There is an old belief in geographical determinism of man’s social and political life. Many early and modem writershave emphasised the influence of geography on political life, policy and structure of the State. They believe that climate, soil, topography, and other geographical conditions directly or indirectly determine the type of government, policy and national character of a people. Aristotle believed that geography guided political wisdom.
Ibn Khaldun also emphasised the effects of geographical environment on politics and history. Bodin was the first modem thinker to dwell upon the relationship between politics and geography. Montesquieu, another French thinker, emphasised the influence of geographical condition on the forms of government and liberty of the people. An English historian, Buckle, went to an extreme. In his book History of Civilisation, he declared that man’s mind is a product of his external environment or geography, that is, of such facts of physical environment as food, climate, soil, and the general aspects of nature. But he overshot the mark. In recent times, also, many writers have emphasised the influence of geography on die politics of a country, such as Bluntschli, Treitschke, Huntington and other. The German writers have invented a new term to show this relationship, ‘geopolitik”, that is, the determination of the politics of a country by its geography.
These writers have, however, mixed science with superstition, facts. with fiction. It has thus become the basis of the fascist or Nazi racialism in Hitler’s Germany.
There is a measure of relationship between and influence of geography on the politics of every country. But it is neither direct nor unchangeable as these thinkers have asserted. It is quite true that die State and political institutions of a country are influenced by its geography, because they occur or grow up in geographical settings. The effects of politics on geography and of geography on politics have long been studies by political and geographical writers. Political geography is an important field of study by both political scientists and geographers.
Indeed, this relationship is, fundamentally, between man and his milieu, that is, between man and nature. It can be explained both ways, i.e., man influencing milieu or nature, and milieu or nature influencing man (or society, culture, civilisation, religion and other aspects of human life). Man, as a geographic agent or actor, has refashioned the landscape or the physical features of nature. Indeed, this influence increases manifold when viewed from the standpoint of the State. It is die basis of power politics. The more a State increases in (i) population, (ii) area, (iii) industry, and (iv) science and technology, the more it tends to expand geographically and to influence, dominate or conquer other lands, countries and nations.
This tendency has created States and kingdoms and empires in the past and present ages. In short, politics is a drama played on the stage of geography. For instance, India, with its huge population and its growing industry and technology, has become so expansionist as to become a threat to the small neighbouring countries around it. Even a small country with favourable geographical situation can also play (he game of power politics. For instances, the insular position and its long coastline made England a naval power, whose politics and government were greatly influenced by its nearness and dependence on the sea.
In modern times, the influence of geography on politics and State systems has further increased by the development of the nuclear warfare potential, on the one side, and of the space technology, on the other. In not very distant future, these two developments, combined into “Star Wars”, as the Americans call them, would deeply influence the politics of the whole world in one way or the other. In other words, astronomy, coupled with geography, would determine mankind’s future for good or evil. If sanity in internal and international policies of the countries did not prevail, these developments would even imperil Earth’s survival as a place of human in-habitation.