Mackinder and the Heartland Theory in Post-Soviet Geopolitical Discourse

Abstract

This paper considers the ways in which Halford Mackinder's ideas are represented and mobilized in geopolitical discourses in post-Soviet Russia. Mackinder is broadly recognized as the most important proponent of ‘classical’ geopolitics, and his teachings about the Pivot of History and Heartland are referred to in virtually all geopolitical texts. Not all of this attention however is positive. We examine the very different ways in which Mackinder is deployed in this literature, and how he is re-signified to make his ideas relevant for contemporary Russia

Notes

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2. Mark Bassin, ‘Between Realism and the ‘New Right’: Geopolitics in Germany in the 1990s,’ Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 28:3 (2003) p. 350–66; M. Bassin, ‘The Two Faces of Contemporary Geopolitics,’ Progress in Human Geography 28 (2004) pp. 620–626.

3. Cf. L. A. Modzhorian, Geopolitika na sluzhbe voennykh avantiur (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye Otnosheniia 1974).

4. D. Hooson, ‘The New Political Geography in Russia: Antecedents and Applications,’ in V. Berdoulay and J. A. van Ginkel (ed.) Geography and Professional Practice (Utrecht: Koninklijk Nederlands Aardrijkskundig Genootschap 1996) pp. 103–309.

5. The following list provides an indication, but is by no means complete. V. V. Razuvaev, Geopolitika Postsovetskogo Prostranstva (Moscow: Institut Evropy RAN 1993); S. B. Lavrov (ed.), Geopoliticheskie i Geoekonomicheskie Problemy Rossii (St. Petersburg: PROPO 1995); K. E. Sorokin, Geopolitika Sovremennosti i Geostrategiia Rossii (Moscow: ROSSPEN 1996); T. A. Mikhailov, Evoliutsiia Geopoliticheskikh Idei (Moscow: Ves’ Mir 1999); Iu. V. Tikhonravov, Geopolitika. Uchebnoe Posobie (Moscow: INFRA-M 2000); V. A. Dergachev, Geopolitika (Kiev: VIRA-R 2000); N. M. Sirota, Osnovy Geopolitiki. Uchebnoe Posobie (St. Petersburg: IVESEP 2001); V. A. Kolosov and N. S. Mironenko, Geopolitika i Politicheskaia Geografiia. Uchebnik dlia Vuzov (Moscow: Aspekt Press 2001); E. A. Vandam, Geopolitika i Geostrategiia (Zhukovskii/Moscow: Kuchkovo Pole 2002); V. L. Petrov, Geopolitika Rossii. Vozrozhdenie ili gibel’? (Moscow: Veche, 2003); N. A. Nartov, Geopolitika (2nd ed.) (Moscow: Edinstvo 2003); P. V. Chernov, Novyi Geopoliticheskii Peredel Mira. Chto Budet s Rossiiei? (Moscow: Vostochnaia Literatura 2003); I. A. Vasilenko, Geopolitika. Uchebnoe Posobie (Moscow: Logos 2003); I. F. Kefeli, Sud'ba Rossii v Global'noi Geopolitike (St. Petersburg: Severnaia Zvezda 2004).

6. V. Zhirinovskii, Geopolitika i Russkii Vopros (Moscow: Geleriia 1998); V. V. Zhirinovskii, ‘Geopoliticheskii Aspekt Unichtozheniia Rossii i Nekotorye Predlozheniia Fraktsii LDPR po Protivodeistviiu Dannomu Protsessu,’ in V. V. Zhirinovskii i Fraktsiia LDPR v Gosudarstvennoi Dume. Obzor (Moscow: n.p. 1995) p. 6–10. Also see the book by Zhirnovskii's deputy A. V. Mitrofanov, Shagi Novoi Geopolitiki (Moscow: Russkii Vestnik 1997).

7. See for example O'Loughlin (note 1).

8. B. Lo, Vladimir Putin and the Evolution of Russian Foreign Policy (London: Blackwell 2003) p. 74. Also see J. Dunlop, ‘Russia: Confronting a Loss of Empire,’ in I. Bremmer and R. Taras (eds), Nation and Politics in the Soviet Successor States, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1993): p. 43–72.

9. S. Kliuchnikov, ‘Russkii uzel evraziistva,’ Nash Sovremennik 3 (1992) pp. 174–180; Tat'iana Ochirova, ‘Geopoliticheskaia kontseptsiia evraziistva,’ Obshchestvennye Nauki i Sovremennost’ 1 (1994) pp. 47–55; K. Hielscher, ‘Der Eurasismus,’ Neue Gesellschaft 40 (1993) pp. 465–69; D. Kerr, ‘The New Eurasianism: The Rise of Geopolitics in Russia's Foreign Policy,’ Europe-Asia Studies 47/6 (1995) pp. 977–988; V. V. Kozhinov, ‘O evraziiskoi Kontseptsii Russkogo Puti,’ in O Russkom Natsional’nom Soznanii (Moscow: Algoritm 2000) pp. 223–239, L. Luks, ‘The third way of the Neo-Evrazijstvo journal ‘Elementy’ – Back to the Third Reich?,’ Studies in East European Thought 52/1–2 (2000) pp. 49–71; C. Pursiainen, Eurasianism and neo-Eurasianism. The Past, Present, and Postmodernity of a Russian Integration Ideology, vol. 5, UPI Working Papers (Helsinki: Finnish Institute of International Affairs 1998); V. Stupishin, ‘Neoevraziitsy??’ Nezavisimaia Gazeta (6 Nov. 1998) p. 7; Tsygankov, ‘Hard-Line Eurasianism’ (note 1); M. Bassin, ‘Eurasianism and Geopolitics in Post-Soviet Russia,’ in J. Godzimirski (ed.), Russia and Europe (Oslo: NUPI 1996) pp. 33–42.

10. K. Khauskhofer, O Geopolitike. Raboty Raznykh Let (I. G. Usachev, trans.) (Moscow: Mysl’ 2001).

11. Kh. Dz. Makkinder, ‘Goegraficheskaia os’ istorii,’ Polis 4 (n.p. 1995 [1904]) p. 162–169.

12. On Ziuganov see L. March, The Communist Party in Post-Soviet Russia (Manchester: Westview 2002); Joan Barth Urban and Valerii D. Solovei, Russia's Communists at the Crossroads (Boulder CO: 1997).

13. G. A. Ziuganov, Geografiia Pobedy. Osnovy Rossiiskoi Geopolitiki (Moscow: n.p. 1998). Also see G. A. Ziuganov, Rossiia i Sovremennyi Mir (Moscow: Obozrevatel’ 1995); G. A. Ziuganov, Rossiia: Rodina Moia. Ideologiia Gosudarstvennogo Patriotizma (Moscow: Informpechat’ 1996).

14. S. D. Shenfield, Russian Fascism. Traditions, Tendencies, Movements (Armonk NY: M.E. Sharpe 2001) p. 52.

15. Ziuganov (note 13) p. 30.

16. Ibid. p. 31.

17. Ibid. pp. 31–32.

18. Ibid. p. 34, emph. orig.

19. Ibid. p. 30, emph. orig.

20. A. Dugin, Osnovy geopolitiki. Geopoliticheskoe budushchee Rossii (1st ed.) (Moscow: Arktogeia 1997) [reissued in 2000 in a much-expanded second edition as Osnovy Geopolitiki. Geopoliticheskoe Budushchee Rossii. Myslit’ Prostranstvom]; Tsygankov, ‘Mastering Space’ (note 1) p. 109n.

