World Regional Geography

Neoliberal economics have emerged in the post-Cold War era as the predominant ideological tenet applied to the development of countries in the global south. For much of the global south, however, the promise that markets will bring increased standards of living and emancipation from tyranny has been an empty one. Instead, neoliberalisation has increased the gap between rich and poor and unleashed a firestorm of social ills.

This book deals with the post-conflict geographies of violence and neoliberalisation in Cambodia. Applying a geographical analysis to contemporary Cambodian politics, the author employs notions of neoliberalism, public space, and radical democracy as the most substantive components of its theoretical edifice. He argues that the promotion of unfettered marketisation is the foremost causal factor in the country’s inability to consolidate democracy following a United Nations sponsored transition. The book demonstrates Cambodian perspectives on the role of public space in Cambodia's process of democratic development and explains the implications of violence and its relationship with neoliberalism.

Taking into account the transition from war to peace, authoritarianism to democracy, and command economy to a free market, this book offers a critical appraisal of the political economy in Cambodia.
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Reviews:

Gunn, G. C. 2013. Journal of Contemporary Asia, 43.1: 188-191.

Brickell, K. 2011. Asia Pacific Viewpoint, 52.3: 372-374.

Percival, T. 2011. Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 32.2: 270-272.

Christie, R. 2010. South East Asia Research, 19.2: 349-372.

Ordóñez de Pablos, P. 2010. International Journal of Asian Business and Information Management, 1.4: 65-66.

In the wake of the Asian Crisis, cases studies from Southeast Asia often reinforced the perception that neoliberalism is thriving in authoritarian states. Processes of intensive neoliberalisation in the region have now been ongoing for over a decade, yet attempts at democratic consolidation have been tenuous, fragile and incomplete at best, calling into question the supposed nexus between democracy and neoliberal reform. Accordingly, there is need for a moment of pause, to take stock of the neoliberalising process in the region, and importantly, to reframe the question and reflect on how and why authoritarianism is continuing to thrive in the neoliberalising Southeast Asian state.

The benefits of a regional or thematic approach to the study and presentation of world geography have long been debated. The goal to not to reimagine these debates or to promote one approach over another; the aim is to explore how world geography courses are currently being taught in American universities. By polling and sharing information about course structures, topics, and forms of evaluation, an open dialogue between instructors that will improve teaching strategies and student comprehension is encouraged.

Advocates for geographic information system (GIS) education contend that learning about GIS promotes students' spatial thinking. Empirical studies are still needed to elucidate the potential of GIS as an instructional tool to support spatial thinking in other geography courses. Using a non-equivalent control group research design, this study examines the effect of using Web-based GIS in a world geography course on the development of students' spatial thinking abilities. The findings indicate that Web-based GIS activities implemented in this study significantly enhanced students' spatial thinking skills.

ABSTRACT Using a stakeholder debate based on a real-world case of regional construction – that of Turkey's application to join the European Union – improved students' critical thinking in an introductory world regional geography course. Such courses are a staple offering among US geography departments, and often the only exposure of non-majors to geographic thinking. A stakeholder debate highlighting regional construction, using structured learning activities and reflection on their own thinking, improved students' critical thinking. We describe the stakeholder debate and its revision after one semester, and provide data from assessment and thematic coding of students' reflection papers.

At a time when nearly every topic seems to be labeled ''critical'' in geography, this essay asks why the discipline has lacked a clear commitment to advancing a ''critical area studies'' agenda. The term ''critical'' can take many meanings but, I argue, it has generally been an important way to ''other'' geography's past, including the encyclopedism of old-fashioned regional studies. With roots in the late 1980s, the idea of joining critical theory and area studies was initially challenged by questions of representation, which are inherent in area studies scholarship. Placing power at the center of their studies, and highly conscious of their own positionality, critical geographers have lacked a coherent approach to the political and ethical issues of representation. Another difficulty lies with critical geography's general skepticism about engaging the ''policy community'', which, especially in the US, tends to be imagined as an uncritical ''other''. Given the discipline's cyclical anxieties about policy relevance that typically surface when funding programs are subject to cuts, this has largely resulted in US geographers speaking past these audiences. With respect to both of these othering practices, I suggest that a critical area studies project would benefit from a more positive framing, stressing ''deep listening'' in empirically informed work, and actively imagining what a critical policy community might look like.

In the history of modern and contemporary academic geography, debates have surged concerning regional geography as both a method of geographical research and a form of pedagogy. Whereas regional geography dominated the discipline in the first half of the twentieth century, since the mid-1950s controversy has ensued concerning the contributions that regional geography made (and makes) to the advancement of the discipline (Johnston, 1997). In this editorial I examine some of the discourse from the 1950s to the present surrounding the debate on regional geography as an integral part of the discipline and some of the patterns evident from this discourse. It is beyond the scope and the intention of this paper to provide an exhaustive review of these debates. However, opinions by geographers from representative times are provided and framed in their respective historical contexts. I find a recurrence of similar themes as to whether regional geography should or should not remain a part of geographic education, yet despite the years of controversy surrounding this issue, geographers have not come to a clear consensus. Based on this observation, I argue that despite the cyclical trends of regional geography as an ideology and pedagogical philosophy and the longstanding controversy surrounding its preservation in geographic curricula, it serves several important purposes and should remain a fundamental component of geographic training and education. One notices the beginnings of the divergence of geographers' opinions regarding regional geography early on in the literature. Robert S. Platt (1957, p. 187), former President of the Association of American Geographers (AAG), called attention to some of the mutual misunderstandings between advocates and adversaries to the regional approach: " Probably regional geography has been hindered by an old pair of definitions contrasting systematic and regional geography. According to this couplet, systematic geography deals with something about every part of the world, and regional geography deals with everything about some part of the world. Under this limitation, regional geography could not be systematic, and systematic geography could not be regional. " Platt argued that even though this disagreement in the discipline is founded on extreme

This atlas provides a macro-regional overview of the areas that surround the European Union, from the Sahara to the Middle East, Western Balkans to European Russia, Turkey to the Arctic. Detailing key socio-economic data as well as developmental trends, the maps provide a comprehensive territorial analysis at a local scale and explore the potential for regional integration and cooperation.These pioneering maps examine challenges that threaten this wide, yet inter-connected, region, including environmental concerns in the North, political unrest in the East, social factors in the Western Balkans, and the upheaval in the Mediterranean since the Arab spring. Coverage investigates such key countries and areas as Libya, Israel, Palestine, Syria, and the Ukraine as well as explores such essential issues as Europe’s energy procurement. In addition, it also presents a comparison with other world regions such as East Asia and North America.In the end, readers discover that territorial integration faces many shortcomings, but that deep regional cooperation would be a key driver for the EU’s sustainable future. This atlas features the main results of the “Integrated Territorial Analysis of the Neighbourhoods” research project undertaken by ESPON (The European Observation Network for Territorial Development and Cohesion). It provides scholars; local authorities and NGOs involved in cross-border cooperation; companies interested in energy, agriculture, water, transportation and communication; and interested readers with key insights into this important region.

This chapter focuses on four stakes: (i) the huge demographic changes of the Western Balkans, and the mobility issue namely due to a re-bordering process since the end of the Yugoslavian wars ; (ii) the undeniable income rise but also rising social disparities; (iii) an economy which is just recovering with strong geographical fragmentation; (iv) in the field of environment, an early stage regulation and the necessity for a rising international cooperation with the European union. We highlight a still low international openness, an obvious core-periphery