Travelling Imaginations – Perception, adaptation and popularisation of Halford J. Mackinder’s Heartland theory
Final Report Abstract
The Heartland theory of the British geographer Halford J. Mackinder (1861-1947) was prevalent through the 20th century as a geopolitical imagination of a future global spatial order. The references of the Russian narrative of regaining global political power to Mackinder’s theory by Alexander Dugin showed long before the Ukraine war, that the Heartland theory remains one of the pivotal points of the discourse on processes of spatial reordering in the 21st century, which is conducted as a result of the threat to and destabilization of established spatial orders, usually forced by acts of war, but also caused by the instability of political systems itself. The prolonged recourse to the Heartland theory is based on its adaptability to various historical and political events, which Mackinder himself inscribed in the theory by modifying it to three times (1904, 1919, 1943) over four decades. Mackinder's Heartland theory cannot be considered a monolithic entity, as he indicated himself. The three modifications must each be understood as independent concepts that were followed by very disparate adaptations corresponding to the national interests of the recipients. The consequence of the effort to unify the drafts, which was not only intended by Mackinder himself but is also observable in the research literature, was the reduction of theoretical complexity to the parameters that remained constant in all drafts. The visualization of these parameters in maps made the global "legibility" of the theory possible, independent of language skills. The reduction of complexity (theory and map) determined the adaptability and popularization of the Heartland theory in the United States during the Second World War, which was mainly forced by immigrated, European mediators. By translating and conveying knowledge about German geopolitics and Karl Haushofer these mediators aroused interest in Mackinder's Heartland theory in the United States, leading to its intensive perception and adaptation. The hypotheses of the Heartland theory were transformed into legitimizing arguments for US foreign policy towards the public during the Second World War and the first phase of the Cold War. As a result of the transcontinental perception process, the Heartland theory continues to function up to the present as a scientific legitimization of strategic and geopolitical narratives that also serve coping with contingency. The theory not only describes the present. It also makes predictions for the future. Both offer explanation and the potential for interpretation of political processes in phases of destabilization of spatial orders, which causes the persisting reference to the Heartland theory, especially in moments of global crisis.
Publications
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Die Reduktion vom Komplexität: Anmerkungen zur Popularität der Heartland-Theorie Halford J. Mackinder, IfL Blog, 29.04.2020
Krause, Oliver
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Mackinder's “heartland” – legitimation of US foreign policy in World War II and the Cold War of the 1950s. Geographica Helvetica, 78(1), 183-197.
Krause, Oliver
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Travelling spatial imagination – die internationale Popularisierung der Heartland-Theorie Halford J. Mackinders, Themenportal Europäische Geschichte
Krause, Oliver
