Geopolitics Flashcards
What is Geopolitics?
- A number of meanings
- Underlying emphasis on politics and its relationship with space
- Prefixes applied
Why is the history of Geopolitics important?
- Key thinkers created different ideas which constructed the subject and knowledges
- Shaped methodologies
- Discourse and power (space and power are related)
How can classical geopolitics be broadly defined?
- The role of space in intl relations
- Intended to further colonial expansion
Was classical geopolitics an inclusive field?
No. Restricted to upper-class men
Who was the earliest key thinker in classical geopolitics?
Friedrich Ratzel
What did Friedrich Ratzel do?
- Tried to make geography more scientific (positivist)
- Inspired by Darwinism in “Politishe Geographie”
What is social Darwinism?
- An idea adopted in the late 19th century applying Darwin’s theory of natural selection to nations
- Nations with the most adaptive potential succeed
- Environmental determinism - RESOURCES important
How does neo-Lamarkism differ from social Darwinism?
- Social Dawinism = imperative/inevitable adaptations or conflic
- Neo-Lamarkism = choice
Technically neo-Lamarkism is what is meant by social Darwinism in a geopolitical context
What was a major problem (besides racism) with Ratzel’s social Darwinism (and classical geopolitics in general)?
Saw conflict as an inevitability
Who came up with the term ‘geopolitics’?
Rudolph Kjellen
What is a seminal paper on environmental determinism?
“Influences of geographic environment” by Ellen Churchill Semple
What are 3 obvious counter-arguments to environmental determinism?
1) The anthropocene - ‘humans’ are now creating and altering the environment
2) Survivorship bias of European success - highly realist perspective
3) Subsistence is a social relation. A choice, not a force of nature
Who saw geopolitics as a strategic enterprise?
- Sir Halford Mackinder
- Isiah Bowman
What did Bowman focus on?
- Relationship between commerce and power
- Need for “economic living space”
- Involved in Treaty of Versailles
Who was critical of classical geopolitics at the time?
Petr Kropotkin
When did Kropotkin publish ‘Mutual Aid’?
1914
What did Kropotkin theorise?
- Social relations, not environment, are the reasons for poverty (Capitalism and imperialism)
- Cooperation, not competition through expansion (symbiosis, continuing the biology analogy)
See Keanes 2009 critics of Mackinder
Who extended Ratzel’s ideas for (indirectly) Nazi benefit?
- Hawshofer
- Space is a necessity for survival
- Extended by Bowman
What was the ‘heartland’ thesis?
A fallacious concept theorised by Mackinder that control of the ‘heartland’ would result in world dominance (because of lots of resources and space)
What is the context behind Mackinder’s interest in geopolitics?
- Interest in empire
- Concern surrounding rise of Germany as industrial naval power. Anxiety surrounding Russia
- Studied at peak of British Imperialism
- Studied/learned from previous empires
- Utopian view of empires
What slowed the speed of British imperialism at the start of the 20th century?
- USA rivalry
- More protectionism from USA
- President Mackinley imposed tariffs on UK goods
What did Joseph Chamberlain do?
- Market protection for empire during the last phase of imperialism
- More of a democratic colonial structure
- A vision of imperial dominance endorsed by all political parties
What was Mackinder’s “Physical vs Political Geography” (1887-90) about?
- Political organisation was paramount for coping with the environment
- Tech to overcome environmental barriers
- Darwinist approach (envi determinism)
- Physical geog study for exploitation
What was Mackinder’s “Britain and the British Seas” (1902) about?
- Explained how and why Britain became an imperial power
- Coal main citation, connotations of “it was meant to be” narrative
- Concept of “geographical inertia” if geography is not utilised
What was Mackinder’s “Geographical Pivot of History” (1904) about?
Phases of history are due to domination of ‘pivot areas’ e.g. the Eurasian heartland
Who coined the term “Lebensraum” (AKA ‘living space’)?
Karl Haushofer - inspired Nazi Germany
Who has recently justified Mackinder’s proposals?
