MACKINDER’S “HEARTLAND”: A HELP OR HINDRANCE IN UNDERSTANDING CENTRAL ASIA’S INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS?
Abstract
In 1904 the British geographer Halford Mac-kinder (1861-1947) delivered a paper to London’s Royal Geographical Society entitled The Geographical Pivot of History. He argued that the “Pivot,” or “Heartland” of Eurasia—much of Russia and Central Asia (see Fig. 1)—was the key to the balance of power in the world, and the state that controlled it would be well-placed to dominate Eurasia and even the world. His ideas proved controversial but entered into the vocabulary of U.S. foreign policy during the Cold War. Some commentators predicted that the end of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. conflict would lay Mackinder’s thesis to rest. However, his ideas have experienced a renaissance in application to Central Asia. Numerous scholars and journalists have seen fit to revise his ideas, claiming that Central Asia, as the focus of a competition for influence from Russia, the U.S., China, Turkey, Iran and others, has taken its rightful place as the Pivot of Asia. Reducing the “Heartland” to Central Asia, Ehsan Ahrari contends that “the father of modern geopolitics, Sir Halford Mackinder, once said that whoever controlled Central Asia would wield enormous power in the world.”1 Basing their analysis on Mackinder’s theories, Sloan argues that “Central Asia is once more a key to the security of all Eurasia,”2 whilst O’Hara describes competition in Central Asia between external powers since 1991 as “the scramble for the ‘Heartland’,”3 and suggests that Mackinder’s “insightful observations may yet be proved correct.”4
Others, however, have criticized this linkage. Edwards argues that it arbitrarily merges ideas about a “new great game” with geopolitics to make policy recommendations, without any attention to theoretical rigor or careful reading of the geopolitical tradition.5 Fettweis contends that the application of Mackinder’s ideas to contemporary Central Asia is profoundly misplaced, as they have been overtaken by the course of events, leading us to waste valuable foreign pol-icy opportunities.6
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References
E. Ahrari, “The Strategic Future of Central Asia: A View from Washington,” Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 56, No. 2, 2003, p. 159.
G. Sloan, “Sir Halford J. Mackinder: The Heart-land Theory Then and Now,” Journal of Strategic Studies, Vol. 22, No. 2/3, 1999, p. 32.
S. O’Hara, “Great Game or Grubby Game? The Struggle for Control of the Caspian,” Geopolitics, Vol. 9, No. 1, 2004, p. 147.
S. O’Hara, M. Heffernan, G. End field, “Halford Mackinder, the ‘Geographical Pivot,’ and British Perceptions of Central Asia,” in: Global Geostrategy: Mackinder and the Defense of the West, ed. by B. Blouet, Frank Cass, London, 2005, p. 101.
See: M. Edwards, “The New Great Game and the New Great Gamers: Disciples of Kipling and Mackinder, “Central Asian Survey, Vol. 22, No. 1, 2003, p. 96.
See: C. Fettweis, “Sir Halford Mackinder, Geopolitics, and Policymaking in the 21st Century,” Parameters, U.S. Army War College Quarterly, Summer 2000, pp. 58-71: available at [http://www.carlisle-www.army.mil/usawc/arameters/00summer/fettweis.htm].
The authors would like to thank Professor Alisher Faizullaev of the University of World Economy and Diplomacy and the Centre of Political Studies, Tashkent, for hosting the symposium and assisting in its organization, and the U.K. Committee on Central and Inner Asia for financial assistance. We would also like to thank Dr Murad Esenov for his support of this special issue, and Dr Brian Blouet for commenting on this paper.
See: Halford Mackinder and the “Geographical Pivot of History”: a centennial retrospective, ed. by K. Dodds and J. Sidaway. Special edition of Geographical Journal, Vol. 170, No. 4, 2004; Global Geostrategy: Mackinder and the Defence of the West, ed. by B. Blouet, Frank Cass, London, 2005.
For a biography of Mackinder, see: B. Blouet, Halford Mackinder: A Biography, Texas A&M University Press, College Station, 1987. For a condensed version, see: B. Blouet, “Mackinder, Sir Halford John (1861-1947),” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Oxford, Vol. 35, 2004, pp. 648-651.
See: H. Mackinder, “The Physical Basis of Political Geography,” The Scottish Geographical Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 2, 1890, p. 79.
See: H. Mackinder, “The Human Habitat,” The Scottish Geographical Magazine, Vol. 47, No. 6, 1931.
See: H. Mackinder, Foreword to: N. Mikhaylov, Soviet Geography: The New Industrial and Economic Distributions of the U.S.S.R. Second edition, Transl. by Natalie Rothstein, Methuen and Co., London, 1937.
See: H. Mackinder, “Man-power as a Measure of National and Imperial Strength,” The National Review, Vol. 45, No. 265, 1905.
H. Mackinder, “On the Scope and Methods of Geography,” Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society, Vol. 9, No. 3, 1887, p. 159.
See: B. Blouet, “Sir Halford Mackinder as British High Commissioner to South Russia, 1919-1920,” Geographical Journal, Vol. 142, No. 2, 1976.
See, for example: R.S. Teague-Jones, The Spy Who Disappeared: Diary of a Secret Mission to Russian Central Asia in 1918. With an Introduction and Epilogue by Peter Hopkirk, Victor Gollancz, London, 1990.
See: B. Blouet, Sir Halford Mackinder, 1861-1947: Some New Perspectives, School of Geography, University of Oxford, 1975; G. Kearns, “Halford John Mackinder: 1861-1947,” in: Geographers Bibliographical Studies, No. 9, ed. by T.W. Freeman Mansell, London, 1985.
See footnote 13.
The other “natural regions” were Sahara, Southern Heartland (Sub-Saharan Africa), Arabia, European Coastland (the remainder of Europe), and Monsoon Coastland (India, China and South-East Asia).
H. Mackinder, Democratic Ideals and Reality: A Study in the Politics of Reconstruction, Constable and Company, London, 1919, p. 194.
See: H. Mackinder, “The Round World and the Winning of the Peace,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 21, No. 4, 1943, p. 603.
For reports on the symposium, see: N. Megoran, S. Sharapova, A. Faizullaev, “Conference report: ‘Halford Mackinder’s “Heartland”: A Help or Hindrance?’, Tashkent, 2-3 December 2004,” Geographical Journal (forthcom-ing); S. Sharapova, “Teoriia Makkindera and sovremennye mezhdunarodnye otnosheniia,” Halqaro Munosobatlar, No. 4,2004, pp. 87-89.
See, for example: G. Smith, “The Masks of Proteus: Russia, Geopolitical Shift and the New Eurasianism,” Trans-actions of the Institute of British Geographers, No. 24, 1999, pp. 481-500; A. Ingram, “Alexander Dugin: Geopolitics and Neo-fascism in Post-Soviet Russia,” Political Geography, No. 20, 2001; J. O’Loughlin, “Geopolitical Fantasies, National Strategies and Ordinary Russians in the Post-Communist Era,” Geopolitics, Vol. 6, No. 3, 2001, pp. 17-48.
See, for example: G. Ó Tuathail, Critical Geopolitics: The Politics of Writing Global Space, Routledge, London,1996, Chapter 3.
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