World Regional Geography Final Exam

Sub-Saharan Africa: Potential Climate Change Impact

Africa is one of the must vulnerable regions affected by climate change... Stressers: 1) Uncertainty in rainfall, warming temperatures, and severe droughts in South Africa 2) Warming temperatures could increase vector-borne diseases like malaria 3) Water scarcity issues

South Asia: Indian Rebellion of 1857

Aka - the Sepoy Mutiny - The rebellion began as a mutiny of sepoys of the East India Company's army on 10 May 1857 - Spread across regions of north and central India. - Resulted in the transfer of rule away from the company to the crown. - Gave rise to growing nationalist movement in South Asia

Oceania: Who are the main actors in the Arctic?

Canada, Denmark, Norway, Russia, Sweden, Iceland and Finland and the United States — have Arctic Ocean coastlines.

East Asia: Imperial decline and Western intervention in China and Japan in the mid 19th Century

China and Japan suffered from internal external problems. - Costly administration of growing population - The Taiping Rebellion

Sub-Saharan Africa: The role of geography in imperialism (environmental determinism)

Environmental Determinism: - Argument that climate and energy determine economic progress and development - Argued that character/form of society could be explained based on physical features of the area - Like social darwinism

Arctic: UNCLOS

Essentially: United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea lays down a comprehensive regime of law and order in the world's oceans and seas establishing rules governing territorial seas, exclusive economic zones, navigational rights, international straits, fishing, deep seabed mining, pollution controls, marine scientific research, and dispute settlement

MENA: The hydrological cycle

General - Describes continuous movement of water above and below surface - Purifies water and gives land freshwater and transports minerals and reshapes geological features of the earth (erosion, sedimentation, etc.) States - Liquid, solid, gas - Involves exchange of heat energy (temperature change) - Evaporation: takes energy and cools environment - Condensation: water releases energy (rainfall) - Fixed, equilibrium system that cycles - Soil an important aspect Phases Liquid water --> evaporates --> water vapor in the atmosphere --> saturation --> condensation --> liquid or solid --> returns to earth as precipitation --> evaporation and evapotranspiration continues the cycle

Russia and More: Land and Ecology (Tundra, Taiga, and Steppe)

Geomorphology - Monotony: thousands of miles of plains - Russia divided into two vast plains: Russian Plain and West Siberian Plateau - Two mountainous regions: the Urals and the range along the southern edge Land and Ecology --> Follows pattern of latitudinal zones, closely related to global climatic patterns, glacial geomorphology, and soil type - Tundra: arctic climate; no agriculture or forestry, along northern Russia - Taiga: south of tundra, most extensive zone of all (belt of continuous coniferous forest); stretches from Gulf of Findland to Kamchatka peninsula; 90% of region forested; exports: timber and fur - Forest: continuation of the mixed forests of central europe - Steppe: flat, natural vegetation is tall feathered grasses and has matted roots that trap moisture; produces rich dark soil (chernozem); very fertile but can create dustbowl conditions

South Asia: Independence and partition 1947 (New borders and political geographies)

Grassroots political resistance: - Indian National Congress Party in 1887. - Decline of the British Empire post WWI and then WW II. - Britain simply no longer had the resources with which to control its greatest imperial asset, and its exit from India was messy, hasty, and clumsily improvised. The subcontinent was partitioned into two independent nation states: - Hindu-majority India and - Muslim-majority Pakistan. - Immediately, there began one of the greatest migrations in human history, as millions of Muslims trekked to West and East Pakistan (the latter now known as Bangladesh) while millions of Hindus and Sikhs headed in the opposite direction. - Many hundreds of thousands never made it. the largest refugee migration ever recorded in the world. Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) was given its independence as a colony in 1948.

Hard vs. Soft Brexit *

Hard Brexit - UK refusing to compromise on issues like the free movement of people and no access to the EU single market Soft Brexit -UK remaining as a member of the EU single market and has to accept free movement of people as a result

East Asia: South Korea

History - In 1950, after Mao came to power, North Korea invaded and took Seoul - UN/US rolled back the troops all the way to the Chinese border, China intervenes and bitter war ensues - Still separated Economy - State led development, industrial development based on import substitutions - 1960s - 1970s: huge growth of exports, labor intensive manufacturing - Encouraged export through tax breaks to firms and by encouraging the growth of giant, interlocking industrial conglomerated known as chaeboi - Economy diversified in 1980s - Manufacturing goods accounted for 91% of total exports (Asian Tiger economies) - Huge numbers of corporations

MENA: How do we imagine and write about the ME? What effects does that process have?

How do we imagine and Write about the ME? - We imagine and write about the Middle East as a mysterious place full of monsters often referred to as 'Marvels of the East' - Stereotyping, western perception that the region never develops and stays the same - Indians/Egyptians/Syrians, no matter where you find them, they are the same. These writings create an image outside of history that contradicts with historical facts - The process of use abstract categories to explain peoples who are different from us help conquer and subdue them easier (not just military conquests but ideologically changed western perspectives of the M.E.) - Production of knowledge about the east which westerners consider these writings as objective knowledge.

South Asia: Hurricanes, Typhoons, Cyclones

Hurricanes are in Atlantic Typhoons in East Asia (much more destructive) Bay of Bengal and Southern Hemisphere Cyclones

Sub-Saharan Africa: The role of the ITCZ in climate and the thermal equator (Nigeria's monsoons)

ITCZ: Low pressure zone along the equator - Heated air rises, causing low pressure, air converges and rises vertically, cools and condenses, creating precipitation When... ITCZ is south of equator: - North-east winds prevail over Nigeria - Produces dry-season conditions When... ITCZ moves into the Northern Hemisphere: - South westerly wind prevails far inland - Brings rain fall during wet season Implication - Prolonged rainy season in far south of Nigeria - Far north undergoes long dry periods annually - Nigeria, thus, has two major seasons: wet and dry, lengths vary from north to south Subtropical High Zone: - Zone of descending air, high pressure, little precipitation - Desert conditions in Sahara and Kalahari

South Asia: Major Rivers

Indus - Flows through Pakistan - Huge center of civilization ancient Brahmaputra - Flows around the himalayas, starts in Tibetan plateau then goes to Bangladesh Ganges - Holy river - Surrounded by some of the most populated cities in the world

East Asia: Japanese Industrialization after 1868

It was an reaction to West's incursions: - The transition from feudalism to industrial capitalism in 1868 - Meiji Restoration - political power restored from the bakufu and daimyo to the imperial family of Japan and his strong bureaucracy with the idea of constitutional monarchy convinced that the country needed to modernize and maintain national independence. - High level of state involvement in industrial development (supporting capitalist monopolies)

East Asia: Communist China (the Great Leap Forward collectivization)

Revolution - Mao gained control of the country in 1949 with majority supports from the peasantry (85% of population) - The Great Leap Forward was a strategy to accelerate economic growth by collectivization of land which led to accelerated industrialization. - Many died as a result; around 20 to 30 million (1960)

Sub-Saharan Africa: Soils and Minerals

Soils - Have low fertility (high rainfall, age, etc.) - Great age of underlying geology, high rainfall leaches nutrients Minerals - Continent composed of very old crystalline rocks - Key to Africa's mineral wealth - Coal, oil, gas, diamonds, copper, cobalt, bauxite, chromium, uranium, iron, and etc.

