Geography Exam #2

Europe's exceptional locational advantages

its relative location, at the crossroads of the land hemisphere, creates maximum efficiency for contact with much of the rest of the world; a "peninsula of peninsulas;" nowhere far from the ocean and its avenues of seaborne trade and conquest; hundreds of

local functional specialization

the production of particular goods by particular people in particular places; a hallmark of Europe's economic geography that later spread to many other parts of the world, whereby particular people in particular places concentrate on the production of par

negative natural population growth

to keep a population from declining, the statistically average woman must bear 2.1 children; for Europe as a whole that figure was 1.6 in 2010; several countries recorded a number as low as 1.3, such as Germany, Portugal, Romania, and Hungary; Bosnia even

the vast majority of immigrants

the majority of European immigrants are generally more religious than the Christian natives; they arrived in a Europe where native populations are stagnant or declining, where religious institutions are weakened, and where certain cultural norms are incom

What happened in Switzerland in 2009 and why?

the new Islamic presence has been a cause of social tension in certain countries, sometimes seriously but occasionally giving way to populist political theatrics; in a controversial referendum in 2009, the Swiss electorate approved a law that prohibits th

supranationalism

a voluntary association in economic, political, or cultural spheres of three or more independent states willing to yield some measure of sovereignty for their mutual benefit; a venture involving three or more states--political, economic, and/or cultural c

Treaty of Rome

under this treaty, six countries joined to become the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1958, also called the "Common Market;" in 1973 the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Denmark joined, and the renamed European Community (EC) now encompassed nine members

euro

the single currency that also symbolizes Europe's strengthening unity and establishes a joint counterweight to the once mighty American dollar; in 2002, 12 of the then 15 EU countries withdrew their currencies and began using the euro, with only the Unite

Four Motors of Europe

each is a high-technology driven region marked by exceptional industrial vitality and economic success not only within Europe but on the global scene as well; (1) France's southern Rhone-Alpes Region, centered on the country's second-largest city, Lyon; (

devolution

the process whereby regions within a state demand and gain political strength and growing autonomy at the expense of the central government; the powerful centrifugal forces whereby regions or peoples within a state, through negotiation or active rebellion

West Germany in 1990

had a population of about 62 million and East Germany 17 million; communist misrule in the East had yielded outdated factories, crumbling infrastructures, polluted environments, drab cities, inefficient farming, and inadequate legal and other institutions

primate city

a country's largest city, ranking atop its urban hierarchy, most expressive of the national culture and usually the capital city as well; a city that is disproportionately large compared to all others in the urban system and exceptionally expressive of th

What happened with Napolean's rule?

in the early 1800s, the country was subdivided into a great number of small d�partements (eventually 96), each of which had representation in Paris, but with power concentrated in the capital; it remained so for nearly two centuries, with the entire count

three cities of Netherlands triangular core region (Randstad)

the regional geography of this highly urbanized country is noted for the Randstad, a roughly triangular urban core area anchored by Amsterdam (the constitutional capital), Rotterdam (Europe's largest port), and The Hague (the seat of government)

Belgium's cultural fault line

Belgium's regional geography is dominated by a cultural fault line that cuts diagonally across the country, separating a Flemish-speaking majority (54%) centered on Flanders in the northwest from a French-speaking minority in southeastern Wallonia (36%)

Brussels

the mainly French-speaking capital of Belgium; lies like a cultural island in the Flemish-speaking sector; but the city also is one of Belgium's greatest assets because it serves as the headquarters, and in many ways as the functional capital, of the Euro

differences between Zurich and Geneva

Zurich, in the German-speaking sector of Switzerland, is the financial center; Geneva, in the French-speaking sector of Switzerland, is one of the world's most internationalized cities

why Austria has looked eastward

it is at its widest, lowest, and most productive in the east, where the danube links it to Hungary, its old ally in the anti-Muslim wars of the past

What is Vienna today?

one of the world's most expressive primate cities with magnificent architecture and monumental art; today it is the Mainland Core's easternmost city, but its relative location changed dramatically with EU enlargement in 2004 and 2007; peripheral to the EU

List the four subregions of the United Kingdom.

