Geography of Economy?

[Union Thug]

First of all, I admit not knowing much about economics, but I was wondering if anyone has published a book or articles on the influence of geography (climate, environment, access to oceans) on the health or robustness of an economy. Can it be said that one country's system is 'better' than another without first factoring in what seems to be the core foundation of economic matters?

Thanks for you help?

[Nay]

1. I believe the book "Guns, Germs and Steel" addresses this

point. sorry, I forget the author's name.

[Union Thug]

4. thank you for the reference /eom

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Of course geography has a lot to do with economy

Nations that are landlocked don't have free access to trade. Countries without arable farmland have to import their foodstuffs. Nations with few exploitable natural resources are left alone; those with oil or diamonds or other valuable products have been 'helped along' by more powerful countries, which have conquered them in order to have control of the natural resources. Happened back in the colonial era, and is happening right now in Iraq.

[Union Thug]

3. I'm curious, because...

...so much has been written about the american 'system' working to build a powerful economy. I've always thought that it had more to do with huge coastlines granting access to the oceans 365 days a year and a moderate climate, as well a treasure trove of natural resources than the specific 'system' in place.

[Waverley_Hills_Hiker]

5. Economic Geography is a subfield of geography

Theres quite a bit on this, maybe not exactley on what you are looking for, though. You are getting into historical as well as economic geography, as well as what used to be called "developement economics"

You might want to start with a basic economic geography text to become familiar with some of the theory and basic concepts, and then move on from there.

There is some discussion of historical economic geography of the US in DW Meinigs trilotgy on the historical geography of the US, The Shaping of America. Some of what Meinig writes about touches on what your interested in.

[Lisa]

6. If you wander over to the bookstore at a nearby college or university ...

... and head for the social science section, the introductory human geography textbooks will probably have sections covering some of the economic geography theories (along with historical, political, and cultural geography). I've been teaching this for a few years, and we've been using Knox and Marston's book -- which isn't too bad, in terms of a general introduction to trade and development. They also go into geographical factors on a micro/local scale, e.g. why certain businesses prefer to set up shop in particular areas even if it may actually cost more for them to do so.

http://www.prenhall.com/divisions/esm/app/knox/

One bonus is that they put a special focus on globalization (a major issue in recent economic geography) and some of the older pre-1990s texts aren't as up-to-date on this.

Another caveat is that some of the classic theories -- like the demographic transition model and the accompanying evolution of economies through the primary (resource extraction) and secondary (manufacturing) sectors, up through the tertiary and now quaternary sectors, are being criticized by researchers because they were developed using limited data (from only some parts of the world during a possibly-unique time in history). So whether these predictions are universally relevant remains to be seen. Will the example of Western Europe during 1700-1900 apply to India in 2000-2100? We don't know.

Also, some ideas about the link between environment and human cultures employ environmental determinism, which was dominant a century ago but fell out of favor in the late 20th century because, among other things, it was often used to justify questionable social policies (e.g. "economic reforms in Africa are wasted because the climate results in a weak work ethic, so capitalism and democracy can't take root") -- and there's an increasing belief that geography and environment don't account for complex factors like colonialism's effect on societies. This is why writers like Jared Diamond (the Guns, Germs and Steel book mentioned earlier) tend to distance themselves from the old-school environmental determinists -- rather than proposing a single explanation, it's now presented as "environmental possibilism" instead.

Good luck! Feel free to DU-mail me if you've got any more questions.

[Union Thug]

7. Thank you all! I've got some good places to start! /eom

[AirAmFan]

8. Paul Krugman (NY Times economic columnist) has written quite a bit

on "regional dynamics". See http://www.wws.princeton.edu/~pkrugman/temin.html and the course reading lists at the end of his homepage at http://www.wws.princeton.edu/~pkrugman

Though Krugman is more interested in the distribution of different kinds of enterprise WITHIN a country or metro area. But the economic principles may be similar for the comparative location economics of whole countries

[Veggie Meathead]

9. I think geography and availability of resources are becoming less

and less important as technology becomes more sophisticated.In such an economy, global in scope, knowledge becomes a more important factor as in India where the global It industry has tapped into a mother lode of highly educated professionals at a fraction of the costs in western countries or Japan.

I was struck by the comment by one of India's IT executives to Morley Safer on 60 minutes:"Geography is history".Indeed.