Gray (2004) “In defence of the heartland” - it was not about what WILL be, but rather what COULD be
What is positivism?
A philosophical approach to methods that focusses on detaching the viewer from the world. Objectively studies the world
What geographical models assume humans are rational agents?
- Quantitative models
- Focusses on ‘profit maximisation’
- V. neoliberal
What did Gerard Toal focus on initially?
- Representation and how danger is projected onto space in El Salvador 1980s conflict
- Wider repercussions of US involvement also analysed, especially links to political motives and cold war
- Start of CRITICAL geopolitics
What does critical geopolitics do?
Distances politics directly away from the state and place, deconstructs power and knowledges
What are 3 key texts which provided the conceptual basis for critical geopolitics?
1) Foucault - Discipline and Punish
2) Said - Orientalism (1978)
3) Escobar - Encountering development (1995)
What was the focus of Foucault’s ‘Discipline and Punish’?
- Less punishment and more social control/discipline
- “Regulation of conduct”
- Discourse to make certain knowledges common sense
What was the focus of Said’s ‘Orientalism’?
- Orient discourse from the west viewed as backward
- Representations of places in the ‘orient’
- Material consequences of (re)production of representations
What was the focus of Escobar’s ‘Encountering Development’?
- Intl development as a discourse
- “Developed” vs “underdeveloped” post-WW2
- End point of development normalised (although imagined, a wave - analogy from Crutcher et al 2009)
Why is discourse important in for geostrategy?
Forms material actions with rules and knowledge shaped over time, engraved in space. Discourse and language are the building blocks of reality
See Toal and Agnew 1992
Who said that critical geopolitics is “geopolitics reborn”?
Merje Kuus (2007) - Geopolitics no longer about the causes, but how it moulds political debates (wider repercussions etc), making policies appear "reasonable and feasible"
What are 3 sites of geopolitical discourse?
1) Formal: adacemia + think tanks
2) Practical: Politicians
3) Popular: Lay people, films, art
Nayak and Jeffrey, 2011
What is a good example of a complicated and far-reaching (spatially and temporally) geological discourse?
War on Terror post-9/11
What is a good critique/alternative interpretation of the War on Terror?
Dalby 2003
- Colonial legacies of west (USA too and esp.)
- Escaped condemnation of war crimes
- Historical context of US arms trade with Iraq in 1980s; provided WMDs
What is “the colonial present” (Gregory, 2004) about?
The discursive imaginations created by US foreign policy post-9/11 and worldwide rifts
How do geopolitical discourses and ideologies interact?
Discourses and ideologies combine to create alliances
When did the “one belt, one road” initiative start?
2013 by Chinese government
What is the “one belt, one road” initiative?
- Created by China in 2013
- An alternative to IMF and WB (US led)
- Builds on existing ideologies of the Chinese communist party
- CONFUSIAN geopolitical ideologies - similar to Kropotkin’s ideas
What is ironic about the US criticism of the “one belt, one road” initiative?
- Claims that it is colonialism when Europe and US have been implementing imperial and economically extractive policies since WW2
- US narrative is very similar to Mackinder’s views
What is the main criticism of the “one belt, one road” initiative?
It “[paves a] pathway for china dominating world trade” (Vox? -check). A trojan horse…
Who has likened the “one belt, one road” initiative to Mackinder’s heartland thesis? What did they say?
Munson, 2013
“He who controls the Indo-Pacific [region] controls the future” (world hegenomy and control)
What is interesting about studying geopolitical discourses and narratives?
Makes you ask; are geopolitical visions only meaningful when materially acted? (and the answer would be no)
Is all of contemporary geopolitics about discourse?
Nope
Politics can be about action and practicing (“deeds, not words”)
Who commented on the exclusion of women from geographical debates and academia?
Gillian Rose
- Researcher and object of research separated
- Objectivity (in quantitative revolution) masculinist
Who commented on the inherent bias involved in (scientific) research?
