About

Website

Introduction

• ExploringGeopolitics offers valuable academic insights into key geopolitical questions
• ExploringGeopolitics is an independent and non-profit initiative
• All services are free of charge
• English is principal language
• Contributions reflect personal view of author
• Interviews are conducted by e-mail
• ExploringGeopolitics was established in 2009

Aims

• To bridge the gap between the academic world and policy makers, business community and journalists
• To inform about geopolitical schools of thought
• To ease finding opportunities to study geopolitics
• To assist in finding sources with geopolitical information

Services

• Interviews with geopolitical specialists
• Exclusive articles of experts in the field
• Information on geopolitical courses and conferences
• External links to websites and publications with a geopolitical flavour

Target Groups

• Academics who have an interest in the research and views of colleagues
• Students that are looking for inspiration regarding geopolitical definitions, methodologies and concepts
• Professionals such as (account) managers, (risk) analysts, policy advisers, army staff and journalists who need to assess geopolitical trends and risks

Special Thanks

David Criekemans was instrumental in the development of Geopolitiek.nl between 2006 and 2008, before this website was sacrifised to start ExploringGeopolitics.

Gyula Csurgai -introducing me to most of the early contributors- and Virginie Mamadouh -suggesting some of the recent interviewees- have been very helpful in finding interesting candidates for the Geopolitical Passport series.

Twitter page

ExploringGeopolitics has a Twitter page:

AllGeopolitics (Twitter)

Link Exchange Partners

Blog of dr Federico Bordonaro

Durham University

Englobe Inc.

Etudes Géopolitiques Européennes Atlantiques

Geocurrents

Geopolitical Assessments

Infoguerre

L’Institut québécois des hautes études internationales

International Centre for Geopolitical Studies

International Peace Information Service

Maastricht University

Programme Paix et sécurité internationales

Radboud University

James Rogers (European Geostrategy)

Royal Holloway, University of London

Universität St.Gallen

Universiteit Antwerpen

University of Amsterdam

University College Dublin

Contributors

Introduction

The website contains over 90 contributions of more than 50 geopolitical specialists and other experts in the field. The list below gives an overview of all contributors.

The list

• Mahdi Ahouie (Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Foundation for Interreligious and Intercultural Research and Dialogue, Geneva, Switzerland)
• Dr Emel Akçali (University of Birmingham, UK)
• Judith Akkerman (PhD candidate, University of Leiden, The Netherlands)
• Dr Marco Antonsich (University of Birmingham, UK)
• Jonathan Armstrong (King's College London, UK)
• Dr Veit Bachmann (PhD candidate, University of Plymouth, UK)
• Professor Mark Bassin (University of Birmingham, UK)
• Dr Luiza Bialasiewicz (Royal Holloway, University of London, UK)
• Professor Gideon Biger (University of Tel Aviv, Israel)
• Timothy Boon von Ochssée (PhD candidate, University of Groningen, The Netherlands)
• Dr Federico Bordonaro (La Sapienza University, Rome, Italy)
• Dr Pádraig Carmody (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland)
• Alex Chitty (King's College London, UK)
• Professor Saul Cohen (Hunter College and City University of New York, US)
• Professor David Criekemans (University of Antwerp, Belgium)
• Professor Gyula Csurgai (Geneva School of Diplomacy, Switzerland)
• Professor Simon Dalby (Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada)
• Professor Elena dell’Agnese (University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy)
• Dr Gertjan Dijkink (University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
• Dr Jason Dittmer (University College of London, UK)
• Professor Klaus Dodds (Royal Holloway, University of London, UK)
• Emmanuel Dupuy (Institut d’Etudes des Relations Internationales, Paris, France)
• Professor Gérard Dussouy (University of Bordeaux, France)
• Kate Edwards (PhD candidate, University of Washington, Seattle, US)
• Leonhardt van Efferink (Editor, King's College London, UK)
• Professor Stuart Elden (University of Durham, UK)
• Sherif Elgebeily (Student, American University of Cairo, Egypt)
• Professor Fabrizio Eva (University of Cà Foscari Venice, Treviso Campus, Italy)
• Professor Colin Flint (University of Illinois, US)
• Professor Michel Foucher (École Normale Supérieure, Paris Ulm, France)
• Patri Friedman (Executive Director of The Seasteading Institute, US)
• Elmar Hellendoorn (PhD candidate of University of Utrecht, The Netherlands)
• Dr Henk van Houtum (Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands)
• Professor Jennifer Hyndman (York University, Canada)
• Dr Linda Johnston (Director of Center for Conflict Management, Kennesaw State University, US)
• Professor Gerry Kearns (Virginia Tech, US)
• Olivier Kempf (Sciences-Po, Paris, France)
• Ian Klinke (PhD candidate, University College of London, UK)
• Marietta Koenig (PhD candidate, University of Hamburg, Germany)
• Professor Frédéric Lasserre (University of Montréal, Canada)
• Professor Virginie Mamadouh (University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
• Dr Nick Megoran (University of Newcastle, UK)
• Dr Julien Mercille (University College Dublin, Ireland)
• Dr Sami Moisio (Academy of Finland, Helsinki)
• Dr Martin Müller (University of St. Gallen, Switzerland)
• Igor Okunev (PhD candidate, Moscow Institute of International Relations, Russia)
• Professor Joe Painter (University of Durham, UK)
• Dr Claude Rakisits (Head of Geopolitical Assessments, Canberra, Australia)
• Francesco Ravanelli (new media consultant, Estonia)
• Dr Nathalène Reynolds (Centre for Asian Studies, Geneva, Switzerland)
• Dr Jérémy Robine (consultant and editor of Hérodote, Paris, France)
• James Rogers (PhD student, University of Cambridge, UK)
• Professor Stéphane Rosière (Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne, France)
• Professor David Slater (Loughborough University, UK)
• Steven Spittaels (International Peace Information Service, Antwerp, Belgium)
• Dr Michael Strauss (Centre d’Etudes Diplomatiques et Stratégiques, Paris, France)
• Dr Andrea Teti (University of Aberdeen, UK)
• Professor Alexandre Vautravers (Webster University, Geneva, Switzerland)
• Dennis de Widt (Centre for Terrorism and Counterterrorism, Universiteit Leiden, The Netherlands)
• Dr William Worster (The Hague University, The Netherlands)

