1. Define Political Geography.

Explain the era of ascendancy or revival in the disciplinary

history of Political Geography.

political geography is what it says it is about politics and geography. But that is altogether too
simple. Political geography is by no means the sum of its two parts. In political geography,
“geography” is drawn on in selective ways: in ways which illumine the political. By the same
token, “politics” is drawn on in ways which shed light on the geographic. Above all, political
geography focuses on the twin ideas of territory and territoriality.Territories as spaces
that are defended, contested, claimed against the claims of others; in short, through territoriality.
Territoriality is activity: the activity of defending, controlling, excluding, including; territory is the
area
whose content one seeks to control in these ways.Territory is Bounded geographic space.
Territoriality is the Attempt to control that space.

One of the enduring fascinations of human society is the way in which the competing claims
over the control and management of land and resources are played out. Interest groups of all
kinds and at all levels are continually vying with each other to promote their own interests,
thereby destabilising and changing the existing order and remaking the world in their own
image. Political geography, in the broadest sense, is the academic study of all these varied
resource conflicts and the way in which they are resolved. In other words, it is about the forces
that go to shape the world we inhabit and how they play themselves out in the landscape across
the globe.Political Geography is a diverse and everchanging field of geographic
entity.Traditional Political Geography had statecenteredness. But State is now seen as only one
of a number of actors.

Intersections of key geographical concerns of space, place, and territory on the one hand and
issues of politics, power, and policy on the other.The diversity of issues and approaches---more
meaningful to talk of political geographies rather than a single unidimensional political
geography.

Political geography recognises the six entities –power, politics and policy, space, place and
territory –are intrinsically linked, but a piece of political geographical research does not need to
explicitly address them all.

Major phases in development of political geography

Phase One: 1900 Political Geography = Human Geography States as Organisms

competing, growing, and dying Land and power at global scale Redrawing the world
political map after First World War Geopolitik -German geopolitics

Phase Two: 1930 Political Geography as the geography of nation states States as
regions Physical infrastructure

Phase Three: 1960 Political Geography as a (minor) part of human geography People
and governance Achieving social justice Individual rights Vs corporate responsibility

Phase Four: 1980 Political geography resurgent World system theory Globalisation The
reinvention of geopolitics
In the late nineteenth century political geography was
effectively synonymous with human geography. While physical geography was concerned with
delineating regions on the basis of climate and topographical features, human geography was
concerned with political divisions. Hence we still have a basic distinction between maps
indicating physical features and those indicating ‘political’ features. However, in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth century as the discipline evolved political geography became a
more clearly defined arm of human geography running alongside commercial and colonial
geography. Subsequently, and reflecting divisions within the broader social sciences, we can
see political geography coexisting alongside social and economic geography. Over the years
the main preoccupations of political geography have changed. One hundred years ago key
practitioners such as Halford Mackinder in the United Kingdom were concerned with
international relations in what was then a colonial world. During the mid-part of the twentieth
century, the key focus became the state and its associated geographical characteristics most
notably territory and borders. To a considerable extent this phase was strong on description of
political phenomenon but weak on analysis. The last few decades of the twentieth century,
however, saw something of a rebirth of the subdiscipline as a consequence of the introduction
of more radical and politically engaged perspectives. More recently still, elements of social
theory have been in- corporated both deepening and broadening its con- ceptual base. There is
now a much more critical approach and a more diverse one being brought to bear on a subject
matter that extends well beyond the realms of the state. While much contemporary political
geography maintains a focus on what might be seen as ‘big’ politics (states, governments, etc.),
there has been an increased concern with ‘small’ politics (local issues, gender, ethnicity, social
identities). In this way, a whole swathe of topics have been added to the more traditional interest
in territory, borders, and states.

Evolution •
Late nineteenth century: synonymous with human geography.
•Late nineteenth to Early-twentieth century: social and economic geography.
• Mid-twentieth century: State was the main focus.
• Late Twentieth century: more radical and politically engaged perspective. •
• Recent: ‘big’ politics (states, governments, etc.)+‘small’ politics (local issues, gender, ethnicity,
social identities).

Brief History
1. Era of Ascendancy:-State is Focus of Attention
2. The Era of Marginalisation-Functional Approach-Missed out theories-Marginalised within
geography and began to disappear as a university subject
3. 3. The Era of Revival-Reintroduction of theory into political geography-Political Turn

Era of Ascendency Ideas of Friedrich Ratzel

• The organic theory of Ratzel: Lebensraum. • Late-nineteenth-century and
early-twentieth-century.

• -Two main characteristics: 1. Derived from biology and other physical sciences and
applied these to politics and society.
2.Geography and other branches of academia should be put into the service of the
state.

Lebensraum
• State-Living organism. • Like every living organism the state ‘required a specific amountof
territory from which to draw sustenance’.
• • States followed the same laws of development as biological.
• When a state’s Lebensraum became insufficient –for example, because of population growth
–the state needed to annex new territory to establish new, larger, Lebensraum.

Ideas of Rudolf Kjellen

• Attempted to identify the ‘world powers’.
• Predicted a future dominated by large continental imperialist states.
• In 1899 he coined the term geopolitisk which translated into German as Geopolitik and by
1924 into English as geopolitics.

The challenge for political geography is how to retain coherence in the face of demands. •
Revolution in communications. • Reshaping the structures of political power at all levels.