Borders Between Peoples and Nations

Natural borders vs. political borders

In plain words: some borders follow nature, like a river; others are lines people simply draw.

Natural borders follow features you could see from an airplane:

• Rivers: the Rio Grande (U.S.–Mexico); the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers (many U.S. state lines).
• Mountains: the Pyrenees (France–Spain); the Andes (much of Chile–Argentina).
• Lakes and seas: the Great Lakes (U.S.–Canada).

Advantages: easy to see, and often easier to defend. Problems: rivers change course. And it can be unclear exactly where a mountain range divides.

Political borders are agreed on by people. This usually happens through treaties or after wars. A common type is the geometric border — a straight line along latitude or longitude:

• The 49th parallel forms much of the U.S.–Canada border. Treaties set it in 1818 and 1846.
• Colorado and Wyoming are bounded almost entirely by lines of latitude and longitude.
• Much of the Egypt–Sudan border follows 22°N.

Advantages: simple to draw on maps. Problems: they often ignore the land and the people. They can cut across farms, towns, and cultural groups. Imagine a line drawn through the middle of your street, putting your neighbors in another country.

Example: A border is described as "following the 38th parallel." That is a geometric border, because it follows a line of latitude. In 1945, Korea was divided near the 38th parallel into Soviet- and U.S.-occupied zones. These zones later became North and South Korea.

Nations, states, and nationalism

In plain words: a nation is a group of people who feel they belong together; a state is a country with a government.

A nation is a group of people. They share a culture, language, or history. A state is a country. When the two match, you get a nation-state. When they don't, trouble can follow. Think of a family split between two houses on different streets, each with different house rules.

Nationalism can unite. Nationalism is strong loyalty to one's nation. In the 1800s, it brought together people who shared a language and culture but lived in many small states:

• Italy unified between 1861 and 1870.
• Germany unified in 1871 under Prussian leadership.

Nationalism can divide. Empires that ruled many peoples were pulled apart:

• Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire broke up after World War I. New states such as Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia appeared.
• Yugoslavia itself broke apart in the 1990s. Wars broke out between Serbs, Croats, Bosnians, and others.

Self-determination is the right of a people to choose their own government. In January 1918, President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points called for redrawing Italy's borders "along clearly recognizable lines of nationality." They also called for an independent Poland made of "territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations." In practice, peoples in Europe were very mixed. Almost every new border left some minorities on the "wrong" side.

Stateless nations. The Kurds are tens of millions of people. They live mainly where Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria meet. The Treaty of Sèvres (1920) promised them a possible state. But the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) replaced it without one. The Kurds remain the largest nation without a state.

Colonial borders and partition

In plain words: many borders were drawn by outside powers who ignored where peoples lived, and conflict often followed.

Many of today's borders were drawn by outside powers. Picture strangers dividing up your town without asking anyone who lives there.

Africa. At the Berlin Conference (1884–1885), European powers set rules for dividing Africa among themselves. No African rulers were invited. Over the next decades, colonial borders were often straight lines. Others followed rivers that Europeans had mapped. The results:

• Some ethnic groups were split between two or more colonies.
• Some rival groups were combined in one colony.
• African countries became independent mostly in the 1950s–1970s. They generally kept the colonial borders, along with the tensions built into them.

The Middle East. After World War I, Britain and France divided much of the Ottoman Empire. They created territories such as Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine. The borders often cut across ethnic and religious groups.

South Asia. In 1947, Britain partitioned — divided — India into two states: Hindu-majority India and Muslim-majority Pakistan. The borders were drawn in about five weeks. The man who drew them was a lawyer who had never been to India. More than 10 million people migrated. Hundreds of thousands were killed in violence. Kashmir is still disputed. East Pakistan became Bangladesh in 1971.

Pattern to remember: borders drawn quickly, by outsiders, without regard to where peoples live → mismatches between nations and states → migration, conflict, and disputed territory.

Reading border and cultural-region maps

In plain words: border maps often have two layers — lines for borders and colors for groups of people. Compare them.

GED maps about borders often show two layers:

• political borders (lines);
• cultural regions (colors or patterns for language, religion, or ethnic group).

How to read them:

1. Read the title and legend. Find which symbol means a border. Find which patterns mean cultural groups.
2. Classify each border. Does it follow a river or mountain (natural)? Or is it a straight line (geometric)?
3. Compare the layers. Does any cultural region cross a border? Then that group is divided. Does any country contain several groups? Then it is multinational.
4. Use the grid. Latitude lines are horizontal and labeled N or S. Longitude lines are vertical and labeled E or W.

Example (Kessa Region map): The Arvalia–Bontara border follows 12°N. That is a geometric border. It cuts the Dosa language area in two. The Arvalia–Corim border follows the Selu River. The Bontara–Corim border follows the Tarn Mountains. Both are natural borders, and they match the Korri language area.