Geography of International Affairs

Catalog description

Contemporary international affairs in their geographical setting; geographic elements in the development of national power, political groupings, and international disputes. GEOG 128 Geography of International Affairs (3) (GS;IL)(BA) This course meets the Bachelor of Arts degree requirements. Geography of International Affairs uses the organizing principle of geographic scale to examine the spatial patterns of and interrelationships among political processes and institutions. Particular emphasis is given to developing an integrative view of how global, national, local and individual scale processes interact to produce patterns of peace and conflict. The course analyzes how the actions of individuals, states and other political actors are influenced by their dynamic geographical contexts. The political geography approach does not simply discuss the war, peace, nationalism, terrorism, and religious organizations in isolation; instead, it concentrates on understanding the integration of these processes, and how their integration mediates political decisions and outcomes. Geography of International Affairs is concerned with the geopolitical context, broadly defined - the manner in which spaces and places are combinations of the political and the social, the domestic and the international, the global and the local - and how it partially determines the form and outcomes of politics. As a course in geography, Geography of International Affairs encourages students to interpret political problems, actions, and disputes through the lens of the Six Essential Elements of Geography (National Geographic): Places and Regions; Physical Systems; Human Systems: Environment and Society; the World in Spatial Terms; and Uses of Geography. Further, this course also encourages students to examine and interpret international affairs through the lens of different geopolitical theories, developed by the likes of Ratzel, Mahan, Mackinder, Spykman, Kissinger, Wallerstein, and others. In this sense, students are encouraged to adopt the role of political geographers. Political geographers have developed and adopted many tools to address these themes. Maps are obvious choices, but geographers also use a wide array of statistical and qualitative techniques to study the distribution of political processes and the processes themselves. They use geographic information systems and computer models to manipulate, display, and analyze spatial data. Geography of International Affairs acquaints students with many of these tools. When the above points are taken together, political geography emerges as a unique field of social science. Geography of International Affairs provides a learning experience that students can get in no other discipline - one that takes an integrated view that makes contemporary international affairs relevant and understandable.