Geography Matters Research Articles

Spatial diffusion and geographical patterns in the Turkish vote for pro-Islamist parties

ABSTRACT Electoral geography is mostly concerned with the geographic distribution of voters and their attributes. We add a new argument to the discussion about electoral geography: that parties pursue geographically oriented stronghold strategies. Parties win electoral provinces, transform them into strongholds, and then use the stronghold´s resources to systematically target nearby provinces. We illustrate our argument with a quantitative analysis of the rise of the Turkish Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (AKP), utilizing a spatial diffusion perspective. Our analysis shows that the AKP has electoral gains in a given ‘receiver’ province if they have performed well in other ‘sender’ provinces in previous elections. This relation is moderated by geographical distance: only past electoral success in nearby ‘sender’ provinces has an impact on the electoral fortune of the AKP in the ‘receiver’ province. Thus, our argument is that geography matters and it channels party strategies.

Going the distance: Estimating the effect of provincial borders on trade when geography (and everything else) matters

Abstract.In the presence of often‐cited provincial non‐tariff trade barriers, one should observe provincial border effects in Canada. However, using provincial trade data leads to upward biased estimates of the border effect, because intraprovincial trade is skewed towards short distance flows that are poorly estimated by gravity models. We overcome this bias by using sub‐provincial trade flows generated from a transaction‐level transportation dataset. The results show that border effects fall as geographies are more fine‐grained and uniform. In contrast to the US, where state border effects were eliminated using similar approaches, provincial border effects remain, with an implied 6.9% tariff equivalent.Résumé.Tenir la distance: estimation de l’effet frontalier provincial sur le commerce en tenant compte de la géographie. Lorsque l’on aborde la question très discutée des obstacles non‐tarifaires aux échanges commerciaux, il convient d’observer l’effet des frontières provinciales au Canada. L’utilisation de données commerciales interprovinciales se traduit néanmoins par des biais par excès au niveau de l’effet frontalier, les flux de courtes distances étant surreprésentés et mal évalués par les modèles gravitaires. Afin de résoudre ce problème d’écart systématique par excès, nous utilisons des données commerciales infraprovinciales issues d’un ensemble de données transactionnelles relatives au transport. Nos résultats montrent que l’effet frontalier diminue dès lors que les unités géographiques sont plus petites et uniformes. En utilisant les mêmes approches, on constate que l’effet frontalier disparaît aux États‐Unis. En revanche, au Canada, l’effet frontalier persiste avec un équivalent tarifaire implicite de 6,9 %.

A spatial analysis of the COVID-19 period prevalence in U.S. counties through June 28, 2020: where geography matters?

PurposeThis study aims to understand how spatial structures, the interconnections between counties, matter in understanding the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) period prevalence across the United States. MethodsWe assemble a county-level data set that contains COVID-19–confirmed cases through June 28, 2020, and various sociodemographic measures from multiple sources. In addition to an aspatial regression model, we conduct spatial lag, spatial error, and spatial autoregressive combined models to systematically examine the role of spatial structure in shaping geographical disparities in the COVID-19 period prevalence. ResultsThe aspatial ordinary least squares regression model tends to overestimate the COVID-19 period prevalence among counties with low observed rates, but this issue can be effectively addressed by spatial modeling. Spatial models can better estimate the period prevalence for counties, especially along the Atlantic coasts and through the Black Belt. Overall, the model fit among counties along both coasts is generally good with little variability evident, but in the Plain states, the model fit is conspicuous in its heterogeneity across counties. ConclusionsSpatial models can help partially explain the geographic disparities in the COVID-19 period prevalence. These models reveal spatial variability in the model fit including identifying regions of the country where the fit is heterogeneous and worth closer attention in the immediate short term.