Arctic: Islands, rocks, and the politics of territorial/oceanic claims

South China Sea - China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei all have competing claims in South China Sea. - Although largely uninhabited, the Paracels and the Spratlys may have reserves of natural resources around them. - There has been little detailed exploration of the area. - The Philippines has sought international arbitration. - In 2013, it announced it would take China to an arbitration tribunal under the auspices of the UN Convention on the Laws of the Sea, to challenge its claims. - In July 2016, the tribunal backed the Philippines' case, saying China had violated the Philippines' sovereign rights. - China had boycotted the proceedings. The 9 dash line *US never ratified UNCLOS

Russia and More: Climate Regions

Subregions: - Russia - Central Asia - Transcaucus - Arctic Russia Climatic Regions: Russia: Continental/latitude, polar - Central Asia: Arid and semi-arid - Lower Tajikistan: Highland Climate: - Size and latitude have large effect; no moderating marine influence, few mountains - Climatic patter simple: severe continental climate, cold winters, short warm summers - Permafrost; long intense winters so subsoil permanently freezes

East Asia: Physiography

Three Main Divisions 1. The Tibetan Plateau - an uplifted massif (a mountainous block of Earth's Crust), 1 million square miles 2. The central mountains and plateaus of China and Mongolia 3. Plains, Hills, Shelves, and Islands - the Chinese plains, hill country, coastal mountains, Korea. And the Japanese Archipelago

East Asia: Japan's post WWII economic miracle

WW2 left Japan in ruins but within five years it had returned to its prewar growth levels: - 1950s - 60s annual economic growth rate was 10% compared with 2% in North America and Western Europe. - Factors - exceptionally high levels of personal savings. Rapid acquisition of new technology. Extensive government support of industry. - Interdependence of government and industry - 'Japan Inc.' - Ministry of International Trade and Industry - guided and coordinated corporations and organized them in business networks (Keiretsu).

MENA: Water scarcity and water conflict

Water Conflict - Middle East contains 3% of world's population but only 1% of available fresh water - Tigris-Euphrates Basin has witnessed long-running disputes between Turkey, Syria, and Iraq over water usage - Egypt has threatened military action against Sudan if it attempts to limit the Nile's flow - Israel, Jordan argue over the use of the Jordan Israel and Palestine fight over water

Oceania: Ecological imperialism and invasive species

"The process of European organisms taking over the ecosystems of other regions in the world — lead to the endangerment and extinction of numerous other native species in this region as introduced species came to dominate" Species introduced by Europeans that led to the endangerment and extinction of native species (ex. the brown tree snake, mongoose, snails, horses, rabbits, sheep, even camels.)

South Asia: Monsoons (how do they work?)

*Seasonal reversal of wind flow in lower mid latitudes* Basics - Major wind system that is the result of the differential heating of wind and sea - Characterized by a dramatic seasonal change in direction of the prevailing wind over the region which brings a marked change in rainfall and leads to distinct and often predictable wet and dry seasons - Such seasonal variations occur because land surfaces heat up and cool down much more quickly than bodies of water - This leads to pressure differences which influences wind flow In South Asia Engine - The heating and cooling of the Asian continent to the north and the mov't of the ITCZ Early summer - The interior parts of Asia begin to heat more repidly than the areas of ocean to the south, creating low pressure convection aas hot air rises all across Asia - Opposite in the winter

South Asia: Pollution

- 200 million people do not have access to clean water, 690 million to sanitation, 80% of water sources are polluted with industrial or household waste, only 10% of all sewage in South Asia is treated Costs to India - Air pollution cause an estimated 2.5 million premature deaths a year - India loses $13.8 billion every year, 6.4% of country's GDP - Biggest problem: $8.3 billion associated with the health effects of water pollution

Brexit: 3) Uneven Development *

- A East-West divide in the European continent, caused by: a) Gradual process of economic convergence, resulting from relatively rapid growth among less developed countries b) Financial and economic crisis, which had considerable impact on the economic performance of most EU member states - UK's pursuit of finance-based accumulation added to the mix, whilst reinforcing the spatial divisions of labor between London and the rest of the country - Ireland relied on credit-driven expansion to stay afloat - British politicians have succeeded in convincing voters that the decline has external factors (Brussels) "The EU experience has shown that deeper integration may coincide with increasing imbalances in competitiveness, trade relations, and development levels. . .Especially at the regional level, the evidence in the literature seems to shift progressively from the widespread euphoria of the convergence models in the 1990s. . .to the uncomfortably repeated divergence (or very slow convergence) findings in the 2000s. . .. At the theoretical level, these findings come to add their weight to old and new debates concerning the relationship between growth, integration, and regional inequality." - 49

South Asia: Kashmir

- A Hindu Maharaja had elected to join India, but Pakistani forces intervened on partition to protect the majority Muslim population, with implications that have never been resolved - Economist Videographic: India, Pakistan, Kashmir - Kashmir: predominantly muslim, isolated as a minority in India at partition - War three times

East Asia: Three Gorges Dam

- A cornerstone of the Chinese central government's approach to economic development in the country's interior - Yangtze river - The dam (2 km from bank to bank - Emblem of China's ambitious aims to modernize through vast industrail programs - Produces huge amount of electricity - Reservoir extends 404 miles upstream, submerging 19 cities, 150 towns, and 4500 villages - 32 generators will provide for almost 10% of China's energy output - Should improve river navigation and control flooding downstream - Environmental consequences and political problems

Russia and More: Permafrost and Climate Change

- Already experiencing mixed effects: longer growing season, new types of agriculture, but infrastructural problems - Energy: warming temperatures mean less consumption; freeing up of rivers and groundwater means more hydroelectricity (in future) - Temperature increase greater in high northern latitudes - Effects: a) Permafrost melting, methane and carbon released b) Droughts in 2010 and 2012 affected grain production (bn $ losses), rising bread prices c) Soil erosion d) Extreme meteorological events Yet... little concrete action happening Permafrost - 5 million ppl live in permafrost zone in Russia, new climate has disrupted homes and livelihoods - Rivers are rising and running faster, villages are eroding into them - Arable land for farming has fallen by more than half - Scientists estimate Earth's Yedoma regions (arctic regions permafrost) contain around 400 billion tons of carbon; if released into the atmosphere, would be catastrophic

Sub-Saharan Africa: the Slave Trade and Abolition (Sierra Leone and Liberia)

