Geopolitical knowledge: Scale, method and the "Willie Sutton syndrome"

Geopolitics

Volumn 12, Issue 1, 2007, Pages 183-191

  Dalby, Simon ^a  

^a CARLETON UNIVERSITY   (Canada)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 33845886132     PISSN: 14650045     EISSN: 15573028     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/14650040601031271     Document Type: Note

References (32)

1. At least an urban legend has it that famous American bank robber Willie Sutton, or "Slick Willie", once replied to a newspaper reporter' question "Why do you rob banks?" with "Because that is where the money is?" While the FBI Web site case history file implies this was his standard retort (http://www.fbi.gov/libref/ historic/famcases/sutton/sutton.htm), the Wikipedia entry suggests that he denied ever saying this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willie_Sutton)!
2. Eric Sheppard and Robert McMaster (eds.), Scale and Geographic Inquiry: Nature, Society, and Method (Oxford: Blackwell 2004).
3. Jon Barnett, 'Destabilizing the Environment-Conflict Thesis,' Review of International Studies 26/2. (2000) pp. 271-88.
4. Thomas Homer-Dixon, 'On the Threshold: Environmental Changes as Causes of Acute Conflict,' International Security 16/1 (1991) pp. 76-116.
5. Thomas Homer-Dixon, 'Environmental Scarcities and Violent Conflict: Evidence from Cases,' International Security 19/1 (1994) pp. 5-40.
6. Thomas Homer-Dixon and J. Blitt (eds.), Ecoviolence: Links among Environment, Population, and Security (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield 1998).
7. Marc Levy, 'Is the Environment a National Security Issue?' International Security 20/1 (1995) pp. 35-62
8. T. Homer-Dixon, M. Levy, G. Porter and J. Goldstone, 'Debate,' Environmental Change and Security Project, Report 2 (1996) pp. 49-71
9. N. P. Gleditsch, 'Armed Conflict and the Environment: A Critique of the Literature,' Journal of Peace Research 35/3 (1998) pp. 381-400.
10. G. A. Baechler and K. R. Spillmann (eds.), Kreigsursache Umweltzerstorung: Environmental Degradation as a Cause of War, 3 vols. (Zurich: Verlag Ruegger 1996).
11. Gunther Baechler, Violence through Environmental Discrimination: Causes, Rwanda Arena, and Conflict Model (Dordrecht: Kluwer 1999)
12. Indra deSoysa, 'Ecoviolence: Shrinking Pie or Honey Pot?', Global Environmental Politics 2/4 (2002) pp. 1-34.
13. N. Peluso and M. Watts (eds.), Violent Environments (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 2001).
14. Thomas Homer-Dixon, Environment, Scarcity, and Violence (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 1999).
15. Colin Kahl, States, Scarcity, and Civil Strife in the Developing World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press 2006).
16. See in particular Robert Chase, Emily Hill, and Paul Kennedy, 'Pivotal States and U.S. Strategy,' Foreign Affairs 75/1 (1996) pp. 33-5
17. Robert Chase, Emily Hill, and Paul Kennedy, (eds.), The Pivotal States: A New Framework for U.S. Policy in the Developing World (New York: Norton 1999)
18. and CIA commissioned research summarised in Daniel Esty et al., 'State Failure Task Force Report: Phase II Findings', Environmental Change and Security Project, Report 5 (1999) pp. 49-72.
19. Ian Bannon and Paul Collier (eds.), Natural Resources and Violent Conflict: Options and Actions (Washington, DC: The World Bank 2003).
20. Kabl, States, Scarcity and Civil Strife (note 13).
21. Alexander Carius and Kurt M. Lietzmann (eds.), Environmental Change and Security: A European Perspective (Berlin: Springer Verlag 1999).
22. Hans Gunter Brauch et al. (eds.), Security and Environment in the Mediterranean (Berlin: Springer Verlag 2003)
23. Ken Conca and Geoffrey Dabelko (eds.), Environmental Peacemaking (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press 2002).
24. Hans Günter Brauch, John Grin, Czeslaw Mesjasz, Pal Dunay, Navnita Chadha Behera, Béchir Chourou, Ursula Oswald Spring, P. H. Liotta, Patricia Kameri-Mbote (eds.), Globalisation and Environmental Challenges: Reconceptualising Security in the 21st Century (Berlin - Heidelberg - New York - Hong Kong - London - Milan - Paris - Tokyo: Springer Verlag 2007).
25. Mike Davis, Late Victorian Holocausts: El Nino Famines and the Making of the Third World (London: Verso 2001).
26. As I do at length in Simon Dalby, Environmental Security (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press 2002).
27. Simon Dalby, 'Ecological Politics, Violence, and the Theme of Empire' Global Environmental Politics 4/2 (2004) pp. 1-11.
28. Philippe Le Billon, Fuelling War: Natural Resources and Armed Conflict, Adelphi paper 373 (Oxford: Routledge for the International Institute of Strategic Studies 2005).
29. Philippe Le Billon, 'The Geopolitical Economy of 'Resource Wars', Geopolitics 9/1 (2004) pp. 1-28.
30. M. T. Klare, Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America's Growing Dependency on Imported Petroleum (New York: Metropolitan Books 2004).
31. Lest this be understood only as a revival of neo-Marxist critiques of imperialism (see, e.g., John Bellamy Foster, Naked Imperialism: The U.S. Pursuit of Global Dominance (New York: Monthly Review Press 2006))
32. it is especially instructive to read the compelling analysis of "World War IV" by a self-confessed conservative on these matters in Andrew Bacevich, The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2005).