural pattern.

SUPRANATIONAL ORGANIZATION Organization of three or more states to promote shared objectives.

TERRITORIAL DISPUTE Any dispute over land ownership.

TERRITORIAL ORGANIZATION Political organization that distributes political power in more easily governed units of land.

THEOCRACY A state whose government is either believed to be divinely guided or a state under the control of a group of religious leaders.

UNITARY STATE A state governed constitutionally as a unit, without internal divisions or a federalist delegation of powers.

UNITED NATIONS A global supranational organization established at the end of World War II to foster international security and cooperation.

AGRIBUSINESS The set of economic and political relationships that organize food production for commercial purposes. It includes activities ranging from seed production, to retailing, to consumption of agricultural products.

AGRICULTURE The art and science of producing food from the land and tending livestock for the purpose of human consumption.

ANIMAL HUSBANDRY An agricultural activity associated with the raising of domesticated animals, such as cattle, horses, sheep, and goats.

AQUACULTURE The cultivation or farming (in controlled conditions) of aquatic species, such as fish. In contrast to commercial fishing, which involves catching wild fish.

BIOTECHNOLOGY A form of technology that uses living organisms, usually genes, to modify products, to make or modify plants and animals, or to develop other microorganisms for specific purposes.

CAPITAL-INTENSIVE AGRICULTURE Form of agriculture that uses mechanical goods, such as machinery, tools, vehicles, and facilities, to produce large amounts of agricultural goods—a process requiring very little human labor.

COMMERCIAL AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY All agricultural activity generated for the purpose of selling, not necessarily for local consumption.

COMMODITY CHAINS A linked system of processes that gather resources, convert them into goods, package them for distribution, disperse them, and sell them on the market.

DAIRYING An agricultural activity involving the raising of livestock, most commonly cows and goats, for dairy products such as milk, cheese, and butter.

DESERTIFICATION The process by which formerly fertile lands become increasingly arid, unproductive, and desert-like.

DOMESTICATION The conscious manipulation of plant and animal species by humans in order to sustain themselves.

EXTENSIVE AGRICULTURE An agricultural system characterized by low inputs of labor per unit land area.

FEEDLOTS Places where livestock are concentrated in a very small area and raised on hormones and hearty grains that prepare them for slaughter at a much more rapid rate than grazing; often referred to as factory farms.

FERTILE CRESCENT Area located in the crescent-shaped zone near the southeastern Mediterranean coast (including Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Turkey), which was once a lush environment and one of the first hearths of domestication and thus agricultural activity.

FOOD SECURITY People’s ability to access sufficient safe and nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life.

GENETICALLY MODIFIED FOODS Foods that are mostly products of organisms that have had their genes altered in a laboratory for specific purposes, such as disease resistance, increased productivity, or nutritional value, allowing growers greater control, predictability, and efficiency.

GREEN REVOLUTION The development of higher-yield and fast-growing crops through increased technology, pesticides, and fertilizers transferred from the developed to developing world to alleviate the problem of food supply in those regions of the globe.

HORIZONTAL INTEGRATION A form of corporate organization in which several branches of a company or several commonly owned companies work together to sell their products in different markets.

HUNTING AND GATHERING The killing of wild animals and fish as well as the gathering of fruits, roots, nuts, and other plants for sustenance.

INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION The rapid economic changes that occurred in agriculture and manufacturing in England in the late 18th century and that rapidly spread to other parts of the developed world.

INTENSIVE CULTIVATION Any kind of agricultural activity that involves effective and efficient use of labor on small plots of land to maximize crop yield.

LABOR-INTENSIVE AGRICULTURE Type of agriculture that requires large levels of manual labor to be successful.

LIVESTOCK RANCHING An extensive commercial agricultural activity that involves the raising of livestock over vast geographic spaces typically located in semiarid climates like the American West.

MECHANIZATION In agriculture, the replacement of human labor with technology or machines.

MEDITERRANEAN AGRICULTURE An agricultural system practiced in the Mediterranean-style climates of Western Europe, California, and portions of Chile and Australia, in which diverse specialty crops such as grapes, avocados, olives, and a host of nuts, fruits, and vegetables make up profitable agricultural operations.

ORGANIC AGRICULTURE The use of crop rotation, natural fertilizers such as manure, and biological pest control—as opposed to artificial fertilizers, pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, additives, and genetically modified organisms—to promote healthy, vigorous crops.

PASTORALISM A type of agricultural activity based on nomadic animal husbandry or the raising of livestock to provide food, clothing, and shelter.

PESTICIDES Chemicals used on plants that do not harm the plants, but kill pests and have negative repercussions on other species that ingest the chemicals.

