Political Organization Of Space Research Articles

Девяностые: учреждение политии

In the 1990s, after the collapse of the USSR, was established the Russian polity, which continues to exist to this day. In this paper polity is understood as a macro-social community, united by a certain political order i.e., by a stable set of institutions and actors, as well as normative standards for organizing their interactions, both formal and informal. Establishment is understood as a series of events that establish these most fundamental frameworks for political action, as well as a repertoire of its scenarios, behavioral stereotypes, strategies, and tactics. The negative myth about the nineties, which has dominated the Russian public discourse in the recent years, describes the 1990s as a time of catastrophe and degradation. It certainly has its reasons, but this myth almost completely ignores the fact that the same decade was also a time of creation. Thus, the current state of Russia cannot be understood without paying attention to the circumstances of its establishment. The article describes some of the key features of the modern Russian polity that emerged in the 1990s — the “main takeaway” of the constituent era. They are the following: the electoral legitimacy of the supreme political power; non-partisan presidency; capitalism as the economic foundation of the political order; federalism as a principle of territorial organization of political space; freedom of association; freedom of religion; open borders. This list is not exhaustive: there are other elements of the design of the Russian polity that can claim the status of constitutive ones. However, a radical change in all these institutions together or in any one of them individually would mean another re-establishment of the political community as a whole.

Strategic adaptation of city-regions in federal systems: comparing Canada and the United States

ABSTRACT The paper investigates the institutional resilience and adaptability of industrialized mid-sized city-regions nested within multitiered federal systems. The wider context of the discussion is the complex and shifting boundaries of subnational territorial politics as spaces of governance, and the attendant dynamic political organization of space amidst ongoing economic shifts and perturbations. The empirical focus is an in-depth comparative case study of two city-regions in Canada and the United States to explore the mechanics of institutional adaptation in the face of economic changes over the past few decades. Revisiting the concept of path dependency as a framework for understanding regional economic development governance, the discussion shifts the analytical focus from explaining stability to accounting for change. It also expands the analytical scope of urban policy governance platforms to shed a greater light on the complex multitiered institutional infrastructure of city-regions nested within federal systems as they seek to navigate through the challenges and opportunities of socioeconomic change.

Национализм, сепаратизм, демократия... Метаморфозы национальной идентичности в “старой” Европе

The author proposes a new approach to the interpretation of political phenomena traditionally described in both academic and political discourse as “nationalism” and “separatism”. “Nationalism” as a concept can provide a research framework for evaluating the factors that provoke ethnic tensions in democracies and stimulate their transformation into open conflicts between the central state and regional authorities in regions possessing a certain level of cultural – economic – political autonomy, but it needs to be updated to take into account the “new nationalism” phenomenon. “New nationalism” has recently taken root in the nation states of “old” Europe in regions with a high level of civic activism and economic and welfare development. Differing nationalist agendas comprise a situational combination of cultural, social and economic factors, which are channeled into political protest. The contestation over identity issues in territorial communities within the nation state are used by political elites to promote preferential tax policies, budget autonomy and an independent social and cultural policy, especially in the use of language and in education. At the core of the political agenda is the “right to decide” and to choose the priorities of community development which is promoted by democratic political agents of diverse political affiliation, predominantly centrist, in coalition with former radical nationalists who have abandoned radical political activities. An overview of regionalist contention in Europe indicates possible future transformations in the organization of political space in democracies where identity issues in hand with consistent development strategies will be the key consolidating factors for political communities involved in the integration processes.

Perspectives on Political Geography in AP® Human Geography

ABSTRACTTwo trends have remade the field of political geography over the past quarter-century. First, a revision of taken-for-granted concepts that amounted to spatial determinism. Second, pioneering many new and emerging concepts such as political ecology. Both trends are important contributions to the evolving section of the AP Human Geography course on the “Political Organization of Space.” Following a plea to make political geography more political and geographical, this article presents a classroom example from the field of political ecology.

