World Leaders and International Relations - Prof. John Douglas Boyer, Study notes of Political Geography

Download World Leaders and International Relations - Prof. John Douglas Boyer and more Study notes Political Geography in PDF only on Docsity! GEOG 1014: World Regions Know Your Heads of State Joseph Stalin Ayatollah Khamene'i of Iran Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas President Hosni Mubarak UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon President Ma Ying-jeou of Taiwan of Egypt Exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Leader of Libya the Dalai Lama of Iran Muammar al-Gaddafi Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India Kim Il-Jong. Communist/Military Dictatorship. North Korea. Ex Prime Minister Fukuda New Russian President Communist Party Leader & New Prime Minister Taro Aso of Japan Dmitry Medvedev President Hu Jintao of China Founder of Palestine Liberation Movement UN Head Ban Ki Moon and Yassir Arafat (died in 2004) New Israeli Prime Minister Tzipi Livini President of Venezuela Prime Minister of the UK Prime Minister of Italy President of Ukraine Hugo Chavez Gordon Brown Silvio Berlusconi Victor Yuschenko Prime Minister of Ukraine President of Myanmar Pope Benedict XVII NATO Secretary General Yulia Timoschenko Than Shwe Jaap de Hoop Scheffer President of Zimbabwe Director General of the President of Pakistan King of Jordan Robert Mugabe International Atomic Energy Asif Zardari Abdullah II Agency – Mohamed ElBaradei Former President of South New Prime Minister of Former Chancellor of Prime Minister of Russia Africa – Thabo Mbeki Japan – Taro Aso Germany – Hitler Vladimir Putin 1. How many people are currently living on the planet? a. 6.5 billion 2. We are in the Age of the American Empire, but what century is approaching? a. The Asian Century 3. What are the three components that make a region? a. Area, Boundaries, Homogeneous state (likeness) 4. What are the physical characteristics of a region? a. Climate b. Vegetation c. Terrain d. Biological Profile 5. What are human characteristics of a region? a. Language b. Dress c. Diet d. Religion 6. Who is helping Saudi Arabia arm themselves? a. The United States 7. What separates Southern Asia from the rest of Asia a. The Himalayas 8. Why are women having fewer children? a. Education (main), contraceptives, women have jobs 9. How many people are projected to live on the planet in 2010? a. Approximately 7 billion 10. What is the projected peak of population? a. 11 billion 11. Where do people live? a. Coastal Areas – within several hundred miles of water b. Temperate climates – mid latitudes c. In or near big cities d. Northern hemisphere e. Near water 12. How are weather events across the world semi-related? a. Right now, it is hurricane season in the U.S. monsoon season in Asia typhoon season in Asia 13. How does the EU feel about Moscow’s recognition of South ossetia and Abkhazia? a. They condemn the recognition because they are toothless and get over 1/3 of their oil from Russia and are therefore reliant upon them for energy 14. Who is the Chuck Norris of Russia? a. Vladimir Putin 15. Who could kick every other world leader’s ass? a. Vladimir Putin (most powerful man in Russia since Stalin) 16. What is Australia a major exporter of? a. Natural Resources 17. Under the demographic transition – what country is in stage one? a. NONE 18. What were the jobs of people in pre-modern stage one societies? a. Hunter-gatherers 19. In stage three of the demographic transition, people are no longer working in agriculture and are instead working in what? a. Factories and urban areas 20. What percent of Americans work in agriculture? a. Less than 2% 21. What is the number one contributing factor to lowering birth rates? a. The education of women 22. What countries do not have immigration? a. North Korea, Russia, Japan, Italy 23. When people migrate, do they keep the same fertility rates as the previous country? a. They will have the same fertility rates for a while, but then eventually due to the conditions of where they currently live, they will adjust to that futurity rate 24. What is the wild card to a demographic transition (birth rates) a. Religion 25. Who decides who has refugee status? a. The UN 26. The US is the only country to take refugees from where? a. Cuba 27. What determines refugee status? a. War zones and dictatorship 28. KNOW POPULATION PYRAMIDS a. Classic Pyramid – “Pyramid” pyramid = triangle = growth b. Column – Steady to no growth c. Inverted – upside down triangle = negative growth 29. What country might break the trend of being rich and having high fertility rates? a. The UAE (The United Arab Emirates) b/c of their culture 30. The U.S. and Japan have about the same fertility rates, however Japan is worried about their inverted pyramid and the U.S. is not. Why is this? a. The U.S. has immigrants adding to their total population, whereas Japan does not 31. Why is Japan considering