- Began in the 16th century with Portuguese slaving for sugar plantations in Brazil - Important source of wealth for African kingdoms too - Abolition movements began at the end of the 18th century in the United States and Great Britain - 1863 was the Emancipation Proclamation, slaves emancipated - Some liberated slaves returned to Africa in countries of Sierra Leone (British Black loyalists) and Liberia (US Black citizens)

Sub-Saharan Africa: Madagascar Ecology

- Biodiversity hotspot - 25% of all flowering plants in Africa, 33 species of lemurs, 800 species of butterflies - 80% of population are subsistence farmers who use slash and burn to clean land - Less than 15% of term-28original forest remains

MENA: Weaponizing Water

- Complex ecosystem created by the annual flooding of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers - Near total destruction of the vast marshlands of southern Iraq by Saddam Hussein's regime has had significant ecological consequences and devastated the 500,000 Ma'dan or "Marsh Arab" people who have populated the marshes for 5,000 years (diverted water sources around marshlands, which starved the people and they were forced to migrate out) - Saddam Hussein was worried the Iran was a threat in this area - So he began total construction of the marshlands - Over past two decades, Turkey has constructed 22 dams and 19 hydroelectric power plants on the euphrates and tigris - Before 1990, Iraq got more than three trillion cubic feet of water a year, today it's less than two trillion

Sub-Saharan Africa: Ecology of Forest and Savannah

- Congo Basin: world's second largest rainforest and river - Forest: 20% of Africa - Savannah: 40% of Africa - Savannah: Grassland found in tropical climates with pronounced dry season (Serengeti) - Great biodiversity threatened by deforestation (demand for timber and firewood)

Ancient China

- Continuous agricultural civilization for 8,000 years - First unified Chinese Empire was that of the Qin dynasty, about 200 BCE, establishes bureaucracy and begins Great Wall - Empires were constantly shifting their boundaries and there was almost cyclical nature to the rise, dominance, and decline of different regional powers - The Han Dynast (206 BCE to 22o) extended the wall westwards and began building internal canals - The infrastructure of China created a complementary relationship between N and S - South was the agricultural and economic center, but the political center was always to the norms - Cyclical nature to the rise fall and re-rise of regional powers

Russia and More: Soviet Union Collapse

- Crisis in system by 1980s - Failure to fulfill consumer needs of its ppl - Persistent regional inequalities contributed to loss of confidence in the system as an alternative economic model - Critical economic failure; inability to take advantage of emerging tech - Collapse in 1990, 15 countries now independent

Arctic: Antarctica

- Desert conditions - Average temperature of 51 C in six months winter - Seven Countries with Claims - Britain, France, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina - Many more countries with bases - Continent is designated a scientific preserve - Governed by the Antarctic Treaty (1961) - Military operations prohibit - Nuclear tests banned - Resource exploitation prohibited (until 2048 — Oil?) - Global climate change is significantly affecting the region and will have global impacts

Sub-Saharan Africa: Climate

- Dominated by ITCZ and Subtropic high - Reasonably variable (wet and dry seasons)

MENA: The Environment

- Dominated by aridity Plate tectonics - Many fault lines, which create uplift and mountains and give rise to orographic rainfall and snowmelt which gives source to water - Earthquakes in Turkey and around Desert - Sahara, world's biggest desert - Less than 1 in rainfall - Crucial to understanding water availability and the region and population density and development and politics and etc.

East Asia: Japan's Economic Stagnation

- Early 1990s, economic slowdown, 1.5% growth rather than 4% - Biggest industrial challenge since WWII Also competing with China for foreign investment - Japan faces deindustrialization itself through the process of creative destruction

Brexit: Current Situation

- Economy: British pound dropped to a 30 year low - For UK to leave, two sides have two years to agree to the terms of the split (Lisbon Treaty) - Theresa May's deal was defeated so deadline extended again - Boris Johnson made new plan - UK left EU Jan 31 2020

MENA: What is Orientalism?

- Edward Said's book Orientalism (1978) - Argues that what is represented in the literature, films, etc is completely different than real life (based on western depiction) - Once established as different and inferior, Western domination of these other peoples and places was not merely justified but also warranted - Although imaginings of the backward, violent, and inferior other have been altered slightly since the early nineteenth century, they have survived and are deeply ingrained - As we perceive the Orient, so too do we often perceive the Middle East in negative and particularistic contexts, such as terrorism, instability, violence, Islamic fundamentalism, anti-Americanism, oppression of women, or oil wealth - Such manufactured and oversimplified geographical imaginings have not only shaped many people's perceptions of the ME but also influenced material practices and political decisions

Russia and More: Environmental legacies left by Soviet Unions and continuing problems

- Emphasis on industrial output and modernization - NOT on environmental protection - Soviet ideology: nature conquered through ambitious engineering projects, pollution considered an inevitable cost of modernization - Environmental degradation, serious problem all across the region - Money wasn't there for many clean up projects

Sub-Saharan Africa: Colonialism's Impact

- European colonization established new political boundaries, reorientation of economies, transport routes - European languages, changes in land tenure, taxation, education, religion, and governance shaped contemporary Africa - Profound and regional - Establishment of new political boundaries Britain - Paternalistic - Indirect rule - Pre-existing leaders responsible to British crown France - Policy of assimilation - Encouraged elites to evolve into French citizens Belgium and Portugal - Authoritarian forms of control - No political participation - Frequent use of armed control

MENA: Qanats

- Form of well like series of vertical shafts that connects tunnels sloping - Taps into water table (tunnel), tunnel cuts across and siphons it and delivers water into the lowlands where most people live - Uses underground water and brings it to surface - Extremely successful, all around Near East world

Russia and More: Importance of Fur to Russian Expansion

- Fur was a prized commodity from the earliest times (Moscovy) - It drew Russian trappers and traders to Siberia in the 16th century - Gov't policy encouraged hunters' exploitation and displacement of indigenous people - Trade reached as far as Alaska Theme: commodity-driven expansion

South Asia: Imperialism's Affect

- Global climatic factors caused massive crop failures, and brutal famines that decimated local populations - The effects were magnified by destructive colonial policies - Death tolls in India were staggering 1860s: 6 - 10 million - Then lots more - Davis argues that the seeds of underdevelopment in what later became known as the Third World were sown in this era of High Imperialism - Looks at mass crop failures across tropical zones in "Third World" - Geographies of famine, drought, and the emerging global market Argument Lots of these societies had ways to deal with climatic problems of drought, flooding, etc for their crops but when colonial powers came in that became ruined and no longer did people have this mechanisms to solve the problem - What we know as a third world, are just parts of the world who were underdeveloped in comparison to Britain and other colonial powers

South Asia: British East India Company (est 1600)