Private-public wage gap and return to experience: Role of geography, gender and education

Analyses of the static private-public wage premium are available for most industrialized countries and the higher education level in the public sector has been shown to be important. We address three shortcomings in these studies – the return to work experience accumulated in the two sectors, the role of geography, and gender differences. Rich register data for Norway allow for observation of work experience by sector and region, and the dynamic gap resulting from different returns to sector experience can be calculated. When selection on observable and unobservable worker characteristics is controlled for, the estimates show that experience accumulated in the private sector has higher return than public sector experience. Geography matters, and both the static gap and the dynamic experience effect are higher in cities. For the low educated, the additional return to private experience is a city phenomenon only. Gender differences are important for high-educated workers. High-educated women have less additional return to private sector experience than high-educated men and receive the same gain from experience accumulated in cities and in the rest of the country. The dynamic experience effect adds to the static private wage premium, and for high-educated male workers it accounts for about 2/3 of the total wage gap including 10 years of experience.

Locally, Regionally and Nationally Online: Online News Comments Sections as Public Arenas in Geographically Anchored Media Structures

This article examines online news comments sections as both representing an example of and a subject concerning changing media structures, the changing relationship between users and media outlets, the way this relationship is influenced by the (changing) understanding of place and, especially, the way users participate in the new public arenas provided by geographically anchored online media sources. The focus is on Finnish online media in its golden era, the early 2010s. The analysis of user comments left in the comments sections of a small local newspaper, a regional newspaper and a national newspaper suggests that geography matters. Comments sections serve as public arenas for discussions of shared issues, specified through geography, and construct public spheres. Especially in the local context, the meaning of such public arenas should not be underestimated.

Too packed for existence? More-than-subjective land-use issues in pockets of local order: the case of land-use conflict in Swedish Lapland

ABSTRACT Time geography has been applied to study geographical situations characterised by intertwining temporal and spatial aspects. The availability of space for the conduct of land-use activities as temporal-action sequences can be investigated using time geography. The present study utilises time geography to examine how geography matters in the context of a contested mining proposal in Swedish Lapland, namely the case of reindeer herding in Gállok. The time-geographic notion of “packing” that denotes time–space compactness is utilised to investigate the room to manoeuvre available for reindeer herding. The theoretical entry lies in the idea that maximum nearness in human society has to do with the manner in which activities are organised in space and time. This is embraced by the time-geographic concept of the pocket of local order. The article reviews discussion in the literature of the notion of packing and discusses the organisation of reindeer herding as land use in the case studied. The study examines how space and time may matter in detail, as well as how the concept of the pocket of local order can be utilised to assess this and to detect the prevailing degree of packing. It suggests that such dependences represent more-than-subjective preconditions of operational character in land use. The study contributes to understanding of how the successful conduct of the business of land use may depend on the ability to maintain organisational coherence in a temporal–spatial sense.

Understanding the Stickiness of Commodity Supply Chains Is Key to Improving Their Sustainability

Summary Commodity trade is central to the global economy but is also associated with socio-environmental impacts, for example, deforestation, especially in producer countries. It is crucial to understand how geographic sourcing patterns of commodities and commercial relationships between places and actors influence land-use dynamics, socio-economic development, and environmental degradation. Here, we propose a concept and methodological approach to analyze the geographic stickiness of commodity supply chains, which is the maintenance of supply network configurations over time and across perturbations. We showcase policy-relevant metrics for all Brazilian soy exports between 2003 and 2017, using high-resolution supply chain data from www.trase.earth . We find that the Brazilian soy traders with the largest market share exhibit stickier geographic sourcing patterns, and that the supply network configurations between production places and traders become increasingly sticky in subsequent years. Understanding trade stickiness is crucial for supply chain accountability, because it directly affects the effectiveness of zero-deforestation commitments.

When does geography matter most? Age-specific geographical effects in the patterning of, and relationship between, mental wellbeing and mental illness.

Mental illness and mental wellbeing are related but distinct constructs. Despite this, geographical enquiry often references the two as interchangeable indicators of mental health and assumes the relationship between the two is consistent across different geographical scales. Furthermore, the importance of geography in such research is commonly assumed to be static for all age groups, despite the large body of evidence demonstrating contextual effects in age-specific populations. We leverage simultaneous measurement of a mental illness and mental wellbeing metric from Understanding Society, a UK population-based survey, and employ bivariate, cross-classified multilevel modelling to characterise the relationship between geographical context and mental health. Results provide strong evidence for contextual effects for both responses before and after covariate adjustment, with weaker evidence for area-classification and PSU-level contextual effects for the GHQ-12 after covariate adjustment. Results support a two-continua model of mental health at the individual level, but indicates that consensual benefit may be achieved across both dimensions by intervening at household and regional levels. There is also some evidence of a greater contextual effects for mental wellbeing than for mental illness. Results highlight the potential of the household as a target for intervention design for consensual benefit across both constructs. Results also suggest the increased importance of geographical context for older respondents across both responses. This research supports an area-based approach to improving both mental illness and mental wellbeing in older populations.