Donna Haraway (1988) “Situated Knowledges”
- Labs are social spaces
- Embodied objectivity needed for production of ideas
- Knowledge is situated
What is the idea behind positionality?
To raise awareness of bias and embodiment in research, encouraging researchers to acknowledge their position and biases
Broadly speaking, what does feminist geopolitics study?
- Security at multiple scales
- Alternative accounts
- Private/subordinate perspectives of geopolitical events
- Knowledge production politics
(See Koopman 2011)
What is anti-geopolitics?
A branch of feminist geopolitics that studies non-prevailing geopolitical discourse (don’t be mislead by the ‘anti-‘ part!).
Focuses on resistance to geopolitical orthodoxy
What is a major issue of critical geopolitics?
- Seen as unethical
- Gerard Toal criticised for ‘just war’ thesis…
- Alternative approaches turn to the politics of peace
What is alter-geopolitics about?
Grassroots struggles to build solidarity within groups
see Koopman 2011
What is an interesting source for corporeal geopolitics?
Sara Smith 2012
How reproduction and health campaigns reflect geopolitical agendas and territorial claims
What is a good example of discourse to cover up hidden geopolitical agenadas?
Shock Doctrine (Klein, 2007) - Neoliberalism covered up by focussing on other issues and using socialist platforms to invoke neoliberal reforms (as in Polish independence 1980s...)
Give a criticism of feminist geopolitics
The discipline is loosing an interest in geostrategy (Dalby 2010)
Also is there a conceptual limit to geopolitics? Just states and spaces? More overlap with cultural geography?
Who theorised ‘everywhere wars’?
Gregory - ‘everywhere wars’ post-war on terror; e.g. Salisbury poisonings
What is the problem with increased reliance on agencies instead of government defence departments?
- Not scrutinised
- Conflicts of interest (e.g. Klein 2007 and US defence subsidiaries profiting out of conflict)
Who theorised ‘predator empire’? What is it about?
Shaw
- Increasing use of cyber technologies in conflicts
- Also evidenced in recent defence review for UK
In what 3 ways has COVID-19 unearthed elements from classical geopolitics in popular discourse?
- US closing borders at the start (based on the false assumption that it could be contained)
- Canada securitisation of border - a smokescreen to cover up emigration prevention
- Wartime solidarity narratives by Boris Johnson
What does ‘Pentagon’s new map’ show? When was it published?
- Essentially shows a neo-classical pivot area in the middle east (Oil!), very similar to heartland of Mackinder and Spykman (grand strategy and security)
- Bernet 2004
What examples are there of visual materials entangled in geopolitical issues?
- Film and photographs of conflicts (Vietnam news footage)
- Reconnaissance photos
- Fictional films depicting heroism in wars
- CAMPBELL 2007 visual economies facilitating profits from conflicts
What inroads are there regarding visual materials and geopolitics/geog in general?
The impact on audience (DITTIMER AND GRAY 2010 - FIND OTHER EXAMPLES!)
Who coined the term “Subaltern geopolitics”?
Joanne Sharpe in “geopolitics from the margins”
What is the premise of subaltern geopolitics?
- Studies geopolitical issues beyond dominant western-centric narratives
- How marginalised states/groups exert power
- Questions the dominant narratives
- Also resistance to development
- Growing movements… No longer “the west and the rest”. “The rest” is fighting back
Read about this
How has the EU responded to Belarus’ ‘maverick’ tendencies?
“Modernisation of Belarus” program (EU 2012)
When were the human chains adopted in Belarus 2020 previously used? Why is this significant?
- Used in Baltic states during 1980s
- A method of ending soviet oppression, so same could be said of Belarus and government/Russian dependence
What is interesting about the recent uprisings in Belarus?
- Protests in public space and human chains (historical context with corporeal dimensions)
- Belarus between the “devil and deep blue sea” (EU and Russia)
- Ukraine uprising conditioning western response/fears
- Changing notions of security… police and government no longer provide safety - applications of alter-geopolitics (Koopman 2011)
Why could the western repsonse to Belarus uprising be significant?
