Human Geog Chapter 2

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Chapter 2:
The Changing
Global Context
Chapter 2 Lecture
Katie Pratt
Macalester College
© 2016 Pearson Education, Inc.

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• Evolution of the modern world
• World-system
• Core and periphery regions
• International division of labor
• Imperialism
• Neocolonialism
• Globalization
Key Concepts
Figure: Chapter 2 Opener - Yuyuan Garden in Shanghai, a sixteenth-century Ming Dynasty
garden, adjacent to the city’s modern business district.

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• First agriculture revolution  transition from
hunter-gatherer groups to minisystems
• Slash and burn agriculture
• Hearth areas (Middle East, South Asia, China,
Americas)
The Premodern World: Hearth Areas
Figure 2.1 Hearth areas.

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• Implications
– Higher population densities
– Change in social organization
– Specialization
– Trade
Hearth Areas (cont’d)
Apply your knowledge: Describe example of traditional crafts from
the
agricultural hearth areas of Arizona and New Mexico.

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• World-Empire
– Group of minisystems
– Common political system
The Premodern World: Early Empires
Figure 2.2a Greek colonies and the extent of the Roman empire.

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• Colonization
– Law of diminishing returns
• Early geographers
• Urbanization
Early Empires (cont’d)
Figure 2.2c Roman engineering: an
aqueduct in Segovia, Spain.
Figure 2.2b Roads built by Romans became
major routes throughout Europe.

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• Framework of human geographies
– Harsher environments in continental interiors maintained
minisystems
– Dry belt of steppes and desert margins
– Principal areas of sedentary agriculture
Premodern World Geography
Figure 2.4 The precapitalist Old World, circa 1400 C.E.

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• Trade routes
Premodern World Geography (cont’d)
Figure 2.5 The Silk Road.

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• Centers of capitalism
• Importance of port cities
• Hinterlands
Premodern World Geography (cont’d)
Figure 2.6 Principle towns of the Hanseatic League.

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Figure 2.7a Principle voyages of exploration.
World Systems

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• External arenas
• Trade and merchant
capitalism
– Plantations
– Import substitution
• Technological
improvements and limits
World Systems (cont’d)
Figure 2.8 Triangular trade.
Apply your knowledge: What are some of the technological reasons that
Europeans sought to colonize other parts of the world?

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• Diffusion
– Began in England, spread
through Europe and globally
• Three distinctive waves
– Influenced by resources
and technology
World Systems: Industrialization in Europe
Figure 2.9 The spread of European industrialization.
Apply your knowledge: What are both positive and negative effects that
industrialization has had on the globe?

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• Structured relationship
– Core, semiperipheral, peripheral
• Imperialism and colonialism
• Leadership cycles
• Hegemony
World Systems: Core and Periphery
Apply your knowledge: Discuss a current international issue involving a
former colonial territory.

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World Systems: Core and Periphery (cont’d)
Figure 2.10a The world-system in 1800. Figure 2.10b The world-system in 1900.
Figure 2.10c The world-system in 2014.

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• Needs of the core
• Colonial economies: comparative advantage and
specialization
• Oceangoing steamships
• Suez and Panama canals
• Network of telegraph communications
• More complex interdependence
Organizing the Periphery: The International
Division of Labor

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Figure 2.12 The British Empire in the late 1800s.
The International Division of Labor (cont’d)
Apply your knowledge: Where were your clothes sewed? Where did the materials
come from? How does this relate to division of labor and comparative advantage?

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Figure 2.13a The colonization of Africa, 1880. Figure 2.13b The colonization of Africa, 1914.
• Ethnocentrism
• Environmental determinism
Organizing the Periphery: Imperialism

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• Neocolonialism
• Commercial imperialism
• Transnational corporations
• Gross domestic product (GDP)
The Struggle for Independence
Apply your knowledge: Provide an example of how neocolonialism reinforces
the power and influence of core countries. Be specific. What is the role of
transnational corporations in neocolonialism?

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• Increasing interconnectedness of the world
– Economic, environmental, political, and cultural
– Greater speed, larger scale, broader scope, and greater
complexity than in the past
• Commodity chains
• Increase in significance of place
– Mobility of money, labor, products, and ideas
Contemporary Globalization

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Commodity Chains

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Globalization: Environment
Figure 2.14 The human “footprint.”

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Globalization: Environment (cont’d)
Figure 2.16 Three key aspects to
sustainability.
Figure 2.15 Pollution and warming due to
climate change threaten Lake Baikal’s
ecosystem.
Apply your knowledge: Give an example of a local environmental concern.
How does it relate to economic development and social equity?

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• Vulnerability to Atlantic storms is rapidly increasing
due to climate change and, in particular, sea level
rise
America’s Drowning Seaboard
Figure 2.D Hurricane Sandy.Figure 2.B Damage from Hurricane Sandy.

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• Heightened risk and spread of disease
• Examples
– Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS)
– Influenza
– Ebola
– West Nile virus
• Pandemic
Globalization: Health

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• Risk society
• Resilience
Globalization: Security Issues
Apply your knowledge: How is the role of knowledge a tool of power in a risk
society?

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Globalization: Western and Cultural
Imperialism
Figure 2.E Distribution of the
world’s population and their
national average income.
Figure 2.17 Indonesian women talk in front
of a H&M billboard in Jakarta.

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Future Geographies
Figure 2.18 The uneven distribution of the world’s population.
Apply your knowledge: What is the middle ground between optimistic and
pessimistic futuristic perspectives?