The Proposed EU-UK Partnership Agreement as a Canada Style Agreement

This paper looks into the question of differentiation in EU foreign policy. Does the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) reached between the EU and the UK in December 2020 fall within a familiar differentiation track? In particular, is it a ‘Canada style’ agreement rather than, say, a ‘Norway style’ agreement? To what extent is it an attempt by the EU to nudge the UK into conformity with EU regulation? Does the agreement show that ‘geography matters’? We shall see that it is most of all a new generation deep trade agreement, like the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between the EU and Canada. In a typology of international agreements, deep trade agreements have their distinct place. Their features allow parties to build a meaningful partnership while keeping a fair amount of control. This paper points to parallels between the EU-UK TCA and such an agreement. It gives the UK the opportunity to ‘take back control’, leaving it much more freedom than under a Norway style agreement. Its main feature is ‘freedom to legislate’, subject to the maintenance of a level playing field, and human rights protection. At no instance, there is a hard obligation for the UK to accept stricter environmental or sanitary standards on its territory than hitherto (the unique alignment of Northern Ireland having been laid down earlier in the 2019 Withdrawal Agreement). Importantly, the sophisticated dispute settlement provisions of the TCA have a unique feature, namely, that of facilitating divergence between the EU and the UK. The TCA allows the parties to inflict tariffs or to suspend (parts of) the agreement only under specific circumstances. Arguably, these circumstances are uniquely applicable to the TCA.

Does the monocentric model work in a polycentric urban system? An examination of German metropolitan regions

In explaining the determinants of urban spatial structure, researchers have relied on the traditional monocentric ‘Alonso-Mills-Muth’ model. This article contributes to this discussion by testing the viability of the monocentric model when applied to metropolitan areas in Germany, a country traditionally associated with a polycentric urban structure, regional differences and urban shrinkage. We estimate the model with a unique dataset covering 92 metropolitan areas over two time periods (2000 and 2014), which allows estimation in both a cross-sectional and a panel framework. Using spatial and panel regression techniques, we test whether the underlying determinants of urbanisation vary according to factors unique to the German context, including the roles of historical geography, regional polycentricism and urban shrinkage. We found that, similar to the US studies, the model performed reasonably well, particularly with the overall fit and the performance of the population variable, which was significant and positively related to urbanised area. Personal income and land prices showed mixed results, and the coefficients for transportation costs proved to be challenging. We also found that regional geography matters: a region in eastern Germany is smaller than one in the west. A proxy variable for regional polycentricity was not significant. Finally, we found that the model’s behaviour differs between growing and shrinking regions, most notably in the differing impacts that population change has on the change in urbanised area.

Economic Geography, Politics, and Policy

Globalization has reduced the importance of distance between countries. Yet, within countries, geography matters now more than ever. Economic activities, including production and employment, occur unevenly across space within countries, and globalization consequently impacts various regions differently. Some areas benefit from international economic integration while others lose, and as a result, economic geography shapes citizens’ experience of globalization. Economic geography also influences governments’ responses to globalization and economic shocks. Economic geography consequently merits the attention of political scientists. By examining economic geography, researchers will find new traction on long-standing theoretical debates and valuable insights on recent developments, including the growing backlash against globalization. The challenges of studying economic geography include causal complexity and measurement issues.