- Goes from being trading company to being administrative agency - In 1773 the British Government transformed the company into an administrative agency - Began to pursue aggressive political expansion - Ruled a large part of South Asia up until 1858 - In the late 1700s early 1800s the company began to focus less on trade and more on economic imperialism - Focus on the region's agricultural wealth and the export of raw materials — cotton, tea, opium, etc. - Opium growth meant less farmland towards food, more food insecurity, more economic insecurity, etc. - Huge effect of completely changing economic political structure, makes it more crop dependent - Dismantled native industry creating dependency - Focuses less on trade of spices, tea, etc, but more on economic industry for europeans, created dependency system

Russia and More: History and Politics

- Hear of Russia was its agricultural region (Kingdom of Muscovy) - Spread of Russian colonization and extension of political control is key to understanding the region - Muscovy expanded south and east to search for more forest resources, particularly fur

MENA: Global distribution of Muslim populations

- Highest Muslim population in Indonesia

East Asia: The Pearl River Delta

- Home to 9 mainland cities in China - World's biggest megacity (population the size of the UK) - Over 66 million residents - GDP 1.2 trillion dollars, growing at an average of 12% for the last decade - Though it accounts for less than 1% of pay's territory and 5% of its population, it generates more than tenth of its GDP and a quarter of its exports

MENA: Trigris-Euphrates Rivers

- Home to cradle of civilization; the fertile crescent - These river systems are the major source of water for most people in the regions but highly undependable - Tigris rises in the Anatolian Plateau of Turkey and flows through Iraq - Eurphrates flows through Syria, Iraq, and empties into the sea in Iran - They are transboundaries river systems, meaning causes conflicts

Brexit: Sentiments

- Huge amount of migrants, multiculturalism, and with Muslim communities not the same separation of religion and public life (the European ideal) - Feelings exacerbated by high unemployment, post 9-11 tensions, terrorist attacks in Europe, and cultural clashes over religion - Racial clashes in Britain, riots and tensions with police So: - Britain wanted to leave EU so didn't have to deal with migration and economic burden

South Asia: Adaptations to Rainfall

- If the monsoon is late, uneven, or doesn't reach certain localities, there are enormous risks of crop failure, drought, and potentially famine - Has lead to remarkable range of indigenous adaptations - Terraced landscapes - Stabilize land for agriculture in the face of serious soil erosion - Agrodiversity: Mixing of crops that have various degrees of productivity and drought tolerance

MENA: Oases

- In Sahara, runoff from the atlas mountains collects underground in deep porous rock layers deep - In some places, land erosion and high water table has allowed some of the water to collect at surface (oases) and be constantly renewed by runoff

South Asia: Arsenic Water Contamination in Bangladesh

- In the 1970s UNICEF built tube wells in the ground and the people started drinking the water - By the 1990s there were high rates of lung, bladder, and skin cancer and it was discovered that there was a high level of this poisonous element in the water

South Asia: Farming and Human Stress

- In the last 20 years, nearly 300,000 farmers in India have ended their lives - In a country where agriculture remains the largest employment sector, it contributed only 13.7 percent to the GDP in 2012-13 - Agricultural investment in India is a big gamble - Over 70% of the population is still rural - Long droughts, poor yields, and unseasonal rains contribute to the struggles that lead to suicides. - End up in debt traps - Difficult for farmers to make ends meet

Oceania: Migration and Ethnic composition

- Indigenous Aboriginal, Maori, and Polynesian populations decimated by Europeans. - Australia and NZ dominated by English, Scottish, and Irish populations. Pacific Islands have 80% indigenous people. - Australia's immigration policy sought to maintain a European "look" through the adoption of the White Australia Policy after independence in 1901. - Immigration restricted to Northern Europeans. Immigrant desirability ranked. - 1973: racist restrictions on immigration lifted and replaced with skills criteria. Immigration from Asia begins e.g. Vietnam, Hong Kong, Philippines.

MENA: The South East Anatolia Project (GAP)

- Involves construction of 23 dams on Turkish part of the Euphrates (I think) - They're using 25% of the flow, so Syria has 25% less of the water flow

MENA: Desalinization

- Israel in particular uses this system - Problem with system: - Need large amounts of tech expertise and capital - Uses a lot lot of energy

East Asia: Water and Scarcity

- Large amount of rainfall in lower china, declines as you go north - Water excess to water scarcity? - Industrial and agricultural use has affected water availability and quality - More than half of China's 50,000 rivers have vanished over the past two decades, according to China's first national census of water, published last year - About 70% of raminaing fresh water is polluted - In 2014, China inaugurated one of the biggest engineering projects of all time: the South North Water Diversion, a 62 billion 2,400 km network of canals and tunnels, designed to divert 44.8 billion cubic meters of water annually from China's most humid south to its parched, industrialized north

MENA: How do we define water security and scarcity?

- Least amount of water in the world out of all regions Definition - Threshold of 1,700 m cubed per capita per year of renewable water; if you are below this, you're water scarce Water availability in MENA - Alright: Iran, Iraq - Okay: Syria, Lebanon, Egypt - Scarcity: most other countries in the region

Russia and More: Environmental Destruction and the Soviet Union

- Lost vast amounts of pasture and agricultural land due to radioactive contamination - Vast amounts of land flooded by hydroelectric dams - Land lost through salinization, changes in water table, and dust and salt storms - Amidst acute food shortages, total amount of cultivated land declined by huge amount - Losing its forests at same rate as in Brazil - Chemical poisoning from pesticides created mental retardation in Moldavia and Uzbekistan

Sub-Saharan Africa: The Resource Curse

- Mineral resources such as diamonds and coltan create conflicts in the region in addition to existing military complexities in the region. - Natural riches have attracted rapacious adventurers, unscrupulous corporations, vicious warlords and corrupt governments The Cycle: Coup: Oppressive regime --> Emergence of new group seeking power --> Weak institutions and little centralization --> Pressure to achieve power over resources

East Asia: North Korea

- North Korea experiences dramatic economic stagnation - A highly isolated and economically stagnant - 25% of the economy is spent on the military - A secretive and militaristic nuclear power lead by Kim Jong Un - Combined with sanctions, economic growth has been non-existent and shortages widespread - Has begun to experiment with Chinese style economic zones to foster some foreign investment in and designated areas of accumulation

East Asia: The Opium War

- The Opium War - 1839-42. Britain provoked war with China, which it easily won. - China ceded Hong Kong to Britain and allowed American and European traders access to Chinese ports. - U.S. Admiral Matthew Perry anchored his flagship in Tokyo Bay to 'persuade' the Japanese to open their ports. - Lesson learned - Asia was technologically far too weak and needed to develop.

Oceania: Australia environmental history (isolation, distinctiveness, and island biogeography)

- Oceania's isolation has led to the development of some of the world's most unique ecosystems. - Australia more than 20,000 different plant species, 650 bird species, and 380 reptile species. - Island biogeography is the study of the species composition and species richness on islands: - Theory that geographic area and isolation influence species colonization, extinction and speciation such that larger islands have more species and isolated islands have fewer species.