England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland

Why is Ireland called the "Celtic Tiger" and what happened?

hard-won independence in 1921 did not bring real economic prosperity until the last few decades of the twentieth century, when Ireland became known as the Celtic Tiger, likening it to the miraculous economic development of the so-called Asian Tigers; for

the two countries of Italy, Mezzogiorno, Ancona Line

Italy is often described as two countries, a progressive north and a stagnant south (known as the Mezzogiorno); the urbanized, industrialized north is part of Europe's core; the low-income south typifies the Periphery; north and south are bound by the anc

Autonomous Communities of Spain: How many are there and what are they?

Spain followed the leads of Germany and France and decentralized its administrative structure in response to devolutionary pressures; these pressures were especially strong in 3 areas: Catalonia, the Basque Country, and Galicia, and in response the Madrid

Catalons

as Catalans like to remind visitors to their corner of Spain, most of the country's industrial raw material are found in the northwest, but most of its major industrial development has occurred in the northeast, where innovations and skills drive a high-t

relations between Catalonia and Castile

relations between Catalonia and Castile (where Madrid is located) are also a product of history; during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), the military dictator Francisco Franco brought all of Spain under his command by violently crushing the resistance i

1974 partition of Cyprus, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, the "Green Line

After the British granted Cyprus independence in 1960, the fragile order broke down in 1974, and civil war engulfed the island; Turkey sent in troops and massive dislocation followed, resulting in the partition of Cyprus into northern Turkish and southern

shatter belt

region caught between stronger, colliding external cultural-political forces, under persistent stress, and often fragmented by aggressive rivals; Eastern Europe and mainland Southeast Asia are classic examples; a zone of persistent splintering and fractur

balkanization

the fragmentation of a region into smaller, often hostile political units; names after the historically contentious Balkan Peninsula of southeastern Europe; the recurrent division and fragmentation of a region

why Norway's economic life has been transformed

has found economic opportunities on, in, and beneath the sea; Norway's fishing industry, now augmented by highly efficient fish farms, long has been a cornerstone of the economy and its merchant marine spans the world; since the 1970s, Norway's economic l

What city is called the "Singapore of the Baltic?

Copenhagen, Denmark

break-of-bulk point

a location along a transport route where goods must be transferred from one carrier to another; in a port, the cargoes of oceangoing ships are unloaded and put on trains, trucks, or perhaps smaller river boats for inland distribution; an entrepot, where t

entrepot

a place, usually a port city, where goods are imported, stored, and transshipped; a break-of-bulk point; where transfer facilities and activities prevail

Kalaallit Nanaat

Greenland came under Danish rule after union with Norway (1380) and continued as a Danish possession when that union ended (1814); in 1953, Greenland's status changed from colony to province, and in 1979 the 60,000 inhabitants were given home rule with th

Europe's Stateless Nation

every ethnic group in Europe's intricate social mosaic, it seems, has its own homeland, either in a state or a subnational unit, no matter how small; there is one significant exception: the Roma; perhaps as many as 11 million Roma, formerly called gypsies

Ethnic Magyar remnants

Ethnic Magyar (Hungarians) remnants of this Greater Hungary can still be found in parts of Romania, Serbia, and Slovakia, and the government in the twin-cities capital astride the Danube River, Budapest, has a history of irredentism toward these external

irredentism

a policy of cultural extension and potential political expansion by a state aimed at a community of its nationals living in a neighboring state; a government's support for ethnic or cultural cohorts in neighboring or more distant countries; derives from a

Peter the Great

When Peter the Great became czar (he ruled from 1682 to 1725), Moscow already lay at the center of a great empire--great, at least, in terms of the territories it controlled; the Islamic threat had been ended with the defeat of the Tatars; the influence o