Cross-Border Aspects of Sustainable Development in the Adriatic Region

In the Adriatic region one could find several contradictory tendencies, as a result of local accommodation of social structures and systems to the political organization of space. The persistent planning and spatial divergence prevents the region from achieving the same potential common development visions, bringing forward that area as a special ‘development region’ within the EU. The discussed case shows the need for a more appropriate governance of different horizontal (spatial and sectorial) as well as vertical (hierarchical) policies in planning cross-border cooperation or social and spatial (re)integration of borderlands and population, especially if we try to create a more sustainable and “long-lasting” development plan for our increasingly globalized and co-dependent “common home” on the European and Mediterranean level.

Kazakhstan's Kin State Diaspora: Settlement Planning and the Oralman Dilemma

the former soviet republics, now independent states, of Central Asia are some of the most fertile environments in the world for research into the trans-state dimensions of ethnicity.1 Having only r...

Political Organization of Space in Advanced Placement Human Geography

The political geography section of the course offers the opportunity to introduce students to one of the most important ways in which humans have divided up the surface of the Earth for purposes of management and control. By challenging students to consider what lies behind the patterns on political maps, this segment of the course can encourage the development of a critical geographical perspective while enhancing student appreciation of the link between geography and current events.

Conflict studies and critical geopolitics — theoretical concepts and recent research in political geography

The political and economic upheavals during the past two decades have led to a new social and political organization of space on all levels of scale. To deal with the obvious changes, political geography had to rethink and to extend its traditional concepts. Transcending its long taken-for-granted radical approaches, the Anglo-American geography developed two conceptional paths, both of which are still relevant for political geography today:

Civil and military space in Europe: An industrial perspective

If European space activities are to remain successful, change is needed. Greater emphasis must be placed on the needs of users, so that space technology development becomes more market driven. Synergy between civil and military applications should be pursued, e.g. through the adoption of dual-use technology. Finally, the political organization of space needs to be reworked with the aim of developing an overall European space policy - something that does not currently exist. This can best be achieved by the establishment of a new authority, probably within the context of the European Union (EU).

The Organization of Political Space and Citizen Responses to Dissatisfaction in Urban Communities: An Integrative Model

For more than three decades, the "spatial dimensions of urbanism" have provided an important theoretical tool for studying urban government and politics. Unfortunately, the now rather voluminous literature on the subject remains "painfully eclectic" (Goodman, 1977, p. 245). This is especially true in the refining of various propositions concerning the linkages between jurisdictional boundaries and individual attitudes and behaviors associated with political participation. Specifically, two problems confront the literature. First, there is a lack of an integrated model that encompasses the full range of behavioral and attitudinal responses to dissatisfaction with urban politics and accounts for the individual's choice from among those alternative response patterns. Second, the literature only incompletely and inappropriately addresses the impact of correspondence or lack thereof between spatial contours of social worlds and political jurisdictions on modes of political participation. This essay addresses these problems by developing a model of citizen response to dissatisfaction based on recent theoretical elaboration of Hirschman's (1970) work and applying that model to the analysis of the impact of correspondence-noncorrespondence on participation.

Space, Freedom, and Stability

This article outlines the many various relationships linking the political organization of space and individual freedom. The expansion of the latter in recent times compli cates considerably the former while it seems to put pressure on the old-standing forms of spatial partitioning.

Texts, actors and higher managers: judges, bureaucrats and the political organization of space

As an empirical discipline, human geography seeks to account for particular events and spatial patterns. Structuralist theories provide generalized explanations for these, but not for their details. To understand particular phenomena, an approach is needed which covers the role of individual actors operating within a structural frame. Giddens' theory of structuration provides a framework for such an approach. It is used here to inform a discussion of the roles of higher managers—executive, legislature, judiciary and senior bureaucrats—within the state apparatus. Particular attention is paid to the activities of the judiciary and of senior bureaucrats in the political organization of space.

