The Political Geography of South Asia

A study of the geopolitics, environment, economic development and demography of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal through the prism of the discipline of political geography. In Part One, Robert Bradnock discusses the cultural and historical origins of South Asia's regional identities and the forces which have contributed to them. He then looks at South Asia's diverse physical environments -from monsoon wetlands to the Himalayas; the evolution of linguistic and religious identities; and the significance of demography in shaping new political identities. Part Two explores the evolution of contemporary regional identities. Discussion of ethnicity, regionalism and nationalism leads to an analysis of South Asia's frontiers, and its post-Independence cores and peripheries. In Part Three Robert Bradnock explores the current geopolitical relationships of the South Asian states to each other and to the rest of the world in the light of post-Cold War economic liberalization and globalization.