A solution could be seen as the final victory over (pseudo-) Leninism in post-socialist Belarus
Where has the Belarus uprising spread internationally?
King’s Parade banner opposite Great St Mary’s church in Cambridge Nov. 2020
Why does Belarus have an uneasy relationship with Russia?
- Reliant on Russia for fuel, energy and loans (at a cost!)
- Weary of merging states with Russia and its allies
(SESTANOVICH 2020)
In what ways does the geopolitical strategy of contemporary Russia reflect Mackinder’s views?
- Russia (Putin esp.) views itself as a modern-day Byzantine Empire with a duty to protect Russian SPEAKERS, not citizens
- Similar to Mackinder’s philosophy of reflecting upon past empires to build better empires
(Williams and Korosteleva 2014)
How could the heartland thesis be applied to Belarus and ‘new cold war’?
- No longer about the need for land and resources (as in Mackinder’s case)
- More about ideologies, languages and identities (all differentially distributed over space)
Why is Russia in a difficult position in terms of intervention with the Belarus tensions?
- Elite in Russia fearful of Belarusian and Siberian protests escalating and overflowing into Moscow
- Russia could intervein out of defence
- Intervention could jeopardise integrity of Russian state internally
(SESTANOVICH 2020)
Why are corporeal geographies particularly important regarding the Belarus protests?
Injuries sustained by protesters could propagate protester’s anger towards Belarusian state into the future
What are the 2 basic methods of the shock doctrine (Klein, 2007)?
- Disaster capitalism
- Shock and awe (eliminate left-wing opposition)
- Both can combine
What is disaster capitalism?
A natural (hurricane/tsunami) or man-made (war) disaster that forces governments to undertake neoliberal policies to recover, even if it contradicts prevailing political orthodoxy
Sri Lanka and Katrina (outlined in Klein 2007)
What is shock and awe?
A method of forcefully (or economically?) eradicating left-wing opposition. Capitalism seen as humane compared to communism
Examples seen in S. American 1970s and 1980s; UK war against trade unions in 1980s (outlined in Klein 2007)
How can disaster capitalism and shock + awe combine?
- Shock and awe to create an socioeconomic disaster ensuring that new neoliberal policies can be implemented and eradication of opposition
Examples:
- Occupation of Iraq destroying people and the economy
- S. Africa post-apartheid (economic disaster utilised, caused by shock and awe)
- Russia and economic shock and awe crating a financial disaster
How has the shock doctrine changed notions of security?
- Security privatised (ironic considering Friedman supported state military) : where you live determines security WITHIN the state, just like social security in neoliberal USA
- Gated communities creating “green and red zones” in the US
- Hostility increased in a neoliberal world (basically extension of “being wary of each other” narrative) - a return of classical geopolitics. Conflict seen as inevitable and peace unattainable
(Klein 2007)
What does anti-geopolitics do, according to Koopman (2011)?
- Resists hegemonic, conventional geopolitics that looks at power, discourse and knowledge
- Grassroots geopolitics beyond academia
- Looks at security within small groups (relevance to protests and neoliberalism)
(Koopman, 2011)
How can the study of groups as sites of security (e.g. Koopman 2011) be extended?
A group as a collection and association of bodies, part of a larger cellular organism
What is Koopman’s (2011) informal ‘order’ of geopolitical study?
1) Geopolitics (traditional and critical)
2) Anti-geopolitics
3) Feminist geopolitics (inc subaltern-)
4) Alter-geopolitics
Koopman, 2011 - uses a game of chess as a metaphor
How does the chess game metaphor (Koopman 2011) apply to traditional/hegemonic geopolitics?
- What happens on a chess board - the players moves
- A realist approach, descriptive
- Underpinned by imperial aspirations
How does Koopman (2011) view geopolitics?
