Lecture

No. 1

INTRODUCTION TO
POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY
Muhammad Naseer Ahmad Taib
Assistant Professor
Department of Political Science
 Introduction
 Political Geography is a branch of Human Geography that
deals with the study of techniques and ideas associated with
space and politics.
 Political Geography as a concept is as old as the history of
civilization. All the civilizations were developed on the
banks of the rivers or sea shore. [Mesopotamian and
Egyptian civilizations]
 It means history itself witnessing the co-relation between
geographical location and politics.
 Political geography is very important subject to deal with the
complexities and implications of space and spatial and their
roles and influences in individual, group or state level
decision making.
 Political Geography is a combination of two
words; Political and Geography
 Politics means; a process of making decisions at
individual, societal and state level.
 Geography means description of Earth.
 It means Political Geography simply means a subject
that deals with the study of Geo-strategic and Geo-
Political environment of a state and their influence
on the decision making.
 Why state A state and B state make different
decisions.
 Geography is an important instrument in
making or remaking political decisions.
 Political geography helps to explain the
cultural and physical factors that underlie
political unrest or political stability.
 Political geographers study how people have
organized Earth’s land surface into countries
and alliances, the reasons for doing so, and the
conflicts that can erupt from the organization.
 Division of land into different political
identities is not divine or evolutionary subject
rather man made.
 It means geography effects the political
behaviour of the individuals while political
decisions define and redefine the geographical
formulations.
Definitions
 Richard Hartshorne. (December 12,
1899 – November 5, 1992) was a
prominent American geographer, and
professor at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison, who specialized
in economic and political geography
and the philosophy of geography. The
Nature of Geography, published in 1939.
 “Political Geography is the study of the
variation of political phenomena from place
to place in interconnection with variation
in other features of the earth as the home of
man.”
 Alexander von Humboldt:
 Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich Alexander von
Humboldt (14 September 1769 – 6 May 1859)
was a geographer, naturalist, explorer, and
Romantic philosopher.
 Political Geography is the study of regions or
features of the earth’s surface.

 John A. Agnew:
 John A. Agnew, is a prominent British-
American political geographer. Agnew was
educated at the Universities of Exeter and
Liverpool in England and Ohio State in the
United States. Books Place and politics (1987)
and Geo-Politics (1998)
 “Political Geography is the study of how politics is
informed by geography.”
 Joe Painter:

 Joe Painter (born 1965) is a British

geographer and academic. He is a
professor in the Department of Geography
and Associate Director in the International
Centre for Regional Regeneration and
Development Studies (ICRDS) at the
University of Durham in the U.K. Book
Political Geography published in 2009
 “Political Geography is the body of knowledge
that produces particular understanding about
the world, characterized by internal debate, the
evolutionary adaption of new ideas and
dynamic boundaries.”
 Mark Black sell: (1942-2008)
 He was human geographer.
 Books: Post War Europe 1997,
Political Geography 2004,
 He defined Political Geography as the
study about the force that go to shape
the world in which we inhibit and play
themselves out in the landscape across
the globe.
 Scope of Political Geography
 This subject mainly deals with;
 It discusses about absolute and relative location.
 It also discusses the determinants of their determinations, and
advantages and disadvantages.
 GPS(Geographical positioning system)
 and VPS(Visual positioning system)
 It deals with Geographical features of Earth and their
significance
 Tropical Region
 Temperate Region
 Frigid
 It also deals with the impacts of Geographical features on climate.
 How climate form the socio- political and economic discourses.
 It also deals with its historical development as a
subject; as it was, as it is and as it ought to be.
 Without theoretical framework no subject get its
academic legitimacy. In this course, there is a little
debate about theoretical aspects of political Geography.
 This course also deals with ‘state’ as the content of
political Geography.
 Features of state
 Geo-political variables which affect the state as an institution.
 It also discusses the concept of state and Nation and
their possibilities;
 Nation-state
 State-Nation
 Nation-State-Nation
 This course also deals with the concept of boundary,
 Its different perspectives and kinds
 It also deals, how the boundaries affect the socio-political
formations.
 It also discusses different boundary disputes and their
socio-politico and economic implications.
 Another subject of political Geography is the shape
of a state.
 How shape of a state affect the Geo-political
compulsions and implications.
 Geo-Politics, Regionalism and Globalization
 It also deals with the subject of Statelessness and
citizenship.
 It also deals with rules and regulation regarding
statelessness and its implication for global politics.
Significance of Political Geography
 It empowers its student about the critical
assessment of power, place, identity.
 It also help them to evaluate major trends, themes,
and approaches that emerged in the field of
political geography; geographies of identification
and differentiation.
 It also empower them to develop a critical
approach toward place-making, bordering and
identification.
 It also helps the students to express major themes
like state, Nation state, and nationalism.
 It also empower its students how to construct and
to evaluate arguments in light of geographical
evidence.
 It also make them able to understand and evaluate
change or its continuity in human activity at
national, regional and international level.
 It also give awareness about the influence of
varied and complex factors on human activity
across space.
 It enhances the capacity of its students to evaluate
human activity in light of geographical evidence.
 It also awareness its students about the diversity
and complexity of human activity as it relates to
space and place