Territory, politics of power, and physical spatial networks: The case of Baghdad, Iraq

Abstract

Despite our commonsense understanding of territory as a bounded region, some political aspects of territory can be better described as effects of physical spatial networks. To illustrate the point, we study territorial practices of power in Baghdad before and during the Iraq War that started in 2003. We use various techniques and measures of spatial networks provided by ‘space syntax’, because they have proven useful for describing the spatiality of social processes. We use Baghdad as a case study, because the territorial practices of power by the Ba'th regime favoring a Sunni minority and undermining a Shiite majority had existed in this city for decades before the Iraq war. These practices were upset and significant territorial changes occurred during the sectarian war in 2006 and 2007 at the time of US-led occupation of Iraq. We study the relationships between territorial practices and physical spatial networks before the war and during the war. Based on our findings, we conclude that spatial network dependency of territory and territoriality may exist under a dominant political system or even during a war when a dominant political system remains unclear. However, more studies are needed to generalize the findings of our study.