Editor

Introduction

Spurring a growing interest in geopolitics and a widespread confusion about its meaning, I decided to found the Dutch website Geopolitiek.nl in 2006. The wish to attract both more foreign visitors and contributors made me decide to start with ExploringGeopolitics in 2009.

As website editor, my main responsibilities are conducting interviews, maintaining the academic network and designing and coding of the website.

I am currently doing the master program 'Geopolitics, Territory and Security' at King’s College London, after earlier obtaining a Master's degree in Financial Economics. In between, I worked as country risk analyst, getting a firm grasp of the global economy, world politics and international security.

Editorial: website structure

In December 2009, the structure of the website changed somewhat. What happened, and why?

• The section Editorial ceased to exist. Editorial messages will be posted on this page from now on.
• The three editorials that I wrote in 2009 also disappeared. Being hardly visited, these pages were actually idle content.
• The editorial pages on which I discussed quotes are no longer part of the website as well. Most of the discussed topics have been subject of interviews with experts in the fields, leaving little added value for my reflections on these matters. I am however looking for allternative ways to present thought-provoking quotes.
• The thematical world maps have been removed too. Updating them was no priority as the maps attracted relatively few visitors. More importantly, the website increasingly focuses on academic geopolitical insights, and not on statistics.
• I have renamed all Geopolitical Passport pages, which so far only contained name of interviewee. Topics that are discussed in interviews have been included in page names to improve search engine visibility.
• I have removed bibliography of International Centre for Geopolitical Studies as this list contained many French books. The French content on the website confused some visitors (thinking that website was bilingual, English-French), while hardly being beneficial (as lion's share of visitors does not read French). I am thinking of publishing an alternative bibliography, based on Geopolitical Passport recommendations, English books in ICGS list and other sources. Any advice in this regard would be very welcome!
• I have replaced the slogan "Because there are many ways to look at power and space" by "Offering valuable academic insights into key geopolitical questions". The new slogan makes immediately clear what the main function of the website is. I further removed the French quote from a book by Philippe Moreau Defarges on the banner and used an English quote of Simon Dalby from an interview on this website instead. This change aims to emphasise that English is the principal language of the website and arouse a further interest in the website among first-time visitors.

Editorial: website visitors

Comparing visitors' numbers of last and first quarter of 2009, I noticed some interesting trends:

• The Netherlands, still the largest source of visitors during the first quarter, ranked sixth during last quarter. This reflects the introduction of English as principal language, which led to removal of all Dutch pages in July 2009.
• The language change partially explains the leading positions of the US (first, also linked to its large population and widespread access to internet) and UK (second) during the last quarter.
• Contrary to The Netherlands, Belgium has remained an important source of visitors, maintaining its third position. I have no explanation for this persistency. Anybody?
• Canada's fourth position is also remarkable, pushing France into fifth position. Other industrialised countries in the visitors top 10 are Germany and Italy.
• The website experienced a strong rise in interest from India (from 10th to 7th position) and Pakistan (from 19th to 9th position). A significant share of the population in both countries speaks English, while contributions on Pakistan and Afghanistan likely further explain the popularity in these countries.
• All in all, ExploringGeopolitics attracted visitors from around 90% of all United Nations members. In some countries, the website was not visited at all, resulting from a virtually non-existent internet infrastructure (e.g. Mauritania and Niger) or strict government restrictions (e.g. Cuba and North Korea).