Untitled Flashcards Set

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• Political geography is the study of the ways in which the world is organized as

a reflection of the power that different groups hold over territory.

• Political maps express interpretations of the world.

• example: U.S. maps include Taiwan as a separate country, but Chinese maps do not.

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• A state is a politically organized independent territory with a government,

defined borders, and a permanent population.

• State governments have power over a population that works together to

contribute to an economy and is connected by transportation and

communication systems.

• A state has sovereignty, which is the right to control and defend its territory

and determine what happens within its borders.

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• The number of states in the world changes with circumstances.

• The United Nations recognizes 195 independent states.

• Some states are not recognized as such by all countries.

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• A nation is a cultural entity.

• A nation is made up of individuals who have forged a common identity

through a shared language, religion, ethnicity, and/or heritage.

• examples: Native Hawaiians, Navajo people

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• A nation-state is a territory in which a group that views itself as a nation is the

same as the politically recognized boundaries the state calls its own.

• The concept of a nation-state is an ideal rather than a reality, because

countries are home to at least small ethnic or cultural minorities.

• Estonia, Japan, Iceland, Iran, Albania, Croatia, and Poland are examples of countries that

are often identified as nation-states.

• Boundaries within Europe were redrawn following World War I to try to

create nation-states.

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• A multistate nation consists of a population that shares a cultural or ethnic

background but lives in more than one country.

• example: ethnic Russians

• Multistate nations can pose challenges to political borders because people

may feel a stronger affinity for a neighboring state that is home to others of

their ethnic group than to their own state.

• Irredentism is attempt to acquire territories in neighboring states inhabited

by people of the same nation.

• example: Russia’s annexation of Crimea and other territory in Ukraine

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• A multinational state is a country with various ethnicities and cultures living

inside its borders.

• Multinational states may struggle to create a sense of unity.

• examples: Iraq, Yugoslavia following the breakup of the Soviet Union

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9.1 The Complex World Political Map

• Organizing Space

• Some countries contain regions that are autonomous or semiautonomous.

• Autonomous and semiautonomous regions are given some authority to govern their own

territories.

• examples: Hong Kong, American Indian reservations

• A stateless nation is a people united by culture, language, history, and

tradition but not possessing a state

• examples: tribal nations in the United States, Basque people of Spain, Palestine, the

Kurds

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9.2 Political Power and Geography

• Issues of Space and Power

• Territoriality is a concept with many dimensions.

• defined by Robert Sack as “an attempt by an individual or group to affect, influence, or

control people, phenomena, and relationships by delimiting and asserting control over a

geographic area”

• an expression of a group’s historic and personal links to a place

• the connection of people, their culture, and their economic systems to the land

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9.2 Political Power and Geography

• Controlling People, Land, and Resources

• Colonialism describes the practice of claiming and dominating overseas

territories.

• Neocolonialism describes the use of economic, political, cultural, or other

pressures to control or influence other countries, especially former

dependencies.

• examples: former African colonies that are independent states but have economies that

rely on outside investment

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9.2 Political Power and Geography

• Controlling People, Land, and Resources

• A choke point is a narrow, strategic passageway to another place through

which it is difficult to pass.

• Choke points can be straits, canals, or other restricted passages.

• Today, large volumes of commodities such as oil and food pass through waterway

choke points.

• Choke points are sources of power, influence, and wealth for the countries that control

them.

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9.2 Political Power and Geography

• Controlling People,

Land, and Resources

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9.2 Political Power and Geography

• Controlling People, Land, and Resources

• A shatterbelt is a region with ongoing political instability.

• States form, join, and break up because of ongoing, sometimes violent, conflicts among

parties and because they are caught between the interests of powerful outside states.

• Long-lasting antagonism between religious, ethnic, and linguistic groups may exist in

shatterbelt regions.

• example: Balkan Peninsula

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9.3 Political Processes Over Time

• The Complicated Nature of Sovereignty

• Self-determination is the right of all people to choose their own political

status.

• The Balkan Peninsula shatterbelt is a consequence of nations fighting for self-

determination against outside powers and against their neighbors.

• States can sometimes be independent but not entirely sovereign.

• A state may rely strongly on another for economic help.

• Sometimes a one country violates another country’s right to self-determination.

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9.3 Political Processes Over Time

• Legacies of Colonialism and Imperialism

• Imperialism is the push to create an empire by exercising force or influence to

control other peoples or nations.

• Spain, Portugal, Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium were imperial powers.

• Impacts of imperialism are still felt today, particularly with regard to language and

religion.

• The Berlin Conference of 1884 divided Africa among European nations, disregarding

existing boundaries.

• Devolution occurs when the central power in a state is broken up among

regional authorities within its borders.

• Devolution tends to happen along national lines.

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Defining Political Boundaries

• Boundaries change when relationships among countries change or when

people assert a claim to territory.

• Boundaries based on physical features may change, as when a river changes

course.

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Defining Political Boundaries

• Countries establish boundaries by defining, delimiting, demarcating, and

defending them.

• defining: explicitly stating in legally binding documentation such as a treaty where

borders are located

• delimiting: drawing boundaries on a map in accordance with a legal agreement

• demarcating: marking a boundary with stones, pillars, walls, fences, or other physical

objects

• administering: defending boundaries by managing the way they are maintained and how

goods and people will cross them

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Types of Boundaries

• Antecedent boundaries are established before many people settle in an area.

• Subsequent boundaries are drawn in areas that have been settled by people

and where cultural landscapes already exist or are in the process of being

created.

• A consequent boundary is a type of subsequent boundary that takes into account

differences within an existing cultural landscape, separating groups that have distinct

languages, religions, ethnicities, or other traits.

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Types of Boundaries

• Superimposed boundaries are

drawn over existing borders by

an outside or conquering force.

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Types of Boundaries

• Geometric boundaries are mathematical. They follow lines of latitude and

longitude or are straight-line arcs between two points.

• Relics are former boundaries that once existed but no longer have an official

function.

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Types of Boundaries

• Sea, or maritime, boundaries can exist miles out to sea.

• Maritime boundaries allow countries to access offshore resources such as oil and coastal

sites for wind farms.

• Countries with maritime boundaries are often more economically developed than those

that are landlocked because of the advantages conferred by having ports to facilitate

trade.

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Types of

Boundaries

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9.4 The Nature and Function of Boundaries

• Types of Boundaries

• Sea, or maritime, boundaries can exist miles out to sea.

• The 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)

established the structure of maritime boundaries:

• A country’s territorial seas extend 12 nautical miles off its coast.

• A country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) extends 200 nautical miles from its coast.

• Coastal countries are required to employ sound environmental practices in the waters

they control.

• Coastal countries must make public any dangers to navigation in their territorial waters.