PLANNED AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY An agricultural economy found in communist nations in which the government controls both agricultural production and distribution.

PLANTATION A large, frequently foreign-owned piece of agricultural land devoted to the production of a single export crop.

SALINIZATION Process that occurs when soils in arid areas are brought under cultivation through irrigation. In arid climates, water evaporates quickly off the ground surface, leaving salty residues that render the soil infertile.

SHIFTING CULTIVATION The use of tropical forest clearings for crop production until their fertility is lost. Plots are then abandoned, and farmers move on to new sites.

SLASH-AND-BURN AGRICULTURE System of cultivation that usually exists in tropical areas, where vegetation is cut close to the ground and then ignited. The fire introduces nutrients into the soil, thereby making it productive for a relatively short period of time.

SPECIALTY CROPS Crops, including items like peanuts and pineapples, that are produced, usually in developing countries, for export.

SUBSISTENCE AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY Any farm economy in which most crops are grown for nearly exclusive family or local consumption.

SUSTAINABILITY A set of policies or practices by which societies can ensure that the people of the future have the same access to resources and thus the same economic and environmental opportunities as people living today.

SWIDDEN Land that is prepared for agriculture by using the slash-and-burn method.

TOPSOIL LOSS When the top fertile layer of soil is depleted through erosion. It is a tremendous problem in areas with fragile soils, steep slopes, or torrential seasonal rains.

TRANSHUMANCE The movements of livestock according to seasonal patterns, generally lowland areas in the winter and highland areas in the summer.

URBAN SPRAWL The process of urban areas expanding outward, usually in the form of suburbs, and developing over fertile agricultural land.

VERTICAL INTEGRATION A form of corporate organization in which one firm controls multiple aspects or phases of a commodity chain.

VON THUNEN MODEL An agricultural model that spatially describes agricultural activity in terms of rent. Activities that require intensive cultivation and cannot be transported over great distances pay higher rent to be close to the market. Conversely, activities that are more extensive, with goods that are easy to transport, are located farther from the market where rent is less.

ACTION SPACE The geographical area that contains the space an individual interacts with on a daily basis.

BEAUX ARTS The movement within city planning and urban design that stressed the marriage of older, classical forms with newer, industrial ones. Common characteristics of this period include wide thoroughfares, spacious parks, and civic monuments that stressed progress, freedom, and national unity.

BLOCKBUSTING As early as 1900, real estate agents and developers encouraged affluent white property owners to sell their homes and businesses at a loss by stoking fears that their neighborhoods were being overtaken by racial or ethnic minorities.

BOOMBURB A large, rapidly growing city that is suburban in character but resembles population totals of large urban cores.

BORCHERT’S EPOCHS According to the geographer John R. Borchert, American cities have undergone five major epochs, or periods, of development shaped by the dominant forms of transportation and communication at the time. These include the sail-wagon epoch (1790–1830), iron horse epoch (1830–1870), steel rail epoch (1870–1920), auto-air-amenity epoch (1920–1970), and satellite-electronic-jet propulsion and high-technology epoch (1970–present).

CENTRAL BUSINESS DISTRICT The downtown or nucleus of a city where retail stores, offices, and cultural activities are concentrated; building densities are usually quite high; and transportation systems converge.

CENTRAL-PLACE THEORY A theory formulated by Walter Christaller in the early 1900s that explains the size and distribution of cities in terms of a competitive supply of goods and services to dispersed populations.

CITY BEAUTIFUL MOVEMENT Movement in environmental design that drew directly from the Beaux Arts school. Architects from this movement strove to impart order on hectic industrial centers by creating urban spaces that conveyed a sense of morality and civic pride, which many feared was absent from the frenzied new industrial world.

COLONIAL CITIES Cities established by colonizing empires as administrative centers. Often they were established on already existing native cities, completely overtaking their infrastructures.

CONCENTRIC-ZONE MODEL Model that describes urban environments as a series of rings of distinct land uses radiating out from a central core, or central business district.

EDGE CITIES Cities that are located on the outskirts of larger cities and serve many of the same functions of urban areas, but in a sprawling, decentralized suburban environment.

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, “the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies.”

EUROPEAN CITIES Cities in Europe that were mostly developed during the Medieval Period and that retain many of the same characteristics, such as extreme density of development with narrow buildings and winding streets, an ornate church that prominently marks the city center, and high walls surrounding the city center that provided defense against attack.

EXURBANITE Person who has left the inner city and moved to outlying suburbs or rural areas.