A peace-making process, currently too focussed on conflicts
How does the chess game metaphor (Koopman 2011) apply to CRITICAL geopolitics?
- Why moves are made on chess boards, what is the rationale, based on power, discourse and knowledge
- See practical geopolitics (Tual 2006)
- NOT why great game occurred or the effects on the board itself (i.e. lay people)
- Authors disembodied from work
Koopman 2011
How does the chess game metaphor (Koopman 2011) apply to ANTI-geopolitics?
- The pieces moving themselves against the actions of the players (higher authority and power). Pawns protesting moves from the “big players”
- Resistance of people to hegemonic geopolitics, from the grassroots
- Resistance is both material (practiced/corporeal) and discursive.
- Very broad, taking on board many different aspects of resistance and views of geopolitics
Koopman 2011
How does the chess game metaphor (Koopman 2011) apply to FEMINIST geopolitics?
- Feminist geopolitics is more than resistance
- The different forms of resistance and shapes of the chess game
- A form of anti-geopolitics, a positive approach to the subject
- Deconstructs grand narratives and looks at them differently, combining global and local. The everyday and intl too - how these shape and destroy each other
Koopman 2011
How are bodies involved in (feminist) geopolitics?
Dower + sharp (2001) - bodies as a place of performance, not so much just discursive manuscripts (meaning to affect)
How does the chess game metaphor (Koopman 2011) apply to ALTER-geopolitics?
- The counters rewriting the game; the colour of the board(/map) and who/what moves where
- Deconstructs powerful narratives and creates alternatives
- Seen in new forms of security shaped by marginalised groups - perhaps also Belarus protests - – Koopman interested in the performance aspects of bodies
- Means different things to different people
Koopman 2011
What does “progressive geopolitics” (Kearns, 2008, 2009) study?
- Looks at the dominated instead of the dominant (hegemonic geopolitics in Koopman’s view)
- Peace opposes domination: all stakeholders are content with the outcome
Kearns 2008 + 2009, linked to Koopman’s (2011) alter geopolitics
What are the two aspects of protests?
1) Proclaiming anger or demanding change etc in mass numbers
2) Collectivist assemblage as a form of security (Koopman 2011 view)
What is the premise of ‘Situated knowledges’ (Haraway, 1988)
- Knowledge based positionality
- Inherent bias in science (or academia at large)
- “God trick” to see things from above
- Situated knowledges connect subject and object as a form of “feminist objectivity”
Haraway 1988 - read again
What is RELATIVISM?
A philosophical world-view that sees objectivity as relative to the personal perspective and positionality
What is an interesting point made by Haraway (1988) in ‘Situated knowledges’?
To study requires power, and is unattainable for a subjugated person or thing. Travelling and materials are costly
Epistemological boundaries
How are objects and discoveries viewed in Haraway 1988?
- Objects are seen to be ‘created’ in discoveries, despite existing (materially or abstractly/theoretically)
- Discoverers receive credit, becoming the owner of the object (e.g. “Father of nuclear physics”)
- The world is in fact an active subject, not a resource to be owned
How is Haraway 1998 related to geopolitics?
- Relevant to geopolitics because of the way we write about conflict, sometimes involving the observer, from a position outside and above the reality
- We study geopolitics from a disconnected perspective, not an embodied, active subject part, not separate
What are map-territory relations?
- Map an abstraction of realty, just represents it
- A real abstraction (?)
- “all models are wrong but some are useful”
- Links to hyperrealities
How can Baudrillard’s Hyperrealities be applied to contemporary geopolitics?
- Drone warfare, detaching bodies from weapons
- “Media-scapes” in computer game warfare ‘it’s just a game - it’s not real!’
What is a good paper discussing the flaws of environmental determinism (also useful for cultural geo!)?
Peet 1985
What was the problem with Ratzel’s Lebensraum?
A Malthusian approach based on biogeography. Highly reductionist approach (Peet 1985)
Links to Bookchin 1995 and the history of geo security behind resurgence of Malthusian thought
Why were Semple’s ideas adopted in the colonisation of America in the 19th century?
