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28-458: Southeast Europe or Southeastern Europe ( SEE ) is a geographical sub-region of Europe , consisting primarily of the region of the Balkans , as well as adjacent regions and archipelagos . There are overlapping and conflicting definitions of the region, due to political, economic, historical, cultural, and geographical considerations. Sovereign states and territories that may be included in
56-506: Is a continental landmass comprising the continents of North America and South America . [REDACTED] Africa [REDACTED] Antarctica [REDACTED] Asia [REDACTED] Australia [REDACTED] Europe [REDACTED] North America [REDACTED] South America [REDACTED] Afro-Eurasia [REDACTED] Americas [REDACTED] Eurasia [REDACTED] Oceania Political geography Political geography
84-473: Is a part of a larger geographical region or continent . Cardinal directions are commonly used to define subregions. There are many criteria for creating systems of subregions; this article is focusing on the United Nations geoscheme , which is a changing, constantly updated, UN tool based on specific political geography and demography considerations relevant in UN statistics. The Statistics Division of
112-460: Is also related to the changes in the world as a result of the end of the Cold War . With the emergence of a new world order (which as yet, is only poorly defined) and the development of new research agendas, such as the more recent focus on social movements and political struggles, going beyond the study of nationalism with its explicit territorial basis. There has also been increasing interest in
140-812: Is classified outside of main Europe. In the CIA World Factbook , the description of each country includes information about "Location" under the heading "Geography", where the country is classified into a region. The following countries are included in their classification "Southeast Europe": In this classification, Moldova is included in Eastern Europe and Greece is included in Southern Europe . Hungary and Slovenia are included in Central Europe . Sub-region A subregion
168-451: Is concerned with the study of both the spatially uneven outcomes of political processes and the ways in which political processes are themselves affected by spatial structures. Conventionally, for the purposes of analysis, political geography adopts a three-scale structure with the study of the state at the centre, the study of international relations (or geopolitics ) above it, and the study of localities below it. The primary concerns of
196-479: Is used for carrying out statistical analysis. The division's first publication was the book World's Women 2000: Trends and Statistics in 2000. According to the UN, the assignment of countries or areas to specific groupings is for statistical convenience and does not imply any assumption regarding political or other affiliation of countries or territories. The following is a non-exhaustive list of subregions, arranged alphabetically by region (i.e., by continent); in
224-480: The 1990s onwards, in part due to the negative historical and political connotations of the term Balkans , especially since the military conflicts of the 1990s in Yugoslavia in the western half of the region, the term Southeast Europe is becoming increasingly popular. The German Ständige Ausschuss für geographische Namen (Standing Committee on Geographical Names), which develops and recommends rules for
252-473: The United Nations (UN) is in charge of the collection, processing, and dissemination of statistical information for the UN. In 1999, it developed a system of macro-geographical (continental) regions, subregions, and other selected economic groups to report advances towards achieving numerous millennial development goals worldwide. These statistical divisions were devised for statistical purposes and
280-665: The Heartland would have control of the world. He used these ideas to politically influence events such as the Treaty of Versailles , where buffer states were created between the USSR and Germany , to prevent either of them controlling the Heartland. At the same time, Ratzel was creating a theory of states based around the concepts of Lebensraum and Social Darwinism . He argued that states were analogous to 'organisms' that needed sufficient room in which to live. Both of these writers created
308-415: The UN geoscheme, higher-level, macro-geographical regions are arranged to the extent possible according to continents. Sequence used in the list (not all criteria are applied to each continent): Afro-Eurasia is a continental landmass comprising the continents of Africa , Asia , and Europe . Eurasia is a continental mainland comprising the continents of Asia and Europe . The Americas
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#1732757849672336-433: The adoption of quantitative spatial science, Robert Sack's (1986) work on territoriality was based on the behavioural approach, Henry Bakis (1987) showed the impact of information and telecommunications networks on political geography, and Peter Taylor's (e.g. 2007) work on World Systems Theory owed much to developments within structural Marxism . However, the recent growth in vitality and importance of this sub-discipline
364-494: The ascendant, and, in particular, that whoever controlled the heartland of 'Euro-Asia' would control the world. This theory involved concepts diametrically opposed to the ideas of Alfred Thayer Mahan about the significance of sea power in world conflict. The heartland theory hypothesized the possibility of a huge empire being created which didn't need to use coastal or transoceanic transport to supply its military–industrial complex , and that this empire could not be defeated by
392-549: The exercise of power is not restricted to states and bureaucracies, but is part of everyday life. This has resulted in the concerns of political geography increasingly overlapping with those of other human geography sub-disciplines such as economic geography, and, particularly, with those of social and cultural geography in relation to the study of the politics of place (see, for example, the books by David Harvey (1996) and Joe Painter (1995)). Although contemporary political geography maintains many of its traditional concerns (see below)
