AP Human Geography 9

Weight-losing case: (bulk reducing)

if the finished product costs less to transport, the firm will be located closer to the raw materials to reduce cost.

Weight-gaining case (bulk gaining)

if the finished product costs more to transport, the firm will be located closer to the market to reduce cost

Core-periphery model

describes the pattern of distribution of the MDCs and LDCs. When the earth is viewed from the North Pole (azimuthal), the MDCs are clustered near the center of the map (core) while the LDCs are near the edges (periphery).

Structuralist Models

economic disparities are the result of historically derived power relations w/in the global economic system; cannot be changed easily (misleading to assume all areas will go through the same process of development).

Lösch's model: (zone of profitability)

firms will identify a zone of profitability (not just a point) where income will outpace costs.

Western & Central Europe

oldest and highly urbanized

Eastern Asia

Japan's dominance is being challenged by China (dominant in terms of low cost mass production) and the "Four Tigers" (South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Singapore)

Hotelling's model

(dealt with locational interdependence) the location of industries can't be understood w/o reference to the location of other industries of like kind; two similar vendors would locate next to each other in the middle of a market area to maximize profit (or beach/street as his model suggests).

Outsourcing

(turning over production in part or in total) to another firm or business outside of the country (offshoring - specifically refers to moving production overseas (e.g., China)).

Weber's Least cost theory

Alfred Weber described the optimal location of a manufacturing firm in relation to the cost of transportation, labor, and advantages through agglomeration

Ullman's conceptual frame

Edward Ullman proposed that trade was an interaction based on three phenomena:

First-round industrialization (up to WWI):

England had a comparative advantage with the rest of the world (e.g., natural resources, cheap labor, ports, ...) and began industrializing with textiles; industrial pace rapidly increased and England created several break-of-bulk locations (where goods are transferred from one type of carrier to another) primarily along its port cities (e.g., London, Liverpool, ...); industrialization diffused into Western Europe and into the United States; the industrialized nations engage in imperialism, seeking out new regions for resources and markets for their goods.

NIMBYism

NIMBY is an acronym for "not in my backyard;" it's used to describe opposition by residents to a proposal for a new development close to them. Examples may include, but are not limited to tall buildings, wind turbines, landfills, incinerators, power plants, prisons, mobile telephone network masts, and especially transportation improvements (e.g. new roads, passenger railways or highways.

-GNI PPP: (gross national income with purchasing power parity)

PPP takes into account price differences between countries. Usually goods in LDCs are priced lower, so this makes the difference between LDCs and MDCs less.

Primary vs. secondary industrial location

Von Thünen only had to deal with primary industries, which are obviously located adjacent to the natural resources (farming, ranching,...). Secondary industries are less dependent on resource location; they deal with more variable costs such as energy, transportation, and labor.

Tourism

a service industry giant, a means by which countries are seeking to develop; tourism & travel = 11% of all global jobs, and 11% of global GNP; the initial investment by the "host" country is huge (i.e. building hotels diverts money that could be used for housing, education, ...); many hotels are owned by MNCs, NOT the "host" country; affects the local economy little. -Tourism can diminish cultural landscape distinctiveness (make more homogeneous) - hotels, fast food chains, resorts, theme parks, and environmental degradation (litter, pollution, effects on wildlife). -Tourism can enhance cultural landscape distinctiveness (place preservation, uniqueness & marketing) - preservation of historic buildings; sustaining indigenous (native) lifestyles; promotion of exotic scenery & wildlife (ecotourism); conservation of natural resources (mostly for commercial reasons - for tourism industry).

Network

a set of interconnected nodes without a center (e.g., financial, transportation, communication, governmental, ...) with modern [information] technology, networks enable globalization to occur and create a higher degree of interaction and interdependence than ever before.

Mid-twentieth century industrialization

after WWII the US became the strongest industrial nation (NAMB (North American manufacturing belt)) with the USSR as the other superpower; oil & natural gas rose to become virtually the most important resources driving the industrialized world; Japan rises to a major industrial power (initially due to its cheap labor).

-HDI: (human development index

an aggregate index of development, which takes into account economic, social and demographic factors, using GDP, literacy and education, and life expectancy.

Calorie consumption

as a percentage of daily requirement is an important index of development. People in MDCs generally consume more than 130% of their daily requirements, but most people in LDCs barely get enough to sustain themselves (e.g., Sub-Saharan Africa).

Liberal Models

assume all countries are capable of developing economically in the same way, and 2) disparities b/w countries & regions are the result of short-term inefficiencies in local or regional markets. Walter Rostow's Modernization Model (1960s) stated countries develop through five stages: Stage 1: Traditional Stage 2: Preconditions for takeoff Stage 3: Takeoff Stage 4: Drive to Maturity Stage 5: Age of Mass Consumption

PQL (physical quality of life index)

based on literacy rate, infant mortality rate, and life expectancy at age one.

OECD: (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development)

born after World War II to coordinate the Marshall Plan; today has 30 member countries (which produce > 2/3 world's goods & services), w/ more than 70 developing and transition economies working w/ them; sometimes accused of neo-colonialism (entrenchment of the colonial order (trade & investment) under a new economic (non-political) guise).