FEUDAL CITIES Cities that arose during the Middle Ages and that actually represent a time of relative stagnation in urban growth. This system fostered a dependent relationship between wealthy landowners and peasants who worked their land, providing very little alternative economic opportunities.

FORWARD CAPITAL A capital city placed in a remote or peripheral area for economic, strategic, or symbolic reasons.

GALACTIC CITY MODEL A circular-city model that characterizes the role of the automobile in the postindustrial era.

GATEWAY CITIES Cities that, because of their geographic location, act as ports of entry and distribution centers for large geographic areas.

GENTRIFICATION The trend of middle- and upper-income Americans moving into city centers and rehabilitating much of the architecture but also replacing low-income populations, and changing the social character of certain neighborhoods.

GHETTOIZATION A process occurring in many inner cities in which they become dilapidated centers of poverty, as affluent whites move out to the suburbs and immigrants and people of color vie for scarce jobs and resources.

GREAT MIGRATION An early 20th-century mass movement of African Americans from the Deep South to the industrial North, particularly Chicago.

HINTERLAND The market area surrounding an urban center, which that urban center serves.

INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION Period characterized by the rapid social and economic changes in manufacturing and agriculture that occurred in England during the late 18th century and rapidly diffused to other parts of the developed world.

INNER-CITY DECAY Those parts of large urban areas that lose significant portions of their populations as a result of change in industry or migration to suburbs. Because of these changes, the inner city loses its tax base and becomes a center of poverty.

ISLAMIC CITIES Cities in Muslim countries that owe their structure to their religious beliefs. Islamic cities contain mosques at their center and walls guarding their perimeter. Open-air markets, courtyards surrounded by high walls, and dead-end streets, which limit foot traffic in residential neighborhoods, also characterize Islamic cities.

LATIN AMERICAN CITIES Cities in Latin America that owe much of their structure to colonialism, the rapid rise of industrialization, and continual rapid increases in population. Similar to other colonial cities, they also demonstrate distinctive sectors of industrial or residential development radiating out from the central business district, where most industrial and financial activity occurs.

MEDIEVAL CITIES Cities that developed in Europe during the Medieval Period and that contain such unique features as extreme density of development with narrow buildings and winding streets, an ornate church that prominently marks the city center, and high walls surrounding the city center that provided defense against attack.

MEGACITIES Cities, mostly characteristic of the developing world, where high population growth and migration have caused them to explode in population since World War II. All megacities are plagued by chaotic and unplanned growth, terrible pollution, and widespread poverty.

MEGALOPOLIS Several metropolitan areas that were originally separate but that have joined together to form a large, sprawling urban complex.

METACITIES Larger than megacities, metacities describe an urban region where multiple dense areas/cores are interspersed with suburbs and green spaces (and squatter settlements in the case of developing countries).

METROPOLITAN AREA Within the United States, an urban area consisting of one or more whole county units, usually containing several urbanized areas, or suburbs, that all act together as a coherent economic whole.

MODERN ARCHITECTURE Point of view, wherein cities and buildings are thought to act like well-oiled machines, with little energy spent on frivolous details or ornate designs. Efficient, geometrical structures made of concrete and glass dominated urban forms for half a century while this view prevailed.

MULTIPLE-NUCLEI MODEL Type of urban form wherein cities have numerous centers of business and cultural activity instead of one central place.

NEW URBANISM A movement in urban planning to promote mixed-use commercial and residential development and pedestrian-friendly, community-oriented cities. New urbanism is a reaction to the sprawling, automobile-centered cities of the mid-20th century.

NODE Geographical center of activity. A large city, such as Los Angeles, has numerous nodes.

POSTMODERN ARCHITECTURE A reaction in architectural design to the feeling of sterile alienation that many people get from modern architecture. Postmodernism uses older, historical styles and a sense of lightheartedness and eclecticism. Buildings combine pleasant-looking forms and playful colors to convey new ideas and to create spaces that are more people-friendly than their modernist predecessors.

PRIMATE CITY A country’s leading city, with a population that is disproportionately greater than other urban areas within the same country.

RANK-SIZE RULE Rule that states that the population of any given town should be inversely proportional to its rank in the country’s hierarchy when the distribution of cities according to their sizes follows a certain pattern.

SECTOR MODEL A model of urban land use that places the central business district in the middle, with wedge-shaped sectors radiating outward from the center along transportation corridors.

SEGREGATION The process that results from suburbanization when affluent individuals leave the city center for homogeneous suburban neighborhoods. This process isolates those individuals who cannot afford to consider relocating to suburban neighborhoods and must remain in certain pockets of the central city.

SQUATTER SETTLEMENTS Residential developments characterized by extreme poverty that usually exist on land just outside of cities that is neither owned nor rented by its occupants.