Metropolitan Merseyside and Greater Manchester: Spatial Issues in Jurisdictional Change

Metropolitan Merseyside and Greater Manchester: Spatial Issues in Jurisdictional Change Rex Honey* England restructured its local government system in 1974 after decades of hesitancy and eight years of intensive study and debate . Among the aspects of reform was a fundamental realignment of governing units having spatial expression, especially in the large metropolitan areas where the problems were most severe. As such, the English experience may prove instructive when debating similar reforms elsewhere, in terms both of actual designs and of the processes by which the designs are formulated. Using as its case the LiverpoolManchester conurbation, this paper briefly describes the problems generating reform, then examines the alternative official proposals, and finally seeks to demonstrate how jurisdictional spatial form emerged from the application of diverse organizing principles, filtered through the political process.1 Traditional Jurisdictions Like any rapidly changing society, England suffered from jurisdictional senescence. Its local government structure dated from the late 19th century and was characterized by a division between town * Dr. Honey is Assistant Professor of Geography at the University of Iowa, Iowa City 52242. The author gratefully acknowledges the cooperation and assistance of numerous individuals involved in England's local goverrunent reform or strategically placed to witness the reform. 1 The author deals with the reform in general and the reform process in particular in: "England's New County Map," The Professional Geographer, Vol. 28, No. 1 (Feb. 1976), pp. 50-56; and "Form, Process and the Political Organization of Space," The Professional Geographer, Vol. 29, No. 1 (Feb. 1977), pp. 14-20. 91 92ASSOCIATION OF PACIFIC COAST GEOGRAPHERS and country—the England of the country squire and the dark satanic mill. The primary unit of local government was the county. Separate from the counties, the large cities had their own "county borough" status, forming enclaves within a county. As the character of local government changed and as transportation improved, the differentiation of county and county borough impeded effective operation of local authorities. The adjoining Merseyside (Liverpool) and Greater Manchester metropolitan areas illustrate the worst aspects of the jurisdictional malaise. Their region experienced dramatic growth during the 19th and early 20th centuries, when Liverpool became Britain's second port and both cities became major manufacturing centers. Growth was more horizontal than vertical; the built-up area expanded disproportionately to population increase, and nearby smaller cities shared in the region's industrial and demographic expansion . Commuting increased to the point that political boundaries ceased to enclose a community in the sense of an area where people reside, work, shop, and play. Central cities could not provide sufficient relocation housing, nor could they coordinate the daily flows of people and goods. As of the early 1970's, over a dozen county boroughs and two counties shared jurisdiction in the Merseyside-Greater Manchester region (Figure 1). In terms of political ecology, local authorities could not hope to "internalize externalities." Manchester and Liverpool remained paramount, but nine other cities also qualified as separate employment centers in a 1971 study of commuting flows (Figure 2).2 It was apparent that commutation bore little relationship to jurisdictions, and cross-commuting was prevalent. Within this setting support for change arose. The Royal Commission Proposal The first positive step toward reforming England's local government was the appointment in 1966 of the Royal Commission on Local 2 The Department of Geography of the London School of Economics and Political Science completed the study under contract with Britain's Department of Environment. The identified commuting regions are roughly equivalent to American Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas. YEARBOOK · VOLUME 40 · 197893 Figure 1. The two counties and 15 county boroughs of metropolitan Merseyside -Greater Manchester on the eve of restructuring. The names and boundaries of Lancashire and Cheshire counties, and of Liverpool and Manchester boroughs, are repeated in Figures 2-4 for comparison. Government in England (often known as the Redcliffe-Maud Commission ). Three years later the Commission offered its recommendations in the form of a majority proposal, accompanied by a minority report from one member who differed substantially over the design of the new system. The Royal Commission attempted to strike a balance among a number of considerations, . , . in particular, the pattern of living, the requirements of...

Conflicting problems in the political organization of space

The political organization of space responds to several potentially conflicting problems. These logically divide between functional problems, which deal with the spatial requirements of a specific service, and system problems, which deal with the spatial requirements of the area and clientele being served. The functional arguments call for thresholds so that jurisdictions are large enough, and accessibility to assure that they are small enough. The systems arguments are also split. Externalities problems require larger jurisdictions, public choice problems require small ones. The solutions to the simultaneous problems may be in conflict, so trade-offs may have to be made. Adapting services to an area, one may assess jointness and distributional efficiency in an effort to derive a solution.

A systems approach to the political organization of space

A systems approach to the political organization of space