allowing immigrants to come in? a. The tax incentive to get people to have more kids has failed, and they need some way to pay for the old people’s retirement, healthcare, etc… since the older generation is much larger than the young (inverted pyramid) 32. What region has the fastest growing population? a. The Middle East 33. Why is the aid that the US and Europe sends to Africa not helping to decrease the population? a. The dynamic isn’t changing – no new jobs, etc. 34. What two groups of people are having more than 2 kids in China? a. Farmers b. The Elite 35. What country is going to be the most populus on the planet? a. India 36. Roughly how many states are there? a. 192 37. How many nations are there? a. Undetermined 38. Dioxin is one of the poisons of choice for what nation? a. KGB (the intelligence and internal security agency of the former Soviet Union) 39. Who has sent war ships into the Black Sea? a. The third U.S. war ship has just entered the Black Sea 40. What has unraveled the modern definition of sovereignty? a. Genocide 41. What is happening in Kosovo? a. Serbian government is committing genocide 42. What 5 states are on the UN Permanent Security Council? a. The United States b. Russia 75. At this week’s OPEC meeting, Saudi Arabia got so pissed off they left the meeting. Who pissed them off? a. Iran and Venezuela. Since Saudi Arabia is an ally of the U.S. they wanted oil prices to go down, however Iran and Venezuela wanted to cut production to raise prices 76. Who kicked out the U.S. Ambassador? a. Bolivia i. Following Bolivia, Venezuela kicked out their U.S. ambassador too. In return, the U.S. kicked out the Bolivian and Venezuelan ambassadors 77. How does NATO feel about the Russian invasion in Georgia? a. NATO demands Russia leave Georgia 78. Where does pure communism exist? a. NOWHERE 79. Where does pure capitalism exist? a. NOWHERE 80. What caused Communism and Socialism to evolve? a. The Industrial Revolution and the concentration of wealth that resulted 81. Why is there so much nationalization in Latin America? a. When you have a lot of poor people together and you let them vote, they are going to lean to the left further towards the capitalist side of the spectrum because they want to redistribute the wealth 82. What is nationalization? a. When the government takes over a private company 83. What is privatization? a. When the government sells one of its companies and makes it private 84. What did the U.S. and U.K. do in response to Chavez buying out Exxon? a. They froze all of Venezuela’s bank accounts and gave the money to Exxon 85. Why would a rich country nationalize an industry (like mortgage giants Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae)? a. For either national security or stabilization (when something poses a threat to the countries economy) 86. What is the number one use of corn in America? a. Feeding it to fat animals (like cows) 87. What is GDP? a. The Gross Domestic Product – the sum of all goods and services that occur within a country each year 88. What is NOT included in GDP? a. Illegal Activities (stuff that’s not taxed) b. Bartering c. Childcare and Housework (Domestic activities) 89. What is the difference between GDP and GDP per capita a. GDP per capita is per person so it gives a better representation of the country’s wealth 90. What country is the top seller of global arms every year? a. The U.S. 91. What country has a high GDP and a high GDP per capita, but it doesn’t mean everyone is doing well? a. Saudi Arabia (the wealth is EXTREMELY concentrated) 92. In the past 100 years, how has there been a military to civilian shift in who fights in the world? a. 100 years ago, in almost every conflict it was the military that died (90-95% were military people killing other military people; 5-10% were in the wrong place at the wrong time) b. NOW, that ratio has almost completely flipped – 90% are civilian deaths, and 10% are military 93. Why is the UN unsucessful as a world government? a. Because every state is sovereign and so they want to govern their own state and not give up some of their power to the UN 94. Why didn’t anyone on the UN Permanent Security Council veto the resolution to invade Iraq the first time (in 1991) a. Because Iraq was the one who invaded Kuwait, thus invading sovereignty 95. Who vetoed the resolution to invade Iraq the second time? a. China, Russia, and EVEN France 96. Who is the one country that REALLY believes in sovereignty? a. China 97. Why would the members of the permanent Security Council veto any movement to add new members to the permanent Security Council? a. Because NOTHING would get done; it barely works with only 5 members 98. Would Ukraine choose NATO or EU? a. The Ukraine would chose NATO over the EU 99. What is the U.S. government now having to do that it usually abhors? a. Nationalization (taking over Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae to save economy) 100.What is the only