Geopolicing Race, Gender, and Class: How the Police Immobilise Urban Allochthones

AbstractCity landscapes are ever‐changing stages for the protagonists that pass through it. For police officers they serve as canvasses to positively and negatively code subjects. As such, geography matters to the body. Rather than taking geographic locations, crime statistics, predictive maps and human bodies as objective truths, I focus on the work of police officers, not in terms of an instrumental‐rational “meeting of policy targets” or attempts to reduce crime, but the work required to make raced, gendered and classed geographical differentiations. This process culminates in geopolicing: the spatial imaginations and practices of police officers as to who, what and where to police and, of course, why. Geopolicing includes the aesthetic re‐ordering and cleansing of urban “matter out of place”. Police officers perceive exclusionary territories in which landscapes racialised as white and identified as affluent are threatened by urban allochthones identified by class, race, gender, age and residential status. The findings are based on my ethnography among police officers in the city of Amsterdam, The Netherlands, between 2007 and 2011.

Physical geography contributes

Physical geography is a process, conducted by people, of integration and synthesis of ideas and observations to advance scientific understanding of Earth’s surface and atmosphere and to apply this knowledge to the greater good of the planet and its people. Therefore, physical geography matters; that is, physical geography makes a difference to people and contributes to environmental decision making at various scales. Based upon presentations and discussion at the 2019 AAG Annual Meeting (see editorial above in this issue), we provide here a historical perspective and distillation of how and why, in our opinions, physical geography matters. Although we provide several specific examples, these represent only a small portion of the large body of excellent and relevant physical geography research.

When geography matters: International diversification and firm performance of Spanish multinationals

This paper studies how the nature and shape of the relationship between inter- national diversification (ID) and performance (P) may vary according to a firm’s geographical focus of internationalization. Using a sample of Spanish multinational firms for the 2004—2012 period we find an M-shaped relationship. However, significant differences are found when the different geographical foci of internationalization are considered. Strong support is found when firms adopt a regional focus (an inverted S-curve when the ID measure refers to the number of foreign countries and an M-curve when it refers to the size of the network of foreign sub- sidiaries), a biregional focus (an S-curve) and a semiglobal focus (an inverted S-curve but also an M-curve with foreign subsidiaries). These findings and their pattern suggest the critical impor- tance of the country of origin and the geographical focus of internationalization in explaining the relationship between ID—P.JEL CLASSIFICATION C33; F23; G15; L25

Are Politics Local? The Two Dimensions of Party Nationalization around the World

The statement that geography matters for politics probably will not be contested by many political scientists. Therefore, it is quite surprising that few studies have systematically explored how the territorial distribution of preferences affects political processes and policy outcomes. This book by Scott Morgenstern is an important landmark study that puts geography high on the research agenda of comparative political science. Three features make this book worthwhile reading for scholars working on the nationalization of elections and parties. First, Morgenstern identifies two dimensions of party nationalization and shows that they are theoretically and empirically unrelated. Static nationalization refers to the extent to which party vote shares are homogeneously distributed across districts at a particular point in time. Dynamic nationalization taps into the consistency in the change of a party’s vote shares across time. The combination of these two dimensions leads to a useful fourfold categorization of nationalized, unstable, unbalanced, and locally focused parties. As Morgenstern shows in Chapters 7, 8, and 9, each type of party has different implications for electoral accountability and bill co-sponsorship among legislators.

Does geography matter in mortality? An analysis of potentially avoidable mortality by remoteness index in Canada.

The avoidable mortality rate is a key indicator of overall health and health care utilization. However, the avoidable mortality rate may differ by the relative remoteness of a community. Avoidable mortality rates specific to remote areas cannot be investigated unless there is a clear geographic classification of remoteness. Therefore, this research uses a newly developed remoteness index to explore the geographic variability of avoidable mortality in Canada. The remoteness index, Canadian Vital Statistics-Death Database (2011 to 2015), and the 2016 Census of Population are used to understand the geographic variability of preventable and treatable mortality rates in Canada. Descriptive and multivariate data analysis techniques are used to test the hypothesis that remoteness is one of the statistically significant predictors of avoidable mortality rates in Canada. There is a clear gradient of preventable and treatable mortality rates by relative remoteness. The preventable and treatable mortality rates are significantly higher in more remote areas than in easily accessible areas. The remoteness index is a good predictor of both preventable and treatable causes of mortality for low-Aboriginal census subdivisions but not for high-Aboriginal census subdivisions in Canada. Both preventable and treatable mortality rates vary significantly by remoteness, despite Canada's universal health care system. The remoteness of Canadian communities may have affected health care delivery and utilization.