South Asia: Water issues -- Flooding and Scarcity

- Orographic uplift intensifies monsoons - Western Ghats receive 79-158 inches of rainfall. - Bangladesh, however, receives the most regular and severe flooding. - Flooding can kill thousands, worse when combined with cyclones (hurricanes) Result - Millions of tube wells in Bangladesh were drawing arsenic contaminated water.

Sub-Saharan Africa: Desertification and Famine

- People have adapted to the landscape: irrigation, flood plain farming, herding following rains - Climate variability, political change, growth of human and animal populations; drought threatens food security - Combined with land degradation, persistent drought can lead to desertification

MENA: Aridity's effect on population density, and people's adaptation to climate

- Precipitation is low and highly variable - 3/4 of region experiences less than 10 in of rainfall annually - Irrigation necessary for agriculture - Soil is thin and devoid of nutrients apart from areas in Turkey and the floodplains of Nile - Snowcapped peaks are found in Turkey, Iran, Lebanon, and Morocco where spring and summer snowmelt provides water for lowland human, plant, and animal populations - People have adapted to the aridity and high temperatures through architecture, patterns of daily and seasonal activity, and dress - Architecture includes high ceilings to allow heat to rise, gardens in middle of houses, and deep set thick walls

Russia and More: Why the failures to curtail environmental transformation and degradation

- Problem could be summed up in three words: priorities, funding, and enforcement - Priority was always for economic growth - Funding required to address environmental problems or prevent them was really lacking - Principles and directives were usually ignored

Sub-Saharan Africa: Independence and Decolonization

- Rapid process of decolonization post WWII - Many peaceful transitions in French West Africa, where economic and cultural ties were maintained - Many violent transitions and rebellions (British colonies of Kenya and Zimbabwe) - Huge destabilization After decolonization: - Unstable political systems accompanied with weak economic infrastructures unsuitable for global economy Legacy of Colonization: - 80 years - European cultural values - Ethnic and cultural divisions - Violence - Example: Zaire and 1947 world cup (failure); "African Naivity"

MENA: ISIS and Climate

- Recent arguments suggest that climate change had a role in creating the Syrian conflict - There's evidence that the 2007 - 2010 drought conflicted to conflict in Syria; worst drought in history - Largely if not completed caused by human-cause climate change - Unusual severity of drought wouldn't have happened with out excess use of land and precipitation changes

South Asia: Climate change and Bangladesh

- Record breaking and recurring floods in Bangladesh, Nepal, and NE india - Coastal areas of Bangladesh and the Bay of Bengal are vulnerable to sea level rise - Frequency of hot days and head waves have also increased in the last century - Decline in Himalayan glaciers - Impacts on water security - Climate refugees - People living in Slums have increased by more than 60% in the past 17 years in Bangladesh - Many new arrivals are climate refugees, people forced to leave their homes due to extreme weather events related to climate change

Sub-Saharan Africa: The Congo "cursed by geology'

- Resource wealth has rarely been harnessed for Congo's benefit - Ruined country - War, violence, etc - Coltan funds wars - Child labor in mining it and other minerals

South Asia: Agriculture and resource/human stress

- Rural population around 500 million people - 'Ecosystem' people living at subsistence levels but in sustainable ways that have protected and preserved the environment - Gradually pushed on to unproductive soils and arid hillsides as commercial forestry, mining, road and dam construction, and industrialization limit access to land

Russia and More: Serfdom

- Russia was a feudal society (11 - 19 c) - Serfdom emerged in 16th and 17th C as a solution to the problem of scarce labor and widely available land - Entailed constraints on the mobility and economic decision making of peasants - 40% of population - Emancipated in 1860s

Arctic: How is climate change affecting the Arctic?

- Sea Level Rise - Species Changes = Food Chain/Food Web changes (food security) - Climate Change = agricultural change (food security) - Changes in Fresh Water supply (security) - Storms /drought / precipitation / ocean currents (Hurricanes?)

East Asia: Special Economic Zones

- Set up in 1980s as carefully segregated export processing areas that offered cheap labor and land and tax breaks to transnational corporations - In 2005, the US bought $142 billion worth of goods made in China - Manufacturing states to become decentralized and outsourced around the world to countries like China (deindustrialization) GDP Growth in China - Uneven geographic growth in China - Coastal regions much more wealth

Russia and More: Collectivization and Industrialization Under the Soviet Union

- Soviet Union: plan to be self-subsistent - Results in severe exploitation of rural people; the collectivized peasant was paid for industrialization by gift of labor - Repression: 10 m dissidents sent to labor camps (Gulags) - But... economy did modernize; in 5 year plans (1928 - 40) economy grew 10% yr

MENA: Syrian Uprising

- Stresses on food, environmental issues, water, will inevitably aid in resulting in conflicts and warefare - But there's other causes as well, since the drought exacerbated and already existing humanitarian crisis - Gov't failure to adequately respond to the crisis was one of the triggers of the protests that started in March 2011

Russia and More: Origins of the Russian Revolution in 1917 *

- Technological modernization caused displacements of serfs and peasants - Flood of rural-urban migration - Severe economic depression: inflation led to famine - No mechanism for change: Tsar rules absolutely - Working class movement organized through the Soviets revolution in October 1917

South Asia: the British Raj and the transformation of India

- The Raj - British rule over South Asia extended to the entire region except Afghanistan and Nepal. - The British brought plantation agriculture to South Asia, producing food crops for the British population there and traders - coconuts, coffee, cotton, rubber, and tea. - Fostered western political ideas of national territorial sovereignty and the materialism that accompanies free markets in land, labour, and commerce

South Asia: British Colonialism (Cultural Imperialism)

- The focus of British imperialism now shifted beyond trade and territorial control to social reform and cultural imperialism. - Thomas Macaulay (1853) - British administrators were urged to create a class of South Asian people who would be "Indian blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect. - "One by one, territories were brought under the control of Britain, direct or indirectly.

East Asia: Central China (agricultural civilization)

- The middle and lower Yangtze - is a heartland area of Han China and of Chinese agricultural civilization.- - Accounts for 25% of cultivated land, one of its most densely populated regions and contains China's largest city, Shanghai 13 million in 2005 - Central China developed around waterways. The Yangtze west east artery combined with the Grand Canal north south. - Settlement patterns are characterized by rectilinear patterns of the drainage canals that link the smaller settlements. - Since 1949, it has developed as a core industrial and food producing region. Also contains a key oil field and the Yangtze dam.