World Systems Theory: (Immanuel Wallerstein)

illuminated by a three-tier structure (core, semi-periphery, periphery); refers to perspective that seeks to explain the dynamics of the "capitalist world economy" as a "total social system". Important because explains the power hierarchy in which powerful and wealthy "core" societies dominate and exploit weak and poor peripheral societies.

Mass production: (assembly line production/Fordism)

industrial arrangement of machines, equipment, and workers for continuous flow of work pieces in mass production operations, each movement of material is made as simple and short as possible. Important because it allowed for goods to be produced at a rate comparable to the demand for many of those products, made for more efficient manufacturing industries.

Footloose industry

industry in which the cost of transporting both raw materials and finished product is not important for the location of firms (e.g., diamonds, computer chips, or E-commerce (web-based economic activities)).

Cottage industry

industry in which the production of goods and services is based in homes (not factories); specialty goods (assembled individually or in small quantities) are often produced in this manner.

Brick-and-mortar industry

industry with actual stores in which trade or retail occurs; doesn't solely exist on the internet.

Foreign direct investment

investment in the economies of LDCs by transnational corporations based in MDCs. However, all countries are not recipients of this investment. Brazil, China and Mexico were the LDCs that received most of the investment.

Venture capital

investments typically made in the early stages of developing companies in the hope of generating a favorable return through the growth or sale of the companies; venture capital investments are generally made as cash in exchange for shares in the invested company.

Substitution principle

losses in one area may be offset by savings in another (e.g., higher labor costs could be offset by lower taxes).

Russia & Ukraine

massively developed under communism (only primary region abundant in oil & natural gas)

Factors of industrial location

numerous costs are considered; some costs are transportation, labor, agglomeration, market, energy, terrain, climate, personal preference, the product itself, ...

NGO: (Non-governmental Organization)

organization not run by state or local governments that generally operate as nonprofits; they have created a web of global development networks in response to top-down (governmental) decision making dominated by the core (e.g., World Bank, WTO (World Trade Organization), IMF (International Monetary Fund)). The goal of NGOs is to have peripheral countries partake in participatory development (locals should be engaged in deciding what development for them is and how it should be achieved); this is seen as counter-hegemonic (hegemons are nations that dominate other nations - economically, politically, culturally, ...).

Global (New international) division of labor

phenomenon whereby corporations and others can draw from labor markets around the world ; made possible through improvements in communication and transportation systems (resulting in time-space compression) - The NIDL is a system of spatial disaggregation - high tech and final assembly (core), manufacturing (increasingly in the semi-periphery), raw materials (many from the periphery)

-Intervening opportunity

presence of a nearer opportunity diminishes the attractiveness of sites farther away.

Deindustrialization

process where the companies move industrial jobs to other regions (typically with cheaper labor), leaving the newly deindustrialized region to switch to a service economy and work through a period of high unemployment. (e.g., the US "Rustbelt"; Northeastern China).

Lean production: (lean manufacturing/Toyotism)

production that is centered around creating more value with less work; using modern transportation, efficiency is maximized by obtaining components and parts through just-in-time delivery from varying competing companies around the world (as opposed to keeping large stockpiles in warehouses as in mass production); this is largely a system pioneered by the Toyota Motor Corporation (can also be described as flexible accumulation (of components)).

Economic backwaters

regions that fail to gain from national economic development.

Primary industrial regions

represent the strongest (and mostly the original) industrial zones (all in the Northern Hemisphere):

-GNP: (gross national product)

similar to GDP except that includes income that people earn abroad.

Secondary industrial regions

states and regions that have been intensely developing and urbanizing in recent decades; typically represent more semi-peripheral economies (e.g., Mexico, Brazil, South Africa, Egypt, India, Australia,...).

Dependency Theory: (structuralist)

states that political & economic relationships b/w countries & regions control & limit the developmental possibilities of less well-off areas (e.g., imperialism caused colonies to be dependent - this helps sustain the prosperity of dominant areas & poverty of other regions); only at later stages of development does the core have a positive impact on the periphery (grants, loans, specialized economic zones,...).

Eastern North America

strongest and most dominant since WWII

Transferability

the ease (or difficulty) in which a good may be transported from one area to another.

Neocolonialism

the economic control that MDCs are sometimes believed to have over LDCs. Through organizations such as the IMF, the MDCs are able to dictate precisely what LDCs economic policies are, or are able to use their economic subsidies to put LDCs industries out of business.

Late twentieth century industrialization & beyond

the four primary industrial zones are still dominant, however, secondary industrial regions are making great strides; many developed economies have been expanding into tertiary, quaternary and quinary activities - diverting (or outsourcing) more manufacturing to other regions (e.g., China, India, Four Tigers, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, ...).

-GDP: (gross domestic product)

the total value of goods and services produced in a year in a given country. The value varies greatly between MDCs and LDCs and is one of the best indicators of development.

Local currency

there are over 1,000 in use in the world today; they establish Local Exchange Trading Systems (LETS) that allow members of a local community to trade services or goods in a local network separated from the formal economy (e.g., gain popularity during economic downturns - parts of Detroit today).

Measures of development

used to distinguish LDCs from MDCs. They include GDP, literacy rate, life expectancy, caloric intake, etc.

Backwash effect

when one region's economic gain translates into another region's economic loss.

Complementarity

when two regions, through trade, can specifically satisfy each other's demands.