An applied methodology for optimal sizing and placement of hybrid power source in remote area of South Algeria

This paper proposes an efficient approach based on Virus colony search (VCS) algorithm to optimize the sizing and placement of stand-alone hybrid power system including photovoltaic solar panels (PV) and battery bank in system which employ diesel generators (DGs) as pilot source of electrical energy formatting hybrid system. The optimization is carried out to incessantly satisfy the load demand. Two objectives have been defined: the reduction of the equalized cost system (economic objective) and equalized CO2 equivalent life cycle emissions (environmental objective). In the optimization problem, the dependability index of not supplied energy (NSE) is also considered to have a reliable system. The VCS algorithm is an effective and powerful approach that has fast convergence and high precision. This algorithm simulates diffusion and infection strategies for the host cells adopted by virus to survive and propagate in the cell environment. With the policies, the individual in the new algorithm explores and exploits the search space more professionally. This study is applied to Fort-Lotfi City: Tindouf (South of Algeria) that still needs access to National grid electricity due to economic and geography matters. The results prove the advantages of hybrid power systems in isolated locations ranging from being cost effective and reducing the accumulated emissions. The proposed algorithm is compared with PSO and MPSO algorithms which confirm its best performance and effectiveness.

When geography matters: International diversification and firm performance of Spanish multinationals

This paper studies how the nature and shape of the relationship between international diversification (ID) and performance (P) may vary according to a firm's geographical focus of internationalization. Using a sample of Spanish multinational firms for the 2004–2012 period we find an M-shaped relationship. However, significant differences are found when the different geographical foci of internationalization are considered. Strong support is found when firms adopt a regional focus (an inverted S-curve when the ID measure refers to the number of foreign countries and an M-curve when it refers to the size of the network of foreign subsidiaries), a biregional focus (an S-curve) and a semiglobal focus (an inverted S-curve but also an M-curve with foreign subsidiaries). These findings and their pattern suggest the critical importance of the country of origin and the geographical focus of internationalization in explaining the relationship between ID–P.

A Long-Distance Call? Social Space and Corporation Nouvelle’s Places of Production

This article analyses the spatial practices of a collective art project developed by Corporation Nouvelle, a group of modernist artists working in Portugal during the First World War. It investigates its formation and activities, while discussing the relationship between the ultra-peripheral places where these activities were designed, and the transnational-cosmopolitan profile that the group developed. The article revisits some well-known data on Robert Delaunay (1885–1941) and Sonia Delaunay (1885–1979), Amadeo de Souza Cardoso (1887–1918) and Corporation Nouvelle’s operations, resting on two interlocked theoretical determinants: the first questions the way we tend to think about space and place as objectified categories; and the second discusses how in art history the notions of center and periphery tend to operate as geographical locations and to function as discrete categories. The case study of Corporation Nouvelle helps to show that such binary opposition is far from exhausting the ways in which peripheral places are perceived and lived. It is also utilized to argue that geography matters: places of production are not mere locations but social constructs that entail a dialectical relationship between the perceived, the conceived, and the lived.

Atmosphere in the home stadium of Hertha BSC (German Bundesliga): melodies of moods, collective bodies, and the relevance of space

ABSTRACT German football stadiums are well known for their atmosphere. It is often described as ‘electrifying,’ or ‘cracking.’ This article focuses on this atmosphere. Using a phenomenological approach, it explores how this emotionality can be understood and how geography matters while attending a match. Atmosphere in this context is conceptualized based on work by as a mood-charged space, neither object- nor subject-centered, but rather a medium of perception which cannot not exist. Based on qualitative research done in the home stadium of Hertha BSC in the German Bundesliga, this article shows that the bodily sensations experienced by spectators during a visit to the stadium are synchronized with events on the pitch and with the more or less imposing scenery. The analysis of in situ diaries reveals that spectators experience a comprehensive sense of collectivity. The study presents evidence that the occurrence of these bodily sensations is strongly connected with different aspects of spatiality. This includes sensations of constriction and expansion within the body, an awareness of one’s location within the stadium, the influence of the immediate surroundings and cognitive here/there and inside/outside distinctions.