Travelling Imaginations – Perception, adaptation and popularisation of Halford J. Mackinder’s Heartland theory

• Applicant: Dr. Oliver Krause
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History
• Term: from 2020 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 433575562

The project studies the “Heartland” theory of the British geographer Halford J. Mackinder as an example of a space-related imagination that, in the first half of the 20th century, had transcontinental and interdisciplinary effects. The theory predicts a global spatial order. The order’s centre is the resource-rich and difficult-to-access northern part of the Asian continent, which is referred to as “Heartland”. Mackinder presumed that once the Heartland was equipped with transport infrastructure – an effort already underway at the beginning of the 20th century – it would become the basis of a new territorial power. In his eyes, this power would pose a threat to the sea-based hegemony of the British Empire. The theory, thus amounting to a geopolitical dystopia, was published by Mackinder in three versions (1904, 1919, 1943), which were perceived, adapted and popularised across various countries and disciplines. In the course of that reception and adaptation, the global spatial order imagined by Mackinder developed lives of its own, leaving the regional context and Mackinder’s authorship behind. The project combines questions and current states of research that so far have been tied to discrete disciplines: on the perception and adaption of the Heartland theory, on the emergence of imaginations, and on processes of visualisation and reterritorialisation of power under the Global Condition. Thereby, the subject will be embedded into the interdisciplinary context and the spatial thinking of the Global History. The project’s goal is to use the example of the Heartland theory to show how and why (geo-)imaginations of global spatial orders can veer away from their original context and become sources of evidence and explanations for different contexts, available to various users. The project’s hypothesis is that in the process central roles are played by a complex translation between the media “text” and “map” (visualisation), and by interdisciplinary reception (history). The project shall result in a habilitation thesis, and is subdivided into three steps: First, the genesis and structure of Mackinder’s Heartland theory are analysed. Second, its reception and adaptation within a large international and interdisciplinary network of actors are examined comparatively. Third, findings are summarised and underpinned by theory-related inductions in order to derive, from the Heartland theory’s example, an explanatory model of the emergence and impact of popular space-related (geo-)imaginations in the 20th century.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants