That anarchy keeps coming. Any day now…..
My reaction to Robert D. Kaplan’s Foreign Policy cover story, "The Revenge of Geography," can be summed up in the following joke: Question: Why will Robert Kaplan never do well at Guitar Hero? Answer: Because you can only go so far playing just one note. Kaplan has been saying the same thing for fifteen years ...
My reaction to Robert D. Kaplan's Foreign Policy cover story, "The Revenge of Geography," can be summed up in the following joke:
My reaction to Robert D. Kaplan’s Foreign Policy cover story, "The Revenge of Geography," can be summed up in the following joke:
Question: Why will Robert Kaplan never do well at Guitar Hero?
Answer: Because you can only go so far playing just one note.
Kaplan has been saying the same thing for fifteen years now. This paragraph from his FP essay encapsulates this point:
The ability of states to control events will be diluted, in some cases destroyed. Artificial borders will crumble and become more fissiparous, leaving only rivers, deserts, mountains, and other enduring facts of geography. Indeed, the physical features of the landscape may be the only reliable guides left to understanding the shape of future conflict. Like rifts in the Earth’s crust that produce physical instability, there are areas in Eurasia that are more prone to conflict than others. These “shatter zones” threaten to implode, explode, or maintain a fragile equilibrium. And not surprisingly, they fall within that unstable inner core of Eurasia: the greater Middle East, the vast way station between the Mediterranean world and the Indian subcontinent that registers all the primary shifts in global power politics.
Look, this is a good and important note, as anyone paying attention to Pakistan recently would attest. But let me dust off something I wrote about one of Kaplan’s earlier books oh-so-many-years ago:
Kaplan discovers that countries with corrupt governments, stagnant economies, and short histories of statehood are falling apart. In other words, Kaplan looks only at failed states and concludes that all states are failing. He believes these trends can be generalized to the rest of the world, yet his own descriptions [in The Coming Anarchy] contradict him. In the countries where statehood has a longer tradition, such as Turkey, Iran, and Thailand, Kaplan finds a stronger state and a less fragmented populace. This observation severs the contagion effect Kaplan wants to ascribe to events in West Africa and Central Asia.
Kaplan believes in the power of geography to disrupt man-made institutions. He’s right some of the time, and some of these cases are pretty important. In general, however, the state — even supposedly weak states — have proven to be remarkably resilient institutions.
Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and co-host of the Space the Nation podcast. Twitter: @dandrezner
More from Foreign Policy
Russians Are Unraveling Before Our Eyes
A wave of fresh humiliations has the Kremlin struggling to control the narrative.
A BRICS Currency Could Shake the Dollar’s Dominance
De-dollarization’s moment might finally be here.
Is Netflix’s ‘The Diplomat’ Factual or Farcical?
A former U.S. ambassador, an Iran expert, a Libya expert, and a former U.K. Conservative Party advisor weigh in.
The Battle for Eurasia
China, Russia, and their autocratic friends are leading another epic clash over the world’s largest landmass.
Sign up for World Brief
FP’s flagship evening newsletter guiding you through the most important world stories of the day. Delivered weekdays.
By submitting your email, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and to receive email correspondence from us. You may opt out at any time.
