Book contents
- The Frontier Complex
- The Frontier Complex
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Maps
- Tables
- Additional material
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- A Note on the Text
- Introduction
- 1 Territory before Borderlines
- 2 Surveys
- 3 Communication
- 4 Reading the Border
- 5 Trans-frontier Men
- 6 The Birth of Geopolitics
- 7 Lines of Control
- Epilogue
- Archives
- Bibliography
- Index
6 - The Birth of Geopolitics
Frontier Experts, Boundary Commissions, and Trans-frontier Information
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 January 2021
- The Frontier Complex
- The Frontier Complex
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Maps
- Tables
- Additional material
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- A Note on the Text
- Introduction
- 1 Territory before Borderlines
- 2 Surveys
- 3 Communication
- 4 Reading the Border
- 5 Trans-frontier Men
- 6 The Birth of Geopolitics
- 7 Lines of Control
- Epilogue
- Archives
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
The sixth chapter reexamines the work of boundary commissions in the context of the emergence of frontier experts such as Thomas Holdich. These experts, who became increasingly central to imperial policy, reflect the increasingly intimate relationship between geography and the state and reveal the networks through which geographical information fused with political and military policy. The chapter also examines the engagement of the frontier experts with the Royal Geographical Society and The Geographical Journal. The cohabitation of geographical studies and international political concerns, I argue, reflected a new geopolitical mode of seeing the region and the world that was in turn bequeathed to India at independence.
Keywords
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- Information
- The Frontier ComplexGeopolitics and the Making of the India-China Border, 1846–1962, pp. 204 - 232Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021