SUBURBS Residential communities, located outside of city centers, that are usually relatively homogeneous in terms of population.

URBAN-GROWTH BOUNDARIES Geographical boundaries placed around a city to limit suburban growth within that city.

URBAN MORPHOLOGY The physical form of a city or urban region.

URBAN REVITALIZATION The process occurring in some urban areas experiencing inner-city decay that usually involves the construction of new shopping districts, entertainment venues, and cultural attractions to entice young urban professionals back into the cities, where nightlife and culture are more accessible.

URBAN SPRAWL The process of expansive suburban development over large areas spreading out from a city, in which the automobile provides the primary source of transportation.

WHITE FLIGHT The abandonment of cities by affluent or middle-class white residents. White flight was particularly problematic during the mid-20th century because it resulted in the loss of tax revenues to cities, which led to inner-city decay. This process reversed itself somewhat during the 1990s and 2000s with urban revitalization projects.

WORLD CITIES Centers of economic, cultural, and political activity that are strongly interconnected and together control the global systems of finance and commerce.

AGGLOMERATION Grouping together of many firms from the same industry in a single area for collective or cooperative use of infrastructure and sharing of labor resources.

ANCILLARY ACTIVITIES/MULTIPLIER EFFECT Economic activities that surround and support large-scale industries such as shipping and food service.

BACKWASH EFFECTS The negative effects on one region that result from economic growth within another region.

BREAK-BULK POINT A location where large shipments of goods are broken up into smaller containers for delivery to local markets.

BRICK-AND-MORTAR BUSINESSES Traditional businesses with actual stores in which trade or retail occurs; they do not exist solely on the internet.

BULK-GAINING INDUSTRIES Industries whose products weigh more after assembly than they did previously in their constituent parts. Such industries tend to have production facilities close to their markets.

BULK-REDUCING INDUSTRIES Industries whose final products weigh less than their constituent parts, and whose processing facilities tend to be located close to sources of raw materials.

COMMODITY DEPENDENCE When peripheral economies rely too heavily on the export of raw materials, which places them on unequal terms of exchange with more-developed countries that export higher-value goods.

CONGLOMERATE CORPORATION A firm comprising many smaller firms that serve several different functions.

CORE National or global regions where economic power, in terms of wealth, innovation, and advanced technology, is concentrated.

CORE-PERIPHERY MODEL A model of the spatial structure of development in which under-developed countries are defined by their dependence on a developed core region.

COTTAGE INDUSTRY An industry in which the production of goods and services is based in homes, as opposed to factories.

DEGLOMERATION The dispersal of an industry that formerly existed in an established agglomeration.

DEINDUSTRIALIZATION Loss of industrial activity in a region.

DEVELOPMENT The process of economic growth, expansion, or realization of regional resource potential.

E-COMMERCE Web-based economic activities.

ECONOMIC BACKWATERS Regions that fail to gain from national economic development.

ECOTOURISM A form of tourism, based on the enjoyment of scenic areas or natural wonders, that aims to provide an experience of nature or culture in an environmentally sustainable way.

EXPORT-PROCESSING ZONE Area where governments create favorable investment and trading conditions to attract export-oriented industries.

FAST WORLD Areas of the world, usually the economic core, that experience greater levels of connection due to high-speed telecommunications and transportation technologies.

FOOTLOOSE FIRMS Manufacturing activities in which the cost of transporting both raw materials and finished product is not important for determining the location of the firm.

FORDISM System of standardized mass production attributed to Henry Ford.

FOREIGN INVESTMENTS Overseas business investments made by private companies.

GENDER EQUITY A measure of the opportunities given to women compared to men within a given country.

GLOBALIZATION The idea that the world is becoming increasingly interconnected on a global scale such that smaller scales of political and economic life are becoming obsolete.

GROSS DOMESTIC PRODUCT The total value of goods and services produced within the borders of a country during a specific time period, usually one year.

GROSS NATIONAL PRODUCT The total value of goods and services, including income received from abroad, produced by the residents of a country within a specific time period, usually one year.

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX Measure used by the United Nations that calculates development not in terms of money or productivity but in terms of human welfare. The HDI evaluates human welfare based on three parameters: life expectancy, education, and income.

INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION The rapid economic and social changes in manufacturing that resulted after the introduction of the factory system to the textile industry in England at the end of the 18th century.

INDUSTRIALIZATION Process of industrial development in which countries evolve economically, from producing basic, primary goods to using modern factories for mass-producing goods. At the highest levels of development, national economies are geared mainly toward the delivery of services and exchange of information.