- Manifest destiny and religious grounds for colonisation of Indian territories in western USA were wearing off
- Semple’s ideas (social Darwinism) made Native Americans seem inferior to white colonisers
(Peet 1985)
How does a Marxian framework refute environmental determinism?
- Relation with environment is a social-ecological relationship
- Bodies extract materials
- Work thought through in advance before it is performed. Humans control their existence, not the environment
Good links to Capitalocene
Peet 1985
Who has written about drone warfare?
Shaw 2013, also hyperrealities by Baudrillard
How has technology superseeded bodies as a security strategy?
Drones are now used for reasons surrounding national security by the US Government (Shaw 2013)
Why is drone warfare significant?
- Conflicts from afar can be fought on home soil
- Hyperreality of killing people without grasping the weapon directly
- Inaccuracy with targeting the correct victims/prey
- Empire of US military bases. Drones can go anywhere
- Psychological effects on civilians
(Shaw 2013)
Why is drone warfare inhumane?
- Innocent civilians can be executed without consultation if they fulfil suspicious behavioural patterns and geographies (which correspond to an algorithm)
- “patterns of life … are coded, catalogued, and eliminated”
- Risk determines who gets killed, not immediate threats
(Shaw 2013)
When did drone attacks become more common?
- 2010, after endorsement by Obama Administration
- 2004-07 nine drone strikes in Pakistan.
- 2008 and 2012 >300
(Shaw 2013)
What does being a sovereign (Foucault) mean?
- Decide who lives and who dies (killed)
- Powerful only when it is the latter
- Drone attacks a form of biopolitics (biogeopolitics?)
(Foucault, Shaw 2013) - CHECK
How could threats/risks (unknown unknowns) manifest themselves epidemeologically?
Possible causes eradicated to prevent the spread of disease. Shaw (2013) used this as a metaphor, but COVID passports have the potential to do the same….
What do alternatives to critical geopolitics offer?
Something less critical! Alternative visions and approaches (Sharp 2011)
What is a good subaltern geopolitics source?
Sharp 2011 - subaltern geopolitics is about viewing from the margins
What are “shatter zones”?
Areas where future geopolitical issues could unfold (Kaplan, 2009)
How does neoclassical geographical determinism relate to the Capitalocene?
Resource scarcity is determined by socio-ecological relations, however geography is a limiting factor that restricts the extent to which resources are exploited
(Kaplan 2009)
How can feminist geopolitics link to cultural geography (specifically representations)?
Visual imagery of conflicts, often overlooked (Campbell 2007)
What are the key points from Campbell 2007 “Geopolitics and visuality”?
- The visual economy of geopolitical crises
- Space alienation as distant conflicts are projected onto TV screens (Vietnam)
- Images are sites of static performances from everyday lives, telling a story
- Focusses on Darfur 2003-05 conflict
- Image composition and subject important
- Audience (touched on)
Campbell 2007
What was missed in the visual representation of the Darfur 2003-05 conflict?
- Observer and Guardian newspapers had a fraction of articles on the subject with photos
- Focus on women and child refugees
- No injuries - the images only showed part of the story
- Newspaper visuals different to NGO visuals
Campbell 2007
How has COVID-19 in the US reignited outdated geopolitical narratives?
- Militarised response
- “Othering discourse” by trump
- Pandemic became a political weapon in the “new cold war” against china
- Likened to a war
(Diaz and Mountz 2020)
How has COVID-19 changed geopolitics?
- Emphasis of national defence changed from territory to people and property
- New conceptualisations of security by the lay public
- Racial insecurities (those in certain necessary industries often black - good links to econ geo)
(Diaz and Mountz 2020)
How have BLM protests changed geopolitics?
- Insecurity for protesters after armed police retaliated on several occasions, ironically harming the people they are trained to protect
- “Once again, US borders shifted inward, making people within its borders its own enemies”
(Diaz and Mountz 2020)
