Mapping Our Lives
Making Maps: Possibilities and Pitfalls of Digital Mapping for Spatial and Social Justice
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Jill Frances Weintroub
Arguably one of the foundational techniques of globalisation, cartography and mapping have produced knowledge about the world from its earliest moments of human occupation. Map-making is tied intricately to our desire, as humans, to understand the world around us, and our place within it. While undeniably a form of knowledge bound intimately to western science, Europe’s age of exploration, and the rise of an interconnected modern world, maps have been created historically (conventionally on paper) as a quintessential declaration of colonial power and domination; however, they have in other contexts and using other media, been produced as expressions of identity, belonging, and resistance. This has never been more apparent than in contemporary times, when digital mapping has become the go-to technology and mode of information-sharing for all kinds of projects, in all kinds of media classes and contexts. From the war-torn neighbourhoods of Aleppo, Syria, through the mid-twentieth century massacre of Algerians in Paris, from the hidden histories of lynching in America, and of gay people in St Louis, to the potential economic impacts of climate change across North American cities and urban precincts, interactive maps (most often based on GIS technology) of various degrees of complexity, are available in real time across the Internet, giving web-site visitors many layers of information at a single sitting. Many of these mapping projects align with some form of social and spatial justice objective, and describe initiatives aimed at redress and recuperation. This paper offers a synthesis of some of these global projects, and discusses their relevance for an embryonic digital mapping project being planned for Johannesburg, South Africa. Called JoziQuest, this project aims to make visible the intricacies of space and memory in a city that remains structured by legacies of apartheid and exclusionary urban planning, which continue to haunt governance in the present.
Transborder Ethnic Kin and Local Prosperity : Evidence from Night-Time Light Intensity in Africa
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Christophe Muller
This study investigates the consequences of cross-border ethnic linkages for local development in Africa, as measured by night-time light intensity. We estimate spatial panel models that are based on geolocalised luminosity data measured by satellite imaging from 1992 to 2012, and matched with several other geolocalised databases describing geographic, political, and ethnic characteristics. We find that local ethnic groups with more transborder ethnic links to politically dominant actors in another country have significantly higher economic development, as measured by luminosity in the corresponding ethnic homeland.
China's One Belt One Road Initiative: Prospects and Challenges
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Alema Karim
The One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative was launched by the Chinese government in 2013 as a major development strategy. It is designed to integrate Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and other regions through massive infrastructural and transportation projects. The aim of OBOR initiative is to revive the historical “Silk Road” in order to facilitate rapid economic growth not just for China but for most of the developing world by modernizing elaborate land and sea trade-routes. If successful, OBOR will have significant and long lasting implications throughout the world in terms of international trade, investment, international relations, and the world order. China’s expanding economic power has caused widespread concern among many nations. Launching of this massive development strategy has generated an interesting debate between experts trusting China’s role as a provider of assistance toward economic development for developing nations, and others depicting the country’s desire toward world power ascendency. The objective of this paper is to examine the prospects of OBOR’s success and the potential challenges that lie ahead.