East Asia: Hydraulic Civilizations

- The rice cultures of south-eastern China and Japan have developed systems to control the excess of water. - Fish farming combined with maximizing rice production. - Rivers like the Yangtze carry huge amounts of silt making them unstable and prone to flooding. - Techniques to deal with excess water - drained marshes, irrigation systems, lakes converted to reservoirs, levees raised. - Hydraulic civilizations - historic empires held together and expanded based on their capacity for controlling water.

East Asia: Climate

- Tibetan Plateau: variable highland climate (massive geographical uplift due to collision of the two plates - Western Interior: arid and semi arid, including Mongolia - North: continental climate South: humid subtropical climate, coastal China, South Korea and Japan - Highlands: cool summers, cold winters - Monsoons online in lower lower part -Most people live in Eastern parts of China in China (Humid Subtropic)

Brexit: 1) Empire and Nationalism

- UK once ruled half the world - After joining the EU, there's a perceived loss of control over their own political and economic systems - Brexit is rooted in the British Empire (post war migration, geopolitical decline) So: - So their 'destiny' weights heavier than in other places - Slogan: 'take back control' Enoch Powell River of Blood speech: - Example of conservative sentiments toward migration and feelings of nationalism

MENA: The Nile River

- Used for irrigation since ancient Egypt - In 20th C it became a major focus of modernization in Egypt (and Aswan dam) - Longest in world (4,130 miles long, runs through ten countries) - Two major tributaries: White Nile (ethiopia, sudan, fertile); Blue Nile (victoria, south sudan, etc) - Impacts population density - Population is all near the river - Humans have modified the river for thousands of years - Ancient egyptians used: irrigation, dykes, etc. to master the water Aswan Dam - Very important for giving energy to egypt - Gives farmers a more dependable source of water for their crops - Gives Egypt electrical power - Several ancient temples had to be removed and rebuilt due to the dam - River Nile conflicts: river passes through 10 countries, so problems of shared resource management

Sub-Saharan Africa: Madagascar's Vanilla Gold Rush (video!)

- Vanilla has become so expensive - Crop native to Mexico - Ethical concerns - Reliance on crop

East Asia: China's North-South Canal project

- Waterway system that links northern eastern China to the central eastern plains - Constructed beginning in the 5th century BCE as a means of establishing communication for the empire - Hugely successful for a long time, up until european intervention in 1800s upward Huge amount of peasants died due to food shortages in China

Sub-Saharan Africa: Apartheid of South Africa (its logic and geography)

- White settler colony - Early independence - Apartheid: "separate development" based on race Apartheid - "Fundamental law:" legal recognition of distinction between whites and blacks - Racial segregation through territorial segregation - 1950 Population Registration Act separated Bantu, colored, white, or asian - Blacks no longer SA citizens, go on tribal reserves - Ended in 1944 (with help of Nelson Mandela) Apartheid Geography: 1) Personal level: beaches, bathrooms, elevators, etc. 2) Urban scale: city was divided into separate residential areas for each racial group 3) Regional and national scale: operated through creation of homelands for different racial groups Geography and Race - "The power of definition:" the ability to name a person, groups' place in society and make it stick - Intersection of space and race - Race is a social construct: made real through spacial separation (and other ways) and racial ideology

Arctic: Importance of the Arctic

1) Opening of Sea Routes (Northwest Passage) - Potential decrease of distance between NYC to Tokyo by 2,500 miles - Commerical/strategic significance - Distance/time = $ in shipping costs - Seasonality - Environmental impact - Very key and strategic for shipping routes world wide 2) Natural Resources - Oil and Gas - Obvious economic and security strategic significance - Also diamonds - Canada and Russia have been engaging in diplomatic struggle - Canada and military in Arctic - Marine resources 3) How to claim territory? - Interact with international law - Or, annex/conquer territories - Create infrastructure - Mobilize support and create new imaginative geographies - Begin to incorporate the territory as part of the nation-state and body politic

Russia and More: Soviet Economic Planning

1) Technical optimization - Developed territorial production complexes - Regional grouping of production facilities based on local resources suited to clusters of interdependent industries (steel) 2) Industrialization of underdeveloped sub regions - Mainly central Asia and Transcaucasus 3) Security and Secrecy - From external military attack - Military industrial dev in Siberia - creation of closed or secret cities

Oceania: Pacific Islands Geography (high volcanic islands, low coral islands)

1. High Volcanic islands (Formed by tectonic activity. Often created in linear chains as tectonic plates move over a hot spot.e.g Hawaii, Tahiti, Samoa.) 2. Low coral islands (Created from the buildup of skeletons and coral organisms.Most often low-lying <1m above sea level. Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Tuvalu.)

Oceania: Australia Physical Geography

1. The Eastern Highlands 2. The interior lowlands 3. The Western Plateau

South Asia: Arrival of European Traders

1690s on - Portuguese trading ports followed by Dutch, French, and British interests 1700s - Britain began to exert more control. - The British East India Company was transformed into an administrative agency by the British Government.

South Asia: New Economy

1950 - 1991 - Many key institutions in India were government owned and operated - Deregulation - Counting the costs (videos) - Huge privatization since 1991, massive flow of FDI into India - India averageing 6% growth rate annually - 2012: India was the world's 19th largest exporter and 10th largest importer - Exports dominated by petroleum products and pharmaceuticals - Also a growing tech boom - Nuclear power; will be world's largest population - Catching up pretty rapidly But there are costs - Massive amounts of rural to urban migration has lead to many problems in overcrowded cities and climate change and pollution - Region's economic growth is not just about FDI - Huge growth in industrial families and firms (Tata group) - Combined with growing levels of inequality in rural and urban areas

East Asia: China's 1980s transition to state led capitalism and economic growth; what underpins this growth?

1980s - China transitioned into capitalism. Economic growth (double digit rate) skyrocketed: - China integrated into the world economy - Central planning dismantled in favor of free market mechanisms. - Special economic zones set up to encourage foreign investments and global trade In 2005, the U.S. bought $243.5billion worth of goods made in China. GDP Growth in China - Uneven geographic growth in China - Coastal regions much more wealth

Russia and More: Soviet Environmental Legacies (Aral Sea, Khruschev's Virgin Lands Campaign, Chernobyl, Lake Baykal)

Aral Sea - Disappearance - Was world's 4th largest lake - Canals created reduced flow to the sea - Modernization brought large scale irrigation, the Kra-Kum canal - Cotton - Salinization - Caused loss to fishing industry; dust storms and respiratory illness Chernobyl - Explosion and release of radioactive contamination into atmosphere, spread over Western USSR and Europe - Many deaths - Secondary radiation (vegetation still releases radioactive material) - Still unclear how to decontaminate area Lake Baykal - World's deepest lake - 20% of earth's fresh water - "Pearl of Siberia" - Polluted in 1960s by toxins in Selenga River which provides half of lake's water - Paper-pulp mill built on lake by Soviet planners to utilize pristine waters - Pollution Khruschev's Virgin Lands Campaign - Mega engineering project; goal to increase agricultural production to alleviate food shortage in USSR after - Transformed steppe into arable land for grain production - Employed lots of workers - Failure due to climatic conditions - Problems of drought and wind erosion

Arctic: Continental Shelves (why are they important?)

Areas where continental surfaces extend under the shallow ocean water around the continents: - The relatively accessible continental shelf is the best understood part of the ocean floor. - Most commercial exploitation from the sea, such as metallic-ore, non-metallic ore, and hydrocarbon extraction, takes place on the continental shelf. - Sovereign rights over their continental shelves up to a depth of 100 m (330 ft) or to a distance where the depth of waters admitted of resource exploitation were claimed by the marine nations that signed the Convention on the Continental Shelf drawn up by the UN's International Law Commission in 1958.

Sub-Saharan Africa: Colonialism in Africa (the Dark Continent)

Colonialism: - "White man's burden" - "Imperial conquest of pristine land" - If Africa could be seen as empty, then it would be ready for European development Colonialism in Africa: - Began with Portugal and Spain trade with West Africa - Cape of Good Hope reached in 1497 - Initially, coastal trading ports under European control: Ivory Coast, Gold Coast, Slave Coast - Trading in the triangle - However, Europeans were unable to move in; land known as the 'White Man's Grave' and 'The Dark Continent' because of illnesses europeans weren't immune to

Oceania: Early colonization in Australia

Colonization - Dutch exploration in 1642 by Abel Tasman. Australia and NZ claim similar colonial histories. - Pacific islands' colonization is less systematic - James Cook claimed Botany Bay for Britain in 1770, calling the territory New South Wales.

Brexit: Northern Ireland's Importance

Context: - Northern Ireland is a part of the UK after separating from Ireland - After fighting between the two Irelands, made "Good Friday Agreement" - Northern Ireland has soft borders with Ireland - If UK were to leave (which ppl in NI voted against), would become a border problem for NI Options: 1) Hard borders with Ireland 2) Hard borders on coast of UK 3) Open Migration if UK stays in EU migration union 4) NI leaves UK and comes together with Ireland Why it matters? - UK's decisions affect NI and affect Britain's borders in Ireland and its control on NI

Sub-Saharan Africa: Mining, Diamonds, Coltan

Diamonds - 65% of worlds diamonds are in Africa - 8.5 billion dollar industry - 2/3 controlled by DeBeers Corporation Blood Diamonds - Angola, DRC, and Congo: they are mined and smuggled across borders - Easy to transport diamonds are used to purchase weapons (around 10-15% of global trade) - Diamond money has funded an increase in magnitude of arms on every side Coltan - Essential for manufacturing batteries - Driving force of war - Places where it's found are controlled by negative Mai Mai forces - They impose order in the mining field and use coercive labor force to extract minerals - Over the years, coltan has helped to finance serious conflict in the DRC, eg. the Ituri conflict and the Second Congo war

MENA: Its place in the global atmospheric circulation

Earth's Water Supply - 96.5% oceans (salt water) - 2.5% freshwater Fresh Water Sources - In MENA, there's barely any sources of fresh water Circulation - High pressure zone between Hadley and Farell cells - Gives us dry descending air

Arctic: Exclusive Economic Zones

Economic Zones - 200 nautical miles from baseline or continental shelf argument - State has rights over resources on surface, in water, or sea floor and under sea floor - Resource exploration and exploitation - Fishing zone, within EEZ movement is free to all Continental Shelf - Countries are interpreting the law with a grain of salt by claiming that their continental shelf is longer than it might be to get more territorial economic claims - "Continental shelf can be extended out from the 200 mile territory claim) - Plate tectonics matter and affect international law - Importance of islands for making claims to territorial seas

Brexit: 2) Regional Fragmentation

End of the UK? - UK and Wales voted to leave EU - Scotland and Northern Ireland voted to remain What next?

East Asia: Environmental degradation

Extinction - Chinese alligator is one of two existing alligator species in the world - Originally found throughout deltas of Yangtze (world's third longest river) are now almost extinct - Plan to reintroduce the alligator when there were only 130 left in the wild (beginning in 1999) - The Baiji Yangtze Dolphin is already extinct - With decades of industrial and agricultural pollution, the ecosystem has rapidly changed - Massive flood control has also changed the environment - The impact of agricultural and industrial development on ecologies of East Asia - The government of China with its mix of free market capitalism and state control, has come to re-evaluate the costs of its development - Linkages to other regions, eg. This endemic species of alligator was saved via the Bronx

South Asia: early South Asia (the Mauryan Empire, the Mughal Empire)

Mauryan Empire - 320 - 125 BCE - One of the first empires in South Asia - Emperor Ashoka's wheel of law - Spread of Buddhism across all of South Asia - Conquest by Dharma, emperor denounced violence - Important for establishing centralized religious political system across south asia Gupta Empire - 320 - 550 CE - Sometimes called the "Golden Age of Hindu Culture" - Peace, stability, huge achievements in mathematics, arts, literature, and astronomy - Plays, inventions, medicine, chess Mughal Empire India - Late 15th C India conquered by Turkish clan from Persia (modern day Iran) - Important because conquest introduces Islam to Punjab (NW) and Bengal (NE) - Integrated into a highly organized system of structure - A golden age for India Art, architecture, music, literature, and law - South Asia became an economic powerhouse (important for later)

Oceania: Three sub regions of the Pacific Islands

Melanesia - Fiji, Papua New Guinea, etc, Micronesia - Guam, Mariams Island, etc, and Polynesia -

Oceania: Australia's Pacific Solution Immigration Policy and changing borders

Offshore Borders Consisted of three central strategies 1) Thousands of islands were excised from Australia's migration zone or Australian territory (they took thousands of islands out of immigration purposes) 2) Australian Defence Force commenced Operation Relex to intercept vessels carrying asylum seekers 3) The asylum seekers were removed to detention centers in Nauru and Papuea New Guinea while their refugee status was determined - Some of these islands like Nauru, are Asutralian, but the government removed them from the "Australian Migration Zone" — a territorial categorization from which asylum applications could legally originate - A creative use of geography removed asylum seekers from sovereign territory - Australia is at forefront of model other countries are starting to use

MENA: Orientalism and imaginative geographies (*watch documentary and reading!)

Orientalism and Imperialism - "The Orient was almost a European invention" - Said - "The struggle over geography is not only about soldiers and cannons, but about ideas, forms, images, and imaginings" - Said - It is a framework for looking at difference - A lens (discourse): the way the west looks at the rest of the world - An academic institution - A style of thought based upon the mental and material differences between the orient and the occident (the notion of the world comprised as two unequal halves) - An important part of material domination

MENA: Ottoman Empire, The Mandate System, and the Aftermath

Ottoman Empire - Successor to the Byzantines, in power for more than 600 years (Turkish Muslims) - By the end of the 19th C, the empire was under a lot of pressure from emerging nationalist movements - WWI: lost its European lands and the polyglot empire began to fall apart to national claims - The ottomans were defeated in WWI and the empire was radically restructured The Mandate System - Post WWI Paris Peace Conference, Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire were carved up - Mandates: areas generally administered by a European power, with the promise and preparation for self-government and future independence - Not independent, but colonies - Syria and Lebanon given to France - Iraq and Palestine to Britain - New form of political control was created in the ME Sykes Picot Agreement - Agreement between French and British to carve up core parts of the Ottoman Empire 1916 - One by one, most of the countries gained independence

South Asia: India, Famine, Climate, and integration into the global economy

Partition and Independence 1947 - Grassroots political resistance - Indian National Congress Party in 1887 - Decline of the British Empire post WWI and then WWII - After WWII Britain was not able to control and maintain all of its empires and the growing nationalism in those empires - Britain simply no longer had the resources with which to control its greatest imperial asset, and its exit from India was messy, hasty, and clumsily improvised Partition - More than 12 million people fled across the new national boundaries - The largest refugee migration ever recorded in the world - Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) was given its independence as a colony in 1948 - In creating new, independent countries, Britain sought to follow the European model of state building national states on the foundations of ethnicity, especially language and religion - This was a British idea that nation states should be ruled by only one group of people or one religion

South Asia: Physiography

Peninsular highlands - A broad plateau flanked by two chains of hills Mountain rim - Spectacular terrain, remote balleys Plains - Created by deposition of material eroded from the highlands and rim Bangal Delta - Created by the Ganges, Brahmaputra, the Meghna, and their distributaries (river branches that flow away), which create vast web of waterways Coastal Fringe - Formed by marine erosion of the highlands

Sub-Saharan Africa: Geomorphology, soils, and minerals

Plateau continent (raised plain) - The higher plateaus are habitable, cooler temps, higher rainfall East African Rift Valley - Two major valleys - 6000 miles from Jordan to the Red Sea - Filled with deep elongated lakes - Continental Rifting: magma rises to the surface, pushes continental crush apart and what's left in opening, rift valley and uplift on sides Lakes - Victoria and Tangayika

Oceania: Geopolitical struggle for the Arctic

Russian assertion that the seabed under the pole, called the Lomonosov Ridge, is an extension of Russia's continental shelf and thus Russian territory. Canada wants its own land too. Yet, indigenous peoples have lived in Arctic region for centuries Their claims are not really acknowledged and not a competition or 'threat'

Russia and More: Why the Soviet Union sought to transform nature to such an extent

Summary: engineering of nature to create ideal place for civilization - Stalin's plan: "Plan for the Great Transformation of Nature" - Krushchev's "Virgin Lands" campaign and project to open Siberia with a dam ( Failure due to climatic conditions) (Problems of drought and wind erosion) - Brezhnev's "River Diversion Project" and railroad All of these... functioned to increase power of central bureaucracy "In the name of communism" Communism - Freed obstacles, dream of modernity - Unlimited social engineering, technology, and total transformation of nature

Sub-Saharan Africa: The Scramble for Africa and the New Scramble for Africa

The Scramble: - By 19th c, European interests in Africa greatly expanded - Explorers, missionaries, and traders move inland - Explosion of exploration and writing about Africa - 1880s: deep competition among European powers to compete for resources across Africa - Competing to dominate global empires and market Geography and Empire: - Geographic knowledge was key to expansion of European politics and economic power - Maps brought 'undiscovered' lands into spacial existence - Geographic knowledge became a valued commodity: trade routes, ports, climate patterns, plants, territories, etc. - With advancement of geographical science, new knowledge of African resources, gold and diamonds were discovered Berlin Conference: - 1884- 1885: Conference divides Africa among European powers driven by imperial expansion, private companies (which integrated the continent into global capitalist economics) New Scramble for Africa: - China has pumped hundreds of billions of dollars into African governments and infrastructure - In return, it has reaped hundred of billions of commodities (eg. light railway in Addis Ababa) - US Africa command bases, in which US military has built an extensive archipelago of African outposts, transforming the continent, into a laboratory for a new kind of war

MENA: Where is the ME? What/where are the boundaries? How has the region been 'made' a geographic space? How is this tied to Orientalism?

World Regions - World regions are not naturally existing, homogeneous spaces; rather they are partly social constructs that are formed and altered in a myriad of discourses Making of the ME - The UK's possessions in South Asia made the Middle East geo-strategically important and the middle of the journey to India - Hence, the its origin as a British-centric label 'to an ambiguous region of Asia between the Mediterranean and Indian Oceans.' - In 1921 Winston Churchill officially institutionalized the term when he established the Middle East Department of the British Colonial Office - The department was concerned with British post-World War I territories in Palestine, Trans-Jordan, Iraq, and Egypt; thus Syria, Lebanon, the Arabian Peninsula, Turkey, and Iran were not part of his vision of the Middle East What's In a Name? **These definitions are coined based on Western influences and interests in the region** - Naming of places is fundamentally an act of power - To have and make a name stick is a reflection of an imbalance of power - It has been western, not eastern, terminology that has girdled the globe along with the spread of western civilization and political influence - These names have Eurocentric origins

East Asia: Reorganizing world regions? The Pacific Rim, China's Belt Road Initiative, and The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor

World Regions Realigning? - Many countries owe China debt - Countries and regions have started to realign; now lots of transpacific trade The Pacific Rim - A new region that has emerged - The direction of flows in int'l trade have reversed Eg: US typically looked eastward to Europe and Northwards to Canada - The pacific rim: 47 nations and territories bordering the Pacific - 48% of world trade and 58% of world GDP - Economic integration of urban centers (Seould, Tokyo, Shanghai, Fuzhou, Singapore, Sydney, Vancouver, LA, etc.) map out a new world region New Regional Relations - In 2013, China president Xi Jinping announced the launch of both the Silk Road economic belt (Belt road initiative) and 21st century maritime silk road, infrastructure development and investment initiatives that would stretch from East Asia to Europe — geopolitical and economic motivations - It harkens back to the original Silk Road - The vision included creating a vast network of railways, energy pipelines, highways, and streamlined border crossings, both westwards — through the mountainous former Soviet republics — and southward, to Pakistan India and Southeast Asia - China has invested in multiple countries to escape the Development Trap Does China have big enough domestic market to compete? China Pakistan Economic Corridor - "China Pakistan economic corridor is a framework of regional connectivity. CPEC will not only benefit China and Pakistan but will have positive impact on Iran, Afghanistan, India, Central Asian Republic, and the region" (CPEC) - Gwadar forms the crux of the CPEC project, as it is envisaged to be the link between China's ambitious One Belt, One Road project and its 21st Century Maritime Silk Road project - The expanded port will be located near a 2.282 acre free trade area in Gwadar