Name: Political Geography

Lecturers: Kryštof Kozák, PhD. and Pauli Bauer, PhD.

Course description:

The course Political Geography has two principle objectives - first, to introduce general theoretical approaches regarding the relationship between territoriality and political, social and historical developments. Second, to apply these concepts in specific locations and highlight the spatial aspects of political and social controversies.

Requirements:

Active participation (10%)

Students are required do read the mandatory texts for each class and be prepared to answer questions related to it in the class. Repeated failures to answer questions in class will lower student’s score.

Newsletter (10%)

Once per semester, each student will prepare a recent news article relevant in terms of political geography and send it out the the class together with questions and related maps. Student preparing the newsletter will bring one or two related maps to the class to be shown from the projector. At the beginning of the class, the article will be discussed with special emphasis on political geography.

Protocol to the texts presentation (10%)

What will be expected:

15 mn presentation:

- A brief general presentation of the text: subject, date, author.

- Situate the text in the social and political context, public debates, scientific fields, discipline, and approach.

- Present the main bibliographical references used by the author. Try to determine the sources used by the authors (primary or secondary sources).

- Present the argumentation and discuss it. Highlight the structure of the text

- Highlight key lessons and main conclusion.

- Limit of the text: point out the strengths and weaknesses.

- Confront with the proposition of another author, another case study, research, texts.

Paper based on the texts presentation (20%)

Students will write a short paper about the chosen text. The paper shall follow the structure of the presentation. Minimum length: 6400 characters with spaces.

Send the paper to Krystof Kozak (kozak@fsv.cuni.cz) if the text was covered in his classes or to Pauli Bauer (paulibauer@gmail.com) if the text was covered in his classes.

Due date for the paper: June 5th, 2018. No late submissions accepted!

Final exam (50%):

Final exam will cover topics from classes, mandatory readings as well as student presentations.

Course program:

21.2. 2018

Introduction, course requirements, concept of geography, territoriality, political geography, human geography, physical geography

KK + PB

28.2.

History of political geography

First maps, map projections, Jerusalem as center of the world, map orientation, administrative maps, military maps, navigation maps, sovereign state

Graeme Wood: Limbo World, Foreign Policy, January-February 2010.

Ricardo Hausmann: Prisoners of Geography. Foreign Policy, January, 1999.

KK

7.3.

Class is cancelled. Visit as many documentary movies of the One World Festival as possible (www.jedensvet.cz) and analyze the movies from the standpoint of political geography and social production of space. We will briefly discuss the movies at the beginning of the next class.

14.3.

Nation building:

Newsletter: Cancy

Fukuyama, Francis. 2004. "State of the Union: Nation-Building 101," Atlantic Monthly, 239, January/February. text available at http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2004/01/nation-building-101/302862/http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2004/01/nation-building-101/302862/

Niccoló Romano

Stephenson, Carolyn . "Nation Building." Beyond Intractability. Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Posted: January 2005 <http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/nation-building>.

PB

21.3.

History of geopolitics Suzana Nesom

Newletter:

First geopolitical concepts, classical geopolitics, imperialism, nation state, Ratzel, MacKinder, Mahan

Halford Mackinder, Karl Haushofer, Isaiah Bowman (excerpts, from: Gearóid Ó Tuathail, Simon Dalby and Paul Routledge: The Geopolitics Reader, 2nd Edition, Routledge, 2006).

KK

28.3.

Geopolitic of Sahara:

Newsletter: Niccoló Romano

Yves Lacoste, "The Sahara: Geopolitical Perspectives and Illusions"

in Hérodote 2011/3 (No 142), pp.183-205.

Emmanuel Grégoire "Niger: A State Rich in Uranium", Hérodote 3/2011 (No 142). Pp. 206-225.

Text presentation: Mailen Mindeguia

PB

4.4

Cold War, bipolar world, domino theory, Third World, critical geography, O Tuathail, Wallerstein - world system, center, periphery:

Newsletter: Mailen Mindeguía

Cold War, bipolar world, domino theory, Third World, critical geography, O Tuathail, Wallerstein - world system, center, periphery

Dittmer, Jason, Popular Culture and Geopolitics : Popular Culture, Geopolitics, and Identity, Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Blue Ridge Summit, PA, USA, 2010, Introduction

Immanuel Wallerstein: Essential Wallerstein, New Press, 2010, World System Analysis, pp. 129-149.

KK

11.4

Borders and frontiers

Newsletter: Ciarán Hehir

John Agnew, "Sovereignty regimes: territoriality and State Authority in Contemporary World Politics", Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 95, 2005, pp.437-461

Jocelyn Parot, "Outer Borders, inner boundaries in Finland. The reconstructed Russian Border and the Changing Geography of memory", in Paul Bauer, Mathilde Darley (Eds), Border of the European Union: strategies of Crossing and Resistance, Prague: Cefres, pp.40-62.

PB

18.4.

Current geopolitical situation, realistic school, military expenditures, military bases

Newsletter: Marie-Anne Dhaussy

Scott, David. "The Great Power ‘Great Game’ between India and China: ‘The Logic of Geography’" Geopolitics 13.1 (2008)

Ciarán Hehir

Emre Iseri: The US Grand Strategy and the Eurasian Heartland in the Twenty-First Century, Geopolitics 14.1 (2011).

KK

25.4.

Post modern Geographies

Newsletter:

Edward Soja Post-modern geography: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory see, radical Thinkers, 2011. See article on Los Angeles.

Tanya Silverman

David Harvey, "Neo-Liberalism as Creative Destruction », Geografiska Annaler. Series B, Human Geography, Vol. 88, No. 2, Geography and Power, the Power of Geography (2006), pp. 145-158.

PB

2.5

Geopolitics of energy and environment

Newsletter:

Martin Ira Glassner: Political Geography. The Politics of Ecology, Energy and Land Use. (chapter)

Philippe Le Billon: The Geopolitical economy of 'resource wars', Geopolitics, Volume 9, Number 1, March 2004 , pp. 1-28(28).

KK

9.5

Theories of critical political Geographies

Newsletter: Tanya Silverman

Henri Lefebvre, State, Space, World, selected essays, Neil Brenner and Stuart Elden (eds.); translated by Gerald Moore, Neil Brenner, and Stuart Elden. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, c2009.

Faith

Michel Foucault, "Questions on Geography", in Jeremy W. Crampton and Sutart Elden (eds.), Space, Knowledge and Power: Foucault and Geography, Georgia State University and Durham University: Ashgate, 2007, pp.174-182.

PB

16.5

Newsletter: Faith

Demographic aspects of geography - population growth, urbanization, population density, biopolitics

Harm deBlij: Geography Matters, Oxford University Press, 2005, kapitola Russia: Trouble on the Eastern Front

Cancy

Harm deBlij: Geography Matters, Oxford University Press, 2005, kapitola Future Demography of Human Population

Recommended:Russia´s demographic problem: h