The Edge of the Plain

This book by James Crawford shows us, exactly as its subtitle promises, How Borders Make and Break the World.

Compelling stories about how human conflict has created and still is maintaining [[Borders] show us the ongoing reality of ongoing geopolitics and, perhaps, the human condition: people occupy other peoples' places, divide interaction, communication and migration between peoples. Some lose, others gain. For a while. And then new people come to take a piece of the cake too.

Example borders come from occupation and reshuffling of fiefdoms, war between peoples and their tribes, solidification of sovereign states (in the West after 1648, as a result of the Münster Peace Treaty), physical walls and barriers (Chinese Great Wall, Jewish Israeli settlement forming, seas, occupation of indigenous lands in the Americas and the Nordic countries, for example.

Reference: James Crawford, 2022. The Edge of the Plain. Edinburgh: Canongate Books.