Unit 4: Political Patterns and Processes

Unit Review Activity

Additional Review Resources

4.3 Political Power and Territoriality

Learning Objective

Describe the concepts of political power and territoriality as used by geographers. 

Essential Knowledge

1. Political power is expressed geographically as control over people, land, and resources, as illustrated by neocolonialism, shatterbelts, and choke points.

2. Territoriality is the connection of people, their culture, and their economic systems to the land. 

4.4 Defining Political Boundaries

Learning Objective

Define types of political boundaries used by geographers. 

Essential Knowledge

Types of political boundaries include relic, superimposed, subsequent, antecedent, geometric, and consequent boundaries. 

4.5 The Function of Political Boundaries

Learning Objective

Explain the nature and function of international and internal boundaries. 

Essential Knowledge

1. Boundaries are defined, delimited, demarcated, and administered to establish limits of sovereignty, but they are often contested.

2. Political boundaries often coincide with cultural, national, or economic divisions. However, some boundaries are created by demilitarized zones or policy, such as the Berlin Conference.

3. Land and maritime boundaries and international agreements can influence national or regional identity and encourage or discourage international or internal interactions and disputes over resources.

4. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea defines the rights and responsibilities of nations in the use of international waters, established territorial seas, and exclusive economic zones. 

4.6 Internal Boundaries

Learning Objective

Explain the nature and function of international and internal boundaries. 

Essential Knowledge

Voting districts, redistricting, and gerrymandering affect election results at various scales.

4.7 Forms of Governance

Learning Objective

1. Define federal and unitary states.

2. Explain how federal and unitary states affect spatial organization. 

Essential Knowledge

1. Forms of governance include unitary states and federal states.

2. Unitary states tend to have a more top-down, centralized form of governance, while federal states have more locally based, dispersed power centers. 

4.8 Defining Devolutionary Factors

Learning Objective

Define factors that lead to the devolution of states. 

Essential Knowledge

Factors that can lead to the devolution of states include the division of groups by physical geography, ethnic separatism, ethnic cleansing, terrorism, economic and social problems, and irredentism. 

4.9 Challenges to Sovereignty

Learning Objective

Explain how political, economic, cultural, and technological changes challenge state sovereignty 

Essential Knowledge

1. Devolution occurs when states fragment into autonomous regions; subnational politicalterritorial units, such as those within Spain, Belgium, Canada, and Nigeria; or when states disintegrate, as happened in Sudan and the former Soviet Union. 

2. Advances in communication technology have facilitated devolution, supranationalism, and democratization.

3. Global efforts to address transnational and environmental challenges and to create economies of scale, trade agreements, and military alliances help to further supranationalism.

4. Supranational organizations—including the United Nations (UN), North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), European Union (EU), Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Arctic Council, and African Union— can challenge state sovereignty by limiting the economic or political actions of member states. 

4.10 Consequences of Centripetal and Centrifugal Forces

Learning Objective

Explain how the concepts of centrifugal and centripetal forces apply at the state scale. 

Essential Knowledge

1. Centrifugal forces may lead to failed states, uneven development, stateless nations, and ethnic nationalist movements.

2. Centripetal forces can lead to ethnonationalism, more equitable infrastructure development, and increased cultural cohesion. 

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