American geography and the rise of political geography in Russia

Abstract

Until the late1980s, political geography was a rather peripheral and exotic field in Soviet geography. The Soviet Union existed in a relative isolation from the outside world, and fluctuations of interest in this field among Western geographers did not significantly affect the Soviet geographical community. In 1984, at the 25th International Geographical Congress in Paris, academician Innokenty Gerasimov (director of the Institute of Geography of the Academy of Sciences in Moscow for 35 years and for a long time the most internationally visible Soviet geographer) objected against the use of the very term 'political geography' in the name of a newly-born IGU study group created on the initiative of a group of British and American geographers led by Ron Johnston. As a result, it was baptized 'study group on the world political map', and in 1988, it became an IGU Commission keeping the same name for years. The reason was a fear of being accused of attempting to revive a discipline which could be associated with German and conservative American geopoltics, stigmatized as 'burgeous pseudo-science'. At the same time, political geography always attracted the attention of leading Soviet geographers, including Gerasimov himself. Characteristically, on his return to his Institute from Paris he made a long report on the results of the congress, stressing the development of political geography and the need to cultivate this field in the USSR. Political geography was promoted by the father-founder of Soviet human geography Nikolai Baransky1 and later by such remarkable figures as Professors Yulian Saushkin, Isaak Maergoiz and Viktor Volsky at Moscow University and Sergei Lavrov at Leningrad University, who tutored students specialized in this field, and published some papers themselves. They tried to find an ideological and institutional justification for the existence of political geography as an autonomous geographical discipline in inventoring politicalgeographical descriptions found in the writings of Marx, Engels and Lenin and they noticed that the basic elements of political geography could be traced from the works of outstanding Russian geographers of the past. In the Universities of Moscow and Leningrad, a number of poltical-geographical dissertations have been undertaken since 1979. All of them were devoted to electoral geography in Western countries, for example Italy, France, USA and Canada. Some general articles giving an idea about the essence and objectives of political geography appeared in geographical journals. Their authors speculated, in particular, about political patterns in developing countries and the political geography of the World ocean, with its strategically important seas and straits. They also tried to summarize and criticize the ideas of Western political geographers. However, until the late1980s political geography did ot take shape as a relevant discipline. Because of ideological constraints, political-geographical studies of the Soviet Union were in fact prohibited, with the partial exception of administrative boundaries. Electoral geography was not related to concrete practical needs. Any extensive reference to works of Western geographers had to include at least formal critical remarks 'from Marxist positions'. In this respect, I remember my first publication in a Wes ern journal. My co-author and I tried to analyze papers submitted to the meeting of the Research Committee on Political Geography at the International Political Science Association's World Congress in Moscow. Publication of our paper became possible only after months of editing. Helpfully, the special committee finally came to conclusion that there was nothing wrong in the article. In one of its section, a well-known American political scientist and geographer was strongly accused of reviving 'the worst traditions of geopolitics', because he considered the mental space of American politicians. We have never discussed it wit him, and he has always been very kind to me. Although it wa my elder co-author who wrote this section, I still feel some fault. I suppose the editors of the journal thought that our contribution was an amazing example of orthodox thinking. Nevertheless, the most interesting theories proposed by American and other Western geographers were known well enough, at least in the most important departments and instites, thanks to the good journal of abstracts published by the All-Union Institute of Scientific and Technical Information and, paradoxically, to the best 'critical' articles as well. A ew era came suddenly and rapidly. Knowledge on ethnic and national identities, borders, and conflicts became really important for politicians and mass media. In lat 1986, the first nationalist manifestation took place in Alma-Ata; it was followed by bloody clashes in NagornoKarabakh and Azerbaijan. Relations between ethnic groups in many other areas were deteriorating quickly. Soon, in late1988, the first quasi-democratic elections were scheduled in March 1989.