Welcome to the companion website for Introduction to Geopolitics, 4th Edition.

Hello. Thank you for engaging with Introduction to Geopolitics. The book means a lot to me, and I’ll try and explain why. There are two reasons.

First, when I was in high school I never dreamed that I would go to university; let alone become a professor. But public education helped me find a career path that I never thought possible. I was able to become who I am because of public universities and the hard work of professors who took the time to help me form my own understanding of how the world works. I would like to do what I can to help you find your path and a way to understand the world we live in.

The second reason is because geopolitics is something that you will not be able to ignore in your lifetimes and most understandings of geopolitics are not helpful. In the past, geopolitics has become popular in times of international tension that have proven to be the precursor of global war. So, it’s a little scary that geopolitics has become a popular topic for professors and think tanks again. As we’ll see, most writing on geopolitics is to advance the agenda of a particular country. I wrote this book to try and provide a way of understanding the actions of all countries, not just your own. It’s my hope that by understanding the geopolitical situation of other countries we can look at a problem from many angles. And I hope that will provide pathways to peace rather than war.

I’m happy to help …

If you have questions or comments about the book then feel free to contact me via email: colin.flint@usu.edu

The book's purpose

The book will help you interpret the dynamism of worlds politics by introducing you to some concepts that continue to be useful and relevant.

I wrote the first edition of this book in 2006. If you’re at the beginning of your university studies that means I started thinking about the book before you’d entered grade school. Of course, I’ve tried to keep the book up to date by writing new editions. Much has changed in the world since 2006. Brexit changed the geopolitics of Europe. China’s growing role in global politics and economics has meant that every country must figure out how to engage with it. The War on Terror no longer seems to be the pressing issue of our times, though many parts of the world still suffer from the actions of Islamic extremists. The impact of global climate change means it is a part of all policy decisions. And the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted all sorts of assumptions we had about our own safety and the inter-connectedness of the world. Cybersecurity has become a pressing issue.

But while all these changes have occurred, so much has stayed the same. The United States is still the most powerful country in the world, even though it has been forced to return its troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. There are still shocking disparities in wealth and life opportunities between countries. Military power is still seen to be the ‘solution’ for most of the world’s issues. We still think of world politics as being driven by the actions of countries, even though trade, information, and migration networks grab the attention of politics.

I believe that a set of geopolitical concepts will help you understand the changing geopolitical world. Face it, geopolitics is going to have an impact upon you through your lives; whether you like it or not, and whether you understand geopolitics or not. You can’t ignore geopolitics so you may as well try and figure out what it is.

A conceptual toolkit

Think of the book as a conceptual toolkit. If you want to hang a picture on the wall, you’ll need certain tools: a hammer and nail. If you want to fix a leaking tap, you’ll need other tools: a wrench and a washer. Similarly, to understand the geopolitics of resource conflicts requires different concepts than, say, understanding global climate change. Each chapter explains a set of concepts that are useful for understanding different global issues. By the end of the book, you should know which concept is useful to understand which issue.

I suspect that you already have some interest in global politics. I hope that using the concepts in the book leads you to not just be aware of a global issue, but be able to interpret and understand it.

Use the toolkit – the Aggies Geopolitical Observatory

Like all toolkits, the concepts in this book are there to be used. You can learn about these concepts by using them to interpret and understand what is going on in the world. That may seem daunting, but the good news is that you’re not alone!

Click here to see how students are using the conceptual toolkit: https://chass.usu.edu/aggiesgo.

I run a project called the Aggies Geopolitical Observatory (Aggies is the nickname for Utah State University). This project allows undergraduate students to use the concepts in this book to interpret current news stories. The students read a story in a newspaper and discuss how one of the concepts in the book helps us gain a deeper understanding of the issue. In other words, you’ll understand a current issue by applying one of the concepts in the book.

We publish new articles every week. Follow along with us and use the students’ essays to understand a concept and see how you can use them to make sense of the world.

This book is a conceptual toolkit. You’ll only get confident with the tools if you use them – just like the team members of the Aggies Geopolitical Observatory

Book Information Complimentary Exam Copy