21. On Dugin see A. Ingram, ‘Alexander Dugin: Geopolitics and Neo-Fascism in Post-Soviet Russia,’ Political Geography 20/8 (2001): 1029–1052; Tsygankov, ‘Mastering Space’ (note 1); W. Laqueur, Black Hundred. The Rise of The Extreme Right in Russia (New York: Harper Collins 1993) pp. 138–142; W. Allensworth, The Russian Question. Nationalism, Modernization, and Post-Communist Russia (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield 1998) pp. 248–252, 258–262 and passim. Dugin maintains a Web site with considerable material translated into European languages: http://www.arctogaia.com.

22. A. Dugin, Konservativnaia Revolutsiia (Moscow: Arkotegeia 1994).

23. Dugin, Osnovy Geopolitiki (note 20) pp. 43–44; Shenfield, RussianFascism: 195.

24. Ibid. pp. 44, 47, 165.

25. C. Schmitt, Land und Meer. Eine Weltgeschichtliche Betrachtung (Cologne: Hohenheim 1981 [originally published 1942]).

26. Dugin, Osnovy geopolitiki (note 20) p. 49.

27. Ibid. p. 46.

28. See M. Bassin, ‘Russia between Europe and Asia: The Ideological Construction of Geographical Space,’ Slavic Review 50/1 (1991) pp. 13–16.

29. Dugin, Osnovy Geopolitiki (note 20) p. 44.

30. Ibid. p. 166.

31. N. J. Spykman, America's Strategy in World Politics (New York: Harcourt Brace 1942); ‘Mr. X’ [George Kennan], ‘The Sources of Soviet Conduct,’ Foreign Affairs 25 (1947) pp. 566–582.

32. Dugin, Osnovy geopolitiki (note 20) pp. 61–67.

33. On Dugin's geopolitical cartography see M. Bassin, ‘Myslit’ Prostranstvom: Eurasia and Ethno-Territoriality in Post-Soviet Maps,’ S. K. Frank and I. Smirnov (eds), in Zeit-Räume. Neue Tendenzen in der historischen Kulturforschung aus der Perspektive der Slavistik (Wiener Slawistischer Almanach, Bd. 49) (Vienna: n.p. 2002) pp. 15–35.

34. Dugin mistakenly dates this as 1905.

35. Dugin, Osnovy geopolitiki (note 20) p. 45. Remarkably, on this map both Britain and Japan are included as part of the Inner Crescent!.

36. Cover of Elementy 1 (1992).

37. Dugin, Osnovy geopolitiki (note 20) pp. 361, 415.

38. Ibid. p. 44.

39. K. S. Gadzhiev, Vvedenie v Geopolitiku (Moscow: Logos 1998).

40. Ibid. p. 35.

41. Ibid. p. 15–16.

42. V. A. Kolosov (ed.), Geopoliticheskoe Polozhenie Rossii: Predstavleniia i Real'nost' (Moscow: Art-Kur'er 2000).

43. Ibid. p. 22.

44. Ibid. p. 23.

45. V. L. Tsymburskii, ‘Zemlia za Velikim Limitrofom: ot ‘Rossii-Evrazii’ k ‘Rossii v Evrazii’,’ in Rossiia–Zemlia za Velikim Limitrofom: Tsvilizatsiia i ee Geopolitika (Moscow: Editorial URSS 2000) pp. 6–26; V. L. Tsymburskii, ‘Ostrov Rossiia: Perspektivy Rossiiskoi Geopolitiki,’ Polis 5 (1993) pp. 6–22 V. L. Tsymburskii, ‘Russkie i Geoekonomika,’ Pro et Contra 8/2 (2003) pp. 178–216.

46. Tsymburskii, ‘Ostrov Rossii,’ (note 45) pp. 6–7; also see Tsymburskii, ‘Russkie i Geoekonomika’ (note 45) p. 210n.

47. Tsymburskii, ‘Ostrov Rossii,’ (note 45) pp. 7–8.

48. Ibid. pp. 8–10.

49. Tsymburskii, ‘Zemlia za Velikim Limitrofom (note 45) p. 114.