420-403: The geography of green politics (see, for example, David Pepper's (1996) work), including the geopolitics of environmental protest, and in the capacity of our existing state apparatus and wider political institutions, to address any contemporary and future environmental problems competently. Political geography has extended the scope of traditional political science approaches by acknowledging that
448-421: The idea of a political and geographical science, with an objective view of the world. Prior to World War II political geography was concerned largely with these issues of global power struggles and influencing state policy, and the above theories were taken on board by German geopoliticians (see Geopolitik ) such as Karl Haushofer who - perhaps inadvertently - greatly influenced Nazi political theory, which
476-460: The multi-disciplinary expansion into related areas is part of a general process within human geography which involves the blurring of boundaries between formerly discrete areas of study, and through which the discipline as a whole is enriched. In particular, contemporary political geography often considers: Critical political geography is mainly concerned with the criticism of traditional political geographies vis-a-vis modern trends. As with much of
504-540: The region are Albania , Bosnia and Herzegovina , Bulgaria , Croatia (alternatively placed in Central Europe ), Greece (alternatively placed in the broader region of Southern Europe ), Kosovo , Montenegro , North Macedonia , Romania (alternatively placed in Eastern Europe ), Serbia , and the European part of Turkey (alternatively placed in the broader region of Southern Europe, also in Western Asia with
532-400: The regional approach. As a result, most of the political geography texts produced during this period were descriptive, and it was not until 1976 that Richard Muir could argue that political geography was no longer a dead duck, but could in fact be a phoenix. From the late-1970s onwards, political geography has undergone a renaissance, and could fairly be described as one of the most dynamic of
560-612: The rest of the country). Sometimes, Cyprus (most often placed in West Asia ), Hungary (most often placed in Central Europe), Moldova (most often placed in Eastern Europe) and Slovenia (most often placed in Central Europe) are also included due to cultural or historical factors and affiliation. The largest cities of the region are Istanbul , Athens , Bucharest , Sofia , and Belgrade . The first known use of
588-507: The rest of the world allied against it. This perspective proved influential throughout the period of the Cold War , underpinning military thinking about the creation of buffer states between East and West in central Europe. The heartland theory depicted a world divided into a Heartland (Eastern Europe/Western Russia); World Island (Eurasia and Africa); Peripheral Islands (British Isles, Japan, Indonesia and Australia) and New World (The Americas). Mackinder argued that whoever controlled
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#1732757849672616-429: The sub-disciplines today. The revival was underpinned by the launch of the journal Political Geography Quarterly (and its expansion to bi-monthly production as Political Geography ). In part this growth has been associated with the adoption by political geographers of the approaches taken up earlier in other areas of human geography, for example, Ron J. Johnston 's (1979) work on electoral geography relied heavily on
644-462: The subdiscipline can be summarized as the inter-relationships between people, state, and territory. The origins of political geography lie in the origins of human geography itself, and the early practitioners were concerned mainly with the military and political consequences of the relationships between physical geography, state territories, and state power. In particular there was a close association with both regional geography , with its focus on
672-536: The term "Southeast Europe" was by Austrian researcher Johann Georg von Hahn (1811–1869) as a broader term than the traditional Balkans , a concept based on the boundaries of the Balkan Peninsula. Countries described in 2004 by Istituto Geografico De Agostini as being entirely within the Balkan region, are: Albania , Bosnia and Herzegovina , Bulgaria , Montenegro , and North Macedonia . However from
700-412: The uniform use of geographical names, proposes two sets of boundaries. The first follows international borders of current countries. The second subdivides and includes some countries based on cultural criteria. The following countries are included in their classification "Southeastern Europe": In this classification, Croatia, Hungary and Slovenia are included in Central Europe , while Turkey (East Thrace)
728-495: The unique characteristics of regions, and environmental determinism , with its emphasis on the influence of the physical environment on human activities. This association found expression in the work of the German geographer Friedrich Ratzel , who in 1897 in his book Politische Geographie , developed the concept of Lebensraum (living space) which explicitly linked the cultural growth of a nation with territorial expansion, and which
756-689: Was a form of politics seen to be legitimated by such 'scientific' theories. The close association with environmental determinism and the freezing of political boundaries during the Cold War led to a significant decline in the perceived importance of political geography, which was described by Brian Berry in 1968 as a 'moribund backwater'. Although at this time in most other areas of human geography new approaches, including quantitative spatial science, behavioural studies, and structural Marxism, were invigorating academic research these were largely ignored by political geographers whose main point of reference remained
784-556: Was later used to provide academic legitimisation for the imperialist expansion of the German Third Reich in the 1930s. The British geographer Halford Mackinder was also heavily influenced by environmental determinism and in developing his concept of the 'geographical pivot of history' or the Heartland Theory (in 1904) he argued that the era of sea power was coming to an end and that land based powers were in
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