Raising Cartographic Consciousness: The Social and Foreign Policy Vision of Geopolitics in the Twentieth Century

In this book, Mark R. Polelle presents an overview of the evolution of geopolitical thought in three national contexts--the United States, Britain, and Germany--from 1870 to the present. Polelle examines in particular the rise of the defense intellectual and shows how the measurement of national power has changed. Geopolitics early in the century assumed the centrality of space and territory, but we close the century with despacialized concerns over geo-economic conflicts (e.g., that between Japan and the United States). Polelle explains this shift by putting it into historical context. His use of both historical and geographical methods makes Raising Cartographic Consciousness a valuable book for historians, geographers, and political scientists.