GE21001 Dynamic Human Worlds Lecture 7 Political Geography: Geopolitics, power, space and inequality Dr. Susan P. Mains Geography

Lecture Outline Political Geography Formal & informal politics Useful Reading: Painter, J Politics, Geography and ‘Political Geography’: A Critical Perspective. London: Arnold.

Defining Political Geography What is political geography? Why is it important? How are people, politics and spaces interrelated?

Defining Political Geography What Understanding changes in politics and social relations locally, nationally, globally Dynamics of human relations Spatial patterns of changes Political institutions and identities are fluid

Defining Political Geography Why Understanding changing political situations and providing policy Planning for political, economic and social changes Understanding conflict Understanding immigration and the processes leading to refugees

Defining Political Geography How How do certain conflicts come about? How do people experience politics in their daily lives? What local and global conditions have led to changing political coalitions? How do we create political districts? How do we allocate government funding?

Defining Political Geography Political Geography a sub-discipline of geography various definitions e.g., “the relationship between space and place (geography) and politics (or power, or government)” (J. Painter 1995)

Defining Political Geography Political Geography political geography as a discourse: a means of framing and understanding the world including some topics, excluding others e.g., the women’s movement and feminism the power of inclusion

Formal & Informal Politics “May you live in interesting times” Formal Politics: the operation of the constitutional system of government and its publicly defined institutions and procedures –e.g., foreign affairs, public policy, political parties

US-Mexico Border

Formal & Informal Politics US-Mexico Border

Formal & Informal Politics

Environmental Protection Agency

Formal & Informal Politics

Informal Politics: “politics is everywhere” –e.g., office politics, school curricula, tv programming, advertising These are overlapping.

Formal & Informal Politics “Politics is about Power” Knowledge Discipline and social control Michel Foucault

Formal & Informal Politics Politics is multi-scalar: individual, local, regional, national, international exists at different temporal scales, weekly, annually, every 4 years, etc. the “glocal” politics is in the eye of the beholder