Reductionist scholarship
19th century American journalist and educationalist, Ambrose Bierce, in what was termed a bout of often frequent farsightedness, once quipped that “War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.” Who would have known that even exactly 100 years after his demise, this man’s observation would still stand relevant.
By sheer coincidence, this also happens to be the year when American journalist Robert D Kaplan came out with his latest book, The Revenge of Geography: What The Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts And The Battle Against Fate. As the title suggests, the book is an effort to know how geography has played its part in shaping geopolitics and how it does not plan to call it a day yet.
I am not exactly a fan of Kaplan’s writings or even thought process. I generally consider his previous works, including the better known Surrender or Starve: Travels in Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, and Eritrea and Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan as a case of fish-out-of-water at the best and attempts towards utter reductionism at the worst. These books, although full of ingredients that make a non-fiction bestseller in the US, fared miserably at the Nielsen. In short, even average chest-thumping Americans took a very dim view of his writings. And that is quite low.
But still, these books tell a lot about how he constructs his arguments. Another book of his with the self-explanatory title Balkan Ghosts was again a non-starter. But somehow or other, President Bill Clinton got hold of a copy, and as legend follows, used the arguments put forward in the book to launch an attack on Yugoslavia. Kaplan’s star rose overnight, albeit for the wrong reasons. When George Bush was mulling an attack on Iraq, Kaplan supported the idea in a then secret meeting with Bush administration insiders. However, these days, he admits he made a mistake. This book is supposed to be the product of that learning curve.
So, let’s look at the premise of the book. The book explores a new paradigm, or if we believe the author, an omnipresent but rather ignored paradigm, that geography has pipped ideology as the anchor-stone of geopolitics in a post-Cold War world. That essentially means that nations decide upon their bilateral and multilateral relationships driven by compulsions of geography and not ideology.
While this analogy is as fresh as any, there are works of other theorists that the author draws on. In fact, Kaplan dedicates a substantial number of pages exploring often debunked theories of these geniuses. So, at the very beginning, readers are thrown into the world of English geographer and academic Sir Halford J. Mackinder, who’s ‘Heartland thesis’ is pitted by Kaplan against the ‘Rimland thesis’ of Dutch geo-strategist and his contemporary, Nicholas J. Spykman. Kaplan explores these ideas for the benefit of the readers and helpfully illustrates why they failed. The problem starts when he presents some of his vague ideas and seeks to draw examples from the contemporary world.
While some of them do hold water, the others fall flat. Take for example Panama Canal. Kaplan maintains that it was the specific geography of Panama that led to the canal and dominance of the US in both Pacific and Atlantic. Had Panama not been there, it would have not been easy for the Americans to surpass Brits at sea. Kaplan theorizes that since Britain was positioned as an island west of mainland Europe, it was geographically well placed to outmanoeuvre Portugal and the Netherlands, which it eventually did, in the war of dominance on water. The US did the same with Britain with Panama Canal. This I concede is a remarkably fresh idea.
However, he fails when he draws parallels between Saudi Arabia and Iran by asserting that these are loose conglomerations of ethnic groups, peoples and lands. And their political centres more often than not cannot hold their distant dominions. Anybody who knows the region will only laugh at this. Similarly, he concedes, rather miserably, that autocrats in Russia, from Stalin to Putin, were necessitated by its ruthless geography.
19th century American journalist and educationalist, Ambrose Bierce, in what was termed a bout of often frequent farsightedness, once quipped that “War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography.” Who would have known that even exactly 100 years after his demise, this man’s observation would still stand relevant.
By sheer coincidence, this also happens to be the year when American journalist Robert D Kaplan came out with his latest book, The Revenge of Geography: What The Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts And The Battle Against Fate. As the title suggests, the book is an effort to know how geography has played its part in shaping geopolitics and how it does not plan to call it a day yet.
I am not exactly a fan of Kaplan’s writings or even thought process. I generally consider his previous works, including the better known Surrender or Starve: Travels in Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia, and Eritrea and Soldiers of God: With Islamic Warriors in Afghanistan and Pakistan as a case of fish-out-of-water at the best and attempts towards utter reductionism at the worst. These books, although full of ingredients that make a non-fiction bestseller in the US, fared miserably at the Nielsen. In short, even average chest-thumping Americans took a very dim view of his writings. And that is quite low.
But still, these books tell a lot about how he constructs his arguments. Another book of his with the self-explanatory title Balkan Ghosts was again a non-starter. But somehow or other, President Bill Clinton got hold of a copy, and as legend follows, used the arguments put forward in the book to launch an attack on Yugoslavia. Kaplan’s star rose overnight, albeit for the wrong reasons. When George Bush was mulling an attack on Iraq, Kaplan supported the idea in a then secret meeting with Bush administration insiders. However, these days, he admits he made a mistake. This book is supposed to be the product of that learning curve.
So, let’s look at the premise of the book. The book explores a new paradigm, or if we believe the author, an omnipresent but rather ignored paradigm, that geography has pipped ideology as the anchor-stone of geopolitics in a post-Cold War world. That essentially means that nations decide upon their bilateral and multilateral relationships driven by compulsions of geography and not ideology.
While this analogy is as fresh as any, there are works of other theorists that the author draws on. In fact, Kaplan dedicates a substantial number of pages exploring often debunked theories of these geniuses. So, at the very beginning, readers are thrown into the world of English geographer and academic Sir Halford J. Mackinder, who’s ‘Heartland thesis’ is pitted by Kaplan against the ‘Rimland thesis’ of Dutch geo-strategist and his contemporary, Nicholas J. Spykman. Kaplan explores these ideas for the benefit of the readers and helpfully illustrates why they failed. The problem starts when he presents some of his vague ideas and seeks to draw examples from the contemporary world.
While some of them do hold water, the others fall flat. Take for example Panama Canal. Kaplan maintains that it was the specific geography of Panama that led to the canal and dominance of the US in both Pacific and Atlantic. Had Panama not been there, it would have not been easy for the Americans to surpass Brits at sea. Kaplan theorizes that since Britain was positioned as an island west of mainland Europe, it was geographically well placed to outmanoeuvre Portugal and the Netherlands, which it eventually did, in the war of dominance on water. The US did the same with Britain with Panama Canal. This I concede is a remarkably fresh idea.
However, he fails when he draws parallels between Saudi Arabia and Iran by asserting that these are loose conglomerations of ethnic groups, peoples and lands. And their political centres more often than not cannot hold their distant dominions. Anybody who knows the region will only laugh at this. Similarly, he concedes, rather miserably, that autocrats in Russia, from Stalin to Putin, were necessitated by its ruthless geography.
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