Czarina Catherine the Great

under Czarina Catherine the Great, who ruled from 1760 to 1796, Russia's empire in the Black Sea Basin grew at the expense of the Ottoman Turks; the Crimea Peninsula, the port city of Odesa, and the entire northern coastal zone of the Black Sea fell under

Russians in North America

the first white settlers in Alaska were Russians, not western Europeans, and they came across Siberia and the Bering Strait, not across the Atlantic and North America; Russian hunters of the sea otter, valued for its high-priced pelt, established their fi

Russification of the Soviet Empire

the communist planners made it Soviet policy to relocate entire peoples from their homelands in order to better fit the grand design, and to reward or punish; the overall effect, however, was to move minority peoples eastward and to replace them with Russ

why Soviet was equated with Russia in the other republics

the centerpiece of the tightly controlled Soviet "federation" was the Russian Republic; with half of the vast state's population, the capital city, the realm's core area, and 76% of the Soviet Union's territory, Russia was the empire's nucleus

the two principal objectives of Soviet planners

1) to accelerate industrialization; 2) to collectivize agriculture

command economy

the tightly controlled economic system of the former Soviet Union, whereby central planners in Moscow assigned the production of particular goods to particular places, often guided more by socialist ideology than the principles of economic geography (disr

What happened to the Orthodox Russian Church since the 1990s?

since the early 1990s, the Russian Orthodox Church has made a vigorous comeback, attended by unrestrained nationalist and ethic propaganda

Tula photo caption

the landscape of Tula, a city of 530,000 about 150 kilometers (100 miles) south of Moscow, is typical of urban centers in western Russia; Tula's townscape today is a mixture of pre-Soviet historic buildings, drab Soviet-era tenements, and scattered post-S

Near Abroad

the newly-formed countries that surround Russia today; the 14 former Soviet republics that, in combination with the dominant Russian Republic, constituted the USSR; since the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union, Russia has asserted a sphere of influence in t

the number of political entities within the Federation

now 83 entities in all: 2 Autonomous Federal Cities (Moscow and St. Petersburg), 21 Republics, 46 provinces (Oblasts), 9 Territories (Krays), 4 Autonomous Regions (Okrugs), and 1 Autonomous Oblast

what Putin did in 2000

in 2000, the new Putin administration moved to diminish the influence of the Regions by creating a new geographic framework that combined the 83 Regions, Republics, and other entities into eight new administrative units, not to enhance their influence in

the number of Federal Districts

eight

population implosion

the opposite of population explosion; refers to the declining populations of the many European countries and Russia in which the death rate exceeds the birth rate and immigration rate

BRICs

acronym for the four biggest emerging national markets in the world today: Brazil, Russia, India, and China

Kuzbas

The Kuznetsk Basin; 950 miles east of the Urals; one of Russia's primary regions of heavy manufacturing resulting from the communist period's national planning

double complementarity

complementarity exists when two regions, through an exchange of raw materials and/or finished products, can specifically satisfy each other's demands

why people in the Far East feel abandoned by Moscow

the once-great naval base of Vladivostok (the city's name means "We Own the East") lies dormant; factory closures are widespread; and when the locals tried something new-clandestinely importing used Japanese cars-the government sent its federal police to

Nagorno-Karabakh - who lives there, who the Soviets gave it to, who controls it now

the Armenians hold another exclave called Nagorno-Karabakh inside what would seem to be Azerbaijan's territory (which is home to 150,000 Christian Armenian citizens who were placed under Islamic Azerbaijan's jurisdiction by Soviet mandate)

In 1954, what happened with Ukraine and the Crimea Peninsula?