INDUSTRIALIZED COUNTRIES Those countries, including Britain, France, the United States, Russia, Germany, and Japan, that were all at the forefront of industrial production and innovation through the middle of the 20th century. While industry is currently shifting to other countries to take advantage of cheaper labor and more relaxed environmental standards, these countries still account for a large portion of the world’s total industrial output.

LEAST-COST THEORY A concept developed by Alfred Weber to describe the optimal location of a manufacturing establishment in relation to the costs of transport and labor, and the relative advantages of agglomeration or deglomeration.

LEAST-DEVELOPED COUNTRIES Those countries, including countries in Africa (except for South Africa), parts of South America, and Asia, that usually have low levels of economic productivity, low per-capita incomes, and generally low standards of living.

MANUFACTURING REGION A region in which manufacturing activities have clustered together. The major US industrial region has historically been in the Great Lakes, which includes the states of Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, New York, and Pennsylvania. Industrial regions also exist in southeastern Brazil, central England, around Tokyo, Japan, and elsewhere.

MAQUILADORAS Cities where US firms have factories just outside the United States–Mexican border in areas that have been specially designated by the Mexican government. In such areas, factories cheaply assemble goods for export back into the United States.

MICROLENDING A provision of small loans to poorer people, typically women, to encourage the development of small businesses that are often community-oriented.

NET NATIONAL PRODUCT A measure of all goods and services produced by a country in a year, including production from its investments abroad, minus the loss or degradation of natural resource capital as a result of productivity.

NONRENEWABLE RESOURCES Natural resources, such as fossil fuels, that do not replenish themselves in a timeframe that is relevant for human consumption.

OFFSHORE FINANCIAL CENTERS Areas that have been specially designed to promote business transactions, and thus have become centers for banking and finance.

OUTSOURCING Sending industrial processes out for external production. The term outsourcing increasingly applies not only to traditional industrial functions but also to the contracting of service industry functions to companies to overseas locations, where operating costs remain relatively low.

PERIPHERY Countries that usually have low levels of economic productivity, low per-capita incomes, and generally low standards of living. The world economic periphery includes Africa (except for South Africa), parts of South America, and Asia.

PRIMARY ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES Economic activities in which natural resources are made available for use or further processing, including mining, agriculture, forestry, and fishing.

PRODUCTIVITY A measure of the goods and services produced within a particular country.

PURCHASING-POWER PARITY A monetary measurement of development that takes into account what money buys in different countries.

QUATERNARY ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES Economic activities concerned with research, information gathering, and administration.

QUINARY ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES The most advanced form of quaternary activities consisting of high-level decision-making for large corporations or high-level scientific research.

REGIONALIZATION The process by which specific regions acquire characteristics that differentiate them from others within the same country. In economic geography, regionalization involves the development of dominant economic activities in particular regions.

RENEWABLE RESOURCES Any natural resource that can replenish itself in a relatively short period of time, usually no longer than the length of a human life.

ROSTOW’S STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT (ECONOMIC GROWTH) A model of economic development that describes a country’s progression, which occurs in five stages, transforming them from least-developed to most-developed countries.

SECONDARY ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES Economic activities concerned with the processing of raw materials, such as manufacturing, construction, and power generation.

SEMIPERIPHERY Those newly industrialized countries with median standards of living, such as Chile, Brazil, India, China, and Indonesia. Semiperipheral countries offer their citizens relatively diverse economic opportunities but also have extreme gaps between rich and poor.

SERVICE-BASED ECONOMIES Highly developed economies that focus on research and development, marketing, tourism, sales, and telecommunications.

SLOW WORLD The developing world that does not experience the benefits of high-speed telecommunications and transportation technology.

SPATIALLY FIXED COSTS An input cost in manufacturing that remains constant wherever production is located.

SPATIALLY VARIABLE COSTS An input cost in manufacturing that changes significantly from place to place in its total amount and in its relative share of total costs.

SPECIALTY GOODS Goods that are not mass-produced but rather assembled individually or in small quantities.

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT The idea that people living today should be able to meet their needs without prohibiting the ability of future generations to do the same.

TERTIARY ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES Activities that provide the market exchange of goods and that bring together consumers and providers of services, such as retail, transportation, government, personal, and professional services.

TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATION A firm that conducts business in at least two separate countries; also known as multinational corporations.

WORLD CITIES A group of cities that form an interconnected, internationally dominant system of global control of finance and commerce.

WORLD-SYSTEMS THEORY Theory developed by Immanuel Wallerstein that explains the emergence of a core, periphery, and semiperiphery in terms of economic and political connections first established at the beginning of exploration in the late 15th century and maintained through increased economic access up until the present.