Ravi Ranjan asked: What is meant by Geopolitics of a region?

Anit Mukherjee replies: Geopolitics, as defined by Robert Blackwill, is understood to mean “the art and practice of the application of power by nations in the international domain.”1 This word is believed to have originated from Rudolf Kjellén, a Swedish political scientist at the beginning of the 20th century.2 In simple words, however, geopolitics would include how nations behave with each other in their quest to protect their national interests and to expand their influence/power. Geopolitics of a region would thus mean how the states within the region interact with each other through different instruments of the state including politics, diplomacy, military power, economic relations, etc. For instance, the geopolitics of East Asia would include understanding how the ASEAN countries engage with each other- building alliances and friendships among themselves and with other powers in the region including China , India , US, Australia , etc.

• 1. See Robert Blackwill, “The Geopolitical consequences of world economic recession- a caution,” RAND Occasional Paper, p. 1, http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/occasional_papers/2009/RAND_OP...
• 2. Ibid.