Cultural geopolitics and the New Border Regions of Eurasia

• Main Author: Kimitaka Matsuzato
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: SAGE Publishing 2010-01-01
• Series: Journal of Eurasian Studies
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1879366509000062

During the two decades after the Cold War, interactions between the peripheries of the former Soviet bloc and their neighboring regions activated to the extent that what can be called the New Border Regions emerged. To analyze this phenomenon, the paper proposes a new methodology -- cultural geopolitics. While classic geopolitics focused on military, economic, and other material resources exploited by sovereign states (modern empires), cultural geopolitics highlights cognitive crafting by transnational actors, such as religious organizations, transborder nationalities, transnational corporations, and NGOs. Cultural geopolitics exploits the achievements that recent empire and religion studies have made. Cultural geopolitics facilitates the understanding, for example, of the Black Sea Rim region as a typical New Border Region.