human thing that is truly globalized? a. Economics 101.Whose navy is controlling joint exercises with Venezuela a. Russia 102.The U.S. is losing their influence over who? a. Latin America 103.Who is predicted to be Japan’s next Prime Minister? a. Taro Aso (conservative) 104.What is the shittiest job on the planet? a. President of Pakistan (Zardari) 105.Know all the Trade Blocks a. NAFTA = North American Free Trade Agreement: United States, Mexico and Canada – agreement to gradually eliminate all duties and tariffs between these three countries b. DR-CAFTA = Dominican Republic – Central American Free Trade Agreement: United States, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua – international treaty to increase free trade c. FTAA = Free Trade Area of the Americas: PROPOSED all of the nations in N. & S. America except Cuba – proposed agreement to end trade barriers between all of the countries in N. & S. America d. EU = European Union: Belgium, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Denmark, Ireland, United Kingdom, Greece, Portugal, Spain, Austria, Finland, Sweden, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia – most evolved supernationalist organization (perhaps a “United States of Europe”); common market, common currency, European Commission, European Parliament, European Court of Justice; free movement of people across international borders of member states e. MERCOSUR = Southern Common Market: Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and (newest addition) Venezuela – free trade agreement to promote free trade and fluid movement of goods, people, and currency across member states f. ASEAN = Association of Southeast Asian Nations: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam – like the EU, aims for political, cultural, and economic integration g. APEC = Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, United States, China, Taiwan, Mexico, Papua New Guinea, Chili, Peru, Russia, Vietnam (pretty much everyone with Pacific Coastline) – improve economic and political ties; will possibly become a huge force in the global economy in the near future h. OECD = Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development: Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States, Japan, Finland, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Czech Republic, Hungary, South Korea, Poland, Slovakia – countries that accept the principles of democracy and free markets 106.Why are the U.S. and China in the least number of trade blocks? a. They don’t want to give up sovereignty or their power to make decisions 107. International Defense a. The United Nations i. Members = all sovereign states in the world except Vatican City; currently 192 ii. Founded in 1945 as a successor to the League of Nations iii. Goal = maintain global peace iv. Made up of several bodies 1. Permanent Security Council – United States, United Kingdom, Russia, China, France 2. General Assembly – each member nation has a representative and a vote b. NATO – North Atlantic Treaty Organization i. Military Alliance between certain European countries, Canada and America ii. Article V – mutual defense clause – “The parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all” c. WARSAW PACT i. Was an alliance formed by the Soviet Union to counter the perceived threat of NATO ii. Ended in 1991 108.What is the difference between a Cartel and a Monopoly? a. A cartel is a group of businesses, a monopoly is one business 109.Who do you NOT want to piss off? a. Jaap de Hoop Scheffer – NATO Security General 110.Who is the most successful military/defense organization of all time? a. NATO 111.What does NATO Article 5 say? a. An attack on any individual country in our club will be taken as an attack on all countries in our club 112. Is the War on Terror in Afganistan a U.S. war? a. NO, it is a NATO War 113.Why would countries like Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Estonia, etc. want to get into NATO so badly? a. At the fall of the USSR, Russia was weak. Knowing that they would probably become strong again, they wanted to make themselves untouchable 114.How do you get screwed without being invaded? a. Ask the Ukrainians 115.What will Russia do to Ukraine if they attemp to join NATO? a. They will attack them 116. Is Boyer a highlander? a. Yes 117.What does it take to pass a resolution in the UN Security Council? a. 9 votes in favor and NO veto votes from any of its 5 permanent members 118.Why is the UN Security General post usually filled by someone from a smaller, neutral nation? a. All 5 permanent members must approve of the new Security General, so it must be someone who doesn’t piss the others off 119.Who is always in charge of NATO operations? a. The U.S. 120.What is the one big asset that IS starting to work for the AU? a. The military 121. Who controls international waters? a. No one 122. What is the most cultural factor that affects what is going on on Earth? a. Religion