Ukraine's boundaries also changed during the Soviet era; in 1954, a Soviet dictator capriciously transferred the entire Crimea Peninsula, including its Russian inhabitants, to Ukraine as a reward for its productivity

Ukraine's spatial division (west and east)

the Dnieper River forms a useful geographic reference to comprehend Ukraine's spatial division; to its west lies agrarian, rural, mainly Roman Catholic Ukraine; in its great southern bend and eastward lies industrial, urban, Russified (and Russian Orthodo

donbas

Soviet planners made eastern Ukraine a communist Ruhr based on abundant local coal and iron ore, making the Donets Basin (Donbas for short) a key industrial complex; meanwhile, the Russian Soviet Republic supplied Ukraine with oil and gas

What is Ukraine dependent on Russia for?

oil and gas; in Ukraine's case, the transit of much needed energy supplies through the east creates a complication; Ukraine's own dependence on Russian supplies makes it vulnerable to Moscow's decisions on prices as well as supplies

Southern Ocean

the ocean that surrounds Antarctica

Russel Wallace and Wallace's Line

the zoogeographical boundary proposed by Alfred Russel Wallace that separates the marsupial fauna of Australia and new Guinea from the non-marsupial fauna of Indonesia

Weber's Line

after Wallace's Line was challenged, the zoogeographer Max Weber found evidence that led him to postulate his own line, which lay very close to New Guinea

crescent-shaped Australian heartland

a crescent-like Australian heartland that extends from north of the city of Brisbane to the vicinity of Adelaide and includes the largest city, Sydney; the capital, Canberra; and the second-largest city, Melbourne

secondary core area

a secondary core area has developed in the far southwest, centered on Perth and its outport, Fremantle; beyond lies the vast periphery, which the Australians call the Outback

Outback

the name given by Australians to the vast, peripheral, sparsely settled interior of their country

Australian cities unmistakable quality

South Australia, Tasmania, and, to a lesser extent, the Northern Territory; life is orderly and unhurried; streets are clean, slums are few, graffiti rarely seen; violent crime is uncommon; standards of public transport, city schools, and healthcare provi

import-substitution industries

the industries local entrepreneurs establish to serve populations of remote areas when transport costs from distant sources make these goods too expensive to import

aboriginal population percentage

2 percent; almost 600,000 Aborigines; has been gaining influence in national affairs

percentage of Australia that could be subject to Aboriginal land claims

as much as 78 percent

Aboriginal land issue

the legal campaign in which Australia's indigenous peoples have claimed title to traditional land in several parts of that country; the courts have upheld certain claims, fueling Aboriginal activism that has raised broader issues of indigenous rights; has

Australian debate

lately, Australians have initiated debate on ways to bring so-called market-driven incentives to Aboriginal areas; at the moment, much Aboriginal land is administered communally by Aboriginal Land Councils, which makes the people land-rich but keeps them

2007 Aboriginal desert camps

in 2007, Australia was shaken by a report on conditions in Aboriginal desert camps in the Northern Territory that chronicled rampant alcoholism, domestic violence, unemployment, school truancy, and a general breakdown of Aboriginal culture; the then-prime

Which island in New Zealand has the Southern Alps? Central Highlands?

the South Island in New Zealand has the Southern Alps; the smaller North Island has proportionately more land under low relief, but it also has an area of central highlands along whose lower slopes lie the pastures of New Zealand's chief dairying district

Canterbury Plain

on the South Island, the largest lowland is the agricultural Canterbury Plain, centered on Christchurch; what makes these lower areas so attractive, apart from their availability as cropland, is their magnificent pastures; the range of soils and pasture p

1840 Waitangi Treaty, judicial rulings, persistent complaints

in 1840, the Maori and the British signed a treaty at Waitangi that granted the colonists sovereignty over New Zealand but guaranteed the Maori rights covering established tribal lands; although the British abrogated parts of the treaty in 1862, the Maori

The Green Factor: rank in world, percentage protected from development, nuclear-free, Environmental Courts

environmental scientists recently ranked New Zealand first in the world (US was the 28th) in a report that examined a range of environmental indices such as clean water, air pollution, renewable energy, and biodiversity conservation; approximately 30 perc