Geopolitics and discourse

1. GEOPOLITICS AND DISCOURSE
-ROGER ABAO

2. INTRODUCTION
1
CONTENTS
PRACTICAL GEOPOLITICAL REASONING
2
THE USSR AS ORIENTAL
3
THE USSR as POTENTIAL RAPIST
4
THE RED FLOOD
5
CONCLUSION
6

3. 1
INTRODUCTION
GEOPOLITICS AND DISCOURSE

4. INTRODUCTION
In conventional academic understanding geopolitics concerns
the geography of international politics, particularly the relatio
nship between the physical environment (location, resources, t
erritory, etc.) and the conduct of foreign policy (Sprout and Sp
rout, 1960). Within the geopolitical tradition the term has a m
ore precise history and meaning. A consistent historical featur
e of geopolitical writing, from its origins in the late nineteenth
century to its modern use by Colin Gray and others, is the clai
m that geopolitics is a foil to idealism, ideology and human wi
ll. This claim is a long-standing one in the geopolitical traditio
n which from the beginning was opposed to the proposition t
hat great leaders and humans will alone determine the course

5. 2
PRACTICAL GEOPOLITICAL REASONING
IN AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

6. Please add title in here
POLICY
AMERICAN
GEOPOLITICS
Reasoning
American geopolitics involves the study of the
different historical means by which US intellect
uals of statecraft have spatialized
international politics and represented it as a
“world” characterized by particular types of
places, peoples and dramas. Such is obviously a
vast undertaking and we wish to make but thre
e
general observations on the contours of
American geopolitical reasoning. Before doing
so, however, it is important to note two factors
about the American case.
Re-conceptualization of Geopolitics
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7. Secondly, we must recognize
that American involvement with
world politics has followed a dist
inctive cultural logic or set of pre
suppositions and orientations, w
hat Gramsci called “Americanis
mo” (De Grazia, 1984–85).
The continuity between the two texts is evidence of the dur
ability of particular narratives in American political discourse.
.First, we must acknowled
ge the key role the Presid
ency plays in the assembl
age of meaning about int
ernational politics within
the United States
(and internationally since
the US became a world p
ower).

8. American System
The “American system”
was not, however, to be
a multi-lateralist, pan-Ameri
can affair or a counterpose t
o the Holy Alliance
Monroe Doctrine
the Monroe Doctrine affirme
d such a position, stating th
at the political system of the
European powers is different
from that of America.
American Hemisphere
“American hemisphere”, of course
, was an arbitrary social construct
—for the United States
can be located in many different h
emispheres, depending on where
one decides to center them
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ext here, according to the need to adjust the font and font size.

9. 3
The USSR as Oriental

10. ORIENTALISM
PASSAGE
COLD WAR
Orientalism is premised,
as Said (1978:12) notes,
on a primitive geopolitic
al awareness of the glob
e as composed of two u
nequal worlds, the Orien
t and the Occident.
Cold War discourse Kenna
n helped shape was “post
-colonialist” in the sense t
hat it drew upon and was
assembled from many fam
iliar and pervasive colonial
discourses such as Oriental
ism and the putative primi
tiveness of non-Western r
egions and spaces.
Kennan had noted the
paranoia of Soviet leade
rs. “Their particular bra
nd of fanaticism”, “wa
s too fierce and too jeal
ous to envisage any per
manent sharing of powe
r”.

11. 4
THE USSR as POTENTIAL RAPIST

12. USSR as Potential Rapist
• Another pre-existent source from which Col
d War discourse and representations of the USSR we
re assembled was patriarchal mythology— particularl
y that concerning fables of female vulnerability, rape
and guardianship.
• The leaders of the USSR were a “frustrated” and “disc
ontented” lot who “found in Marxist theory a highly co
nvenient rationalization for their own instinctive desire
s”

13. In the face of this instinct
ive behavior, the US need
ed to be aware that the U
SSR “cannot be charme
d or talked out of existen
ce”
These instinctive desires
produced Soviet “aggressi
veness” (another favorite
Cold War description of th
e USSR) and “fluid and co
nstant pressure to extend t
he limits of Russian police
power which are together t
he natural and instinctive u
rges of Russian rulers”

14. 5
THE RED FLOOD

15. Communism as a flood Soviet Foreign Policy Theweleit's Account
The image of the flood, which has also a sexual dimension (unrestrained, gushing desire, etc.),
is critical, for it is by this means that the geography of containment becomes constituted.
If the Soviet threat has the characteristics of a flood then one needs firm and vigilan containment
along all of the Soviet border.
The response of the
Freikorps, in Thewel
eit’s account, is to
act as firm, erect da
ms against this anarc
hic degeneration of
society.
It is threatenin
g but also attra
ctive
The image of the R
ed
flood was a particu
larly powerful elem
ent in fascist myth
ology during the in
ter-war period.

16. The Red Flood
• Containment is thus constituted as a virtua
lly global and not singularly Western Euro
pean task.
• Effective containment in Western Europe s
o the scenario goes, will lead to increasing
Soviet pressure on the Middle East and Asi
a which eventually could result in the USSR
spilling out into one or more of these regi
ons.
CONTAINMENT

17. Such an image is easily reinforced by ap
propriate cartographic visuals featuring
bleeding red maps of the USSR spreadin
g outwards, or menacingly penatrating
arrows busily trying to break out
The explanation of why US security managers i
nstinctively read the North Korean invasion of S
outh Korea as an act of Soviet expansionism

18. 6
CONCLUSION

19. Conclusion
• The Cold War as a discourse may have lost its credibilit
y and meaning as a consequence of the events of 1989 but it is cl
ear from the Gulf crisis [over the reflagging of Kuwaiti ships] that
intellectuals of statecraft in the West at least, and the military-in
dustrial complex behind them, will try to create a new set of ene
mies (the “irrational Third-World despot”) in a re-structured worl
d order
• The reductive nature of the practical geopolitical reasoning used
in the 1990–91 Gulf crisis by President Bush and Prime Minister
Thatcher looks all too familiar

20. THANK YOU!!!!!!