Classical Geopolitics: A New Analytical Model

225 Pages·2016·0.87 MB·English

by  Phil Kelly

ClassiCal GeopolitiCs

ClassiCal GeopolitiCs
A New Analytical Model
Phil Kelly
stanford university press
Stanford, California
Stanford University Press
Stanford, California
© 2016 by the Board of Trustees of the leland Stanford Junior University.
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or
by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and
recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system without the
prior written permission of Stanford University Press.
library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kelly, Philip, author.
Classical geopolitics : a new analytical model / Phil Kelly.
pages cm.
includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-8047-9664-4 (cloth : alk. paper) —
isbn 978-0-8047-9820-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Geopolitics. 2. international relations—Soviet Union. i. Title.
jc319.k424 2016
320.1'2—dc23
2015021622
isbn 978-0-8047-9950-8 (electronic)
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality
paper. Typeset at Stanford University Press in 10/14 Minion.
Contents
Preface vii
1 introduction 1
2 Model and Theory 18
3 Several Geopolitical Approaches of the Recent Past 45
4 Classical Geopolitical Assumptions 70
5 Classical Geopolitical Theories 83
6 Applications of the Model 136
7 Setting the Course for a Rejuvenated Geopolitics 166
Appendix: Classical Geopolitical Concepts/Theories 173
Notes 187
index 205

preface
Despite its usage in the press and occasionally in academic writings, the term
“geopolitics” has stayed blurred in definition and misused in application, in
part, because of its past associations with disreputable and discredited the-
ories and ideologies. Only recently has the term experienced more visibility,
although this has come largely in the media, where the label connects to inter-
national disruptions harmful to international tranquility and to stock market
profits. it has not been available in a positive sense for extending the insights
one might see in its potential yet hidden contribution. Accordingly, the goal
of this book is to convince the reader that geopolitics should deserve a higher
respectability and utility within the realm of international-relations theory and
policy.
As a contemporary label, one can trace two paths of origin,1 both arising
around the beginning of the twentieth century. The first, the organic, reflected
a Germanic concern with “scientific laws” that contributed to states’ survival
in an increasingly unstable world, its two spokespersons, Friedrich Ratzel and
Rudolf Kjellén. The second, the geostrategic of British and North American
interest, depicted geographic placement of states and regions as conditioning
foreign affairs actions, with Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan, halford Mackinder,
and Nicholas Spykman its standard bearers. Both versions enjoyed respect and
consideration by foreign policy makers and scholars.
But following World War ii, these classical sectors suffered, almost to their
demise, from their alleged ties to General Karl haushofer and his Munich
school of geopolitics and to the aggressions of Adolf hitler, both sources seen
as linked in their promotion of war and racism. The tradition largely disap-
peared from the extant iR literature for the following decades, only later to be
raised to a limited visibility in the statements and writings of henry Kissinger.2
Gradually, the term found increased notice from a variety of new places, certain
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Preface
of these being: the postmodernist “critical geopolitics” movement beginning
during the 1980s; the numerous South American authors writing about their
local territorial disputes and national developments during the period; the re-
alist approach for North American academia that merged geopolitics within its
focus of national power; and new generations of scholars and policy makers
who have taken on its aura. A further instance of the new respect may be seen
in the recent publication by the noted realist author harvey Starr,3 showing a
title indicating also some academic resurrection of our concept.
Geopolitics has experienced of late at least two confusing and faulty mean-
ings that have seriously diminished its legitimacy: (1) a “power politics” and
realpolitik description of manipulation alleged to the larger nations, proba-
bly derived from the misperception that geopolitics resides within the realist
international-relations model that emphasizes “power.” Rather, the focus of
geopolitics, away from realism, should rest upon states’ geographic positions
reflective of the term’s spatial heritage; and (2) once more, an image of ca-
tastrophe and crisis—wars and threats of wars and other economic and po-
litical news depressing world financial markets—often heard in reference to
Wall Street reporting. Neither of these versions receives any sort of definition;
both are negative and reference a world at fault. Until these negative images are
corrected and deflected from classical geopolitics, our study of spatial impacts
upon policy—that is, geopolitics—will not see a full contribution. To repeat,
that correction represents the goal of this book, the restoring of acceptance to
classical geopolitics.
The traditional term offers an objective and neutral tool for students and
statespersons to enlist as an insightful guide toward description and analy-
sis within the milieu of foreign affairs, the assumption being that geographic
placement of countries can impact upon their actions. This spatial linkage derives
from pure common sense! Such a reliance upon a geographic location condi-
tioning international events has been in evidence for millennia, perhaps being
the earliest of military and foreign affairs models. This continued widespread
practice of geopolitics as a policy and action guide in itself should lend some
credibility as a usable iR model.
The author will structure this book according to these three objectives:
1. Purpose: to construct a classical geopolitical model.
2. Aim: with such a construction, to demonstrate the utility and the legiti-
macy of classical geopolitics as an important iR model.
viii
Preface
3. Approach: three ways (below) that will show the benefit of classical geo-
politics:
A first way will mark out a standard definition of the traditional version, a
not-too-difficult task since it appears that most classical depictions tend closely
to parallel, their emphases resting upon the geographic placement of states af-
fecting their foreign affairs behaviors.
A second way will be to locate relevant theories that will enter the geopolit-
ical model, a model being merely a container for theories that will fit the defi-
nition of “geopolitics.” This author has located more than sixty generalizations
that relate to the positional-geographic dimensions of geopolitics; all will be
described and some applied later on in this book. This second way of locating
relevant theories likewise will help to legitimize the traditional model.
Thirdly, and with more difficulty than the first two ways, any series of theo-
ries that attach themselves to a particular model should each be useful to shed-
ding good insights into foreign affairs policies, actions, and events. in a later
chapter, four methods for such theory-application will be suggested, followed
by an assortment of contemporary and historical case studies as testing places
for the gathered theories in the hope that these instances will further the au-
thor’s goal of demonstrating the utility of geopolitics as an acceptable and use-
ful international-relations model.
Classical geopolitics is the study of the impact or influence of certain geo-
graphic features—these being positions and locations of regions, states, and
resources plus topography, climate, distance, immigration, states’ sizes and
shapes, demography, and the like—upon states’ foreign policies and actions
as an aid to statecraft. Accordingly, this study lends itself to a description and
analysis both of theory and of policy.
The classical label is raised here to separate traditional geopolitics from
postmodern “critical geopolitics,” the latter differing quite extensively from the
former.4 The traditional emphasizes the gathering and applying of objective
and interpretive theory; the critical focuses upon deconstructing alleged ex-
ploitation, blaming geopolitics itself for assisting in the exploitation, with the-
ory largely ignored. This book is about the classical.
A model denotes a listing place for theories that correspond to the definition
of a particular international-relations approach—in the current case, to geo-
politics. One approach of this book lies with the collection of relevant theories,
heartlands, shatterbelts, checkerboards, sea-land power, buffer states, distance and
ix