Boundaries
This type of boundary consists of straight lines, usually following latitude or longitude.
What is a geometric boundary?
This is the basic sovereign political unit in the world today.
What is a state?
Malacca, between Singapore and Indonesia, Hormuz in the Persian Gulf, and Gibraltar, connecting the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, are choke points and these physical features of the Earth.
What are straits?
Though the majority of Syrians identify with some form of Sunni Islam, the country is home to a vast diversity of religious and ethnic groups, including Kurds, Armenians, Turkmen, Alawis, Twelver Shi’a Muslims, various Christian denominations, including Greek Orthodox Christians and Druze, Yezidis, Baha’is, and Jews. As such, Syria is an example of this force.
What is a centrifugal force?
The Berlin Wall is an example of this kind of boundary.
What is a relic boundary?
This type of boundary follows a natural feature of the Earth's surface.
What is a physical boundary?
This term refers to a people who claim a determined place in the world but do not exercise territoriality or sovereignty over it.
What is a stateless nation?
The Suez, which connects the Indian Ocean with the Atlantic Ocean via the Red and Mediterranean Seas, is a manmade choke point.
What is a canal?
Xenophobia and nationalism are political and cultural processes that successfully or unsuccessfully aim at generating this force.
What is a centripetal force?
Iceland and Japan, two ethnically homogeneous countries, are considered this kind of state.
What is a nation-state?
This type of boundary is drawn without the consent or consultation of the people living there.
What are superimposed boundaries?
What is an autonomous region?
This currently divided peninsula is a historic example of a shatterbelt.
What is the Korean Peninsula?
The process where a central government transfers significant powers and authority to regional or local governments, granting them greater autonomy and self-governance, often to ease ethnic/cultural tensions or manage diverse demands, leading to localized decision-making but sometimes increasing fragmentation, is known as this.
What is devolution?
South Africa and the former Yugoslavia are considered this kind of state.
What is a multinational state?
This type of boundary was created before the cultural landscape was significantly developed.
What is an antecedent boundary?
This is often viewed as the opposite of a unitary state.
What is a federal state?
This term, for the process where a large region or country breaks down into smaller, often hostile, independent states, usually due to ethnic, religious, or cultural divisions, leading to conflict and fragmentation, is the classic example of a shatterbelt.
What is Balkanization?
This 20th and 21st-century process has led to increased interconnectivity, economic integration, but also challenges to state sovereignty.
What is globalization?
The Basques and the Kurds are not only examples of stateless nations, but also of this.
What is a multistate nation?
This type of boundary was drawn after cultural groups settled, often following cultural and ethnic lines.
What is a subsequent boundary?
This name is given to organizations made up of multiple countries that give up some degree of sovereignty in exchange for economic, political, or military benefits.
What is a supranational organization?
Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somalia, located in the Horn of Africa, are culturally diverse, weak, fragmented states aligned with powerful global rivals, containing globally significant reserves of natural resources and geostrategic locations. As such, they are examples of these two key geopolitical terms.
What are shatterbelts and choke points?
This is the name given to a political movement or policy where a country seeks to reclaim territories it claims belong to it due to shared ethnicity, history, or culture.
What is irredentism?
This is the name given to the oceanic area that extends 200 nautical miles from a country's baselines.
What is the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ)?