ch 2 world systems globalization

Chapter 2 Lecture

Human Geography: Places and Regions in Global Context

Sixth Edition

Wendy A. MitteagerState University of New York, Oneonta

The Changing Global Context

© 2013 Pearson Education, Inc.

Key Concepts• Evolution of the Modern World• World-System• Core and Periphery Regions• Neocolonialism• Globalization• Sustainability• Cultural Imperialism

Figure: Chapter 2 Opener An Icelandic ash plume impacted flights on a global scale in May 2010

Interconnectivity of global Icelandic ash plume => Closed down European airports => Black market for transportation tickets sprung up in Moscow• Specialized fruit & vegetable

farmers & flower growers in Africa, the Middle East & the Caribbean were cut off from their markets

• Kenya, 5,000 miles south normally ships 937 tons of fresh produce to Europe nightly

• Flower farms laid off workers, flowers wilted, thrown into compost heaps

• Stalled horticultural industry, Kenya’s hard currency earner impacted entire country

• p. 34-35


Figure 2.3 A remnant mini-system in the Amazon

The Premodern World• Mini-systems

Subsistence-based social economies with a organized around reciprocity.

• Slash-and-burn a major innovation:

• Plants harvested close to ground, stubble dried, then burned.

• Hearth Areas– West Africa– Middle East– South Asia– China– Americas


Figure 2.1 Old World hearth areas

Fertile Crescent – Tigris & Euphrates Rivers – Middle East

South Asia:Indus River Valley- India

Ganges River Valley, India

Irawaddy River, Bangladesh

Huang (Yellow) River Valley, China

Hearth Areas in Semi Arid Sub-Tropical Regions with proximity to major River Valleys

The Pre-modern World, (cont’d)


Figure 2.2 New World hearth areasTamaulipas – Tehuacan Valley – Mexico CityAndes Mts.


The Pre-modern World, (cont’d)

Figure 2.4a Greek colonies and the extent of the Roman empire

• World-Empire– Group of mini-systems absorbed into a common

political system.– Wealth flows fromProducer classes to an Elite class in form Of Taxes or tributes.

The Premodern World, (cont’d)• Colonization

– The physical settlement of people in a new territory from the colonizing state.

• Urbanization– Towns & cities became– essential as centers of – administration for early– world-empires. – Military garrisons & – theological centers for – the ruling classes

Figure 2.4b Highly developed infrastructure of the Roman Empire


[Insert Figure 2.6]

The Premodern World, (cont’d)• Framework of human geographies

– Harsher environments in continental interiors– Dry belt of Grassland Steppes and Desert margins– Principal areas of sedentary agriculture

Figure 2.6 The Silk Road


The Premodern World, (cont’d)

Figure 2.5 The precapitalist Old World, circa 1400 C.E.


Figure 2.7 European Age of Discovery

World Systems


World Systems, (cont’d)

• New World Plantations

• North, Central & • South Americas• Technological

improvementsand limits –

• before The Industrial Revolution, agriculture & trade relied on wood, wind, & water power (fuel, shipping, mills)

Figure 2.8 Cotton plantation, Mississippi River



Figure 2.A European industrialization

• Industrialization in Europe• Diffusion

– I. Began in England, spreadthrough Europe and globally

– 18th century• Three distinctive waves

– Influenced by resourcesand technology

II. Ruhr Valley of Germany – Mineral ResourcesIII. System of Rivers & Canals fortransport acrossNorthern European Plain


World Systems: Core & Periphery

• Structured relationship – Core, Semi-peripheral, Peripheral

• Imperialism & Colonialism • Allowed establishment of territories to use

resources & labor, establish trading & financial networks.

• Neo-colonialism – supported by prior colonial networks to support new international division of labor


World Systems: Division of Global Labor• Suez and Panama

Canals• Network of telegraph

communications

Figure 2.11 International telegraph network in 1900

• Colonial economies serve• Needs of core regions to

transport & communicate between periphery:

• Development ofoceangoing steamships

World Systems: British Empire

Figure 2.13 Late 1800s British empire



• Neocolonialism &• Commercial imperialism transferred to:• Transnational corporations ~ concentration of

capital & resource control over global core-periphery economic system

• Gross Domestic Product (GDP) measuring economic growth in monetary gain only, no human development

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?


World Systems: Core & Periphery, (cont’d)

Figure 2.9 The world-system in 1800



World Systems: Core & Periphery, (cont’d)




Globalization

• Increasing interconnectedness of the world – Economic, environmental, political, 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


Globalization: Environment

Figure 2.15 The human “footprint”


Globalization: Environment, (cont’d)

Apply your knowledge: Give an example of a local environmental concern. How does it relate to economic development and social equity? Water pollution.

Figure 2.17 Three key aspects to sustainability

Figure 2.16 Pollution continues to threaten the ecosystem of Lake Baykal


Globalization: Health

Figure 2.18 Diffusion of the HIV virus


Globalization, (cont’d)

Figure 2.19 Communication flow between major world regions

• Security– Risk society

• Spatial Justice• Cultural Imperialism• Westernization• “Jihad vs. Mc World”


Globalization: Worlds Apart

Figure 2.D A Swiss familyFigure 2.C An Ethiopian family


End of Chapter 2