For an agency created to build the nation’s scientific capacity, the prospect of issuing the fewest new research grants in four decades represents more than a budgetary contraction. It signals a fundamental change in how, where, and what science will be conducted in the United States. The National Science Foundation is an independent agency of the United States government that supports research and education focused on non-medical fields of science and engineering. Established in 1950, NSF’s mission is to promote progress in science, advance the national health, prosperity, and welfare, and secure the national defense. This is accomplished through the awarding of research grants across the nation. Two publications bookend the inception and the future vision of NSF – The Endless Frontier, 75^th Anniversary edition and the National Academy of Sciences’ The Endless Frontier: The next 75 years in science (2020).

Geography is the bedrock of how NSF functions. NSF does not merely fund science geographically; its decision-making structure itself is geographically distributed. I learned this firsthand as a Program Officer in the Geography and Regional Science Program (2005-2006) as a temporary program director or “rotator”. The coupling of permanent staff and rotators from across the country forms the basis of soliciting and evaluating proposals. The program director makes recommendations regarding funding that can influence new directions in the fields of science, engineering, and education. NSF grants are highly competitive and prestigious, and navigating the process to win an award is challenging. Proposals go through a rigorous merit review where external independent experts evaluate proposals and panels of experts from across the country are invited to review program proposals, including the independent reviews, and provide recommendations on priority grants for funding. The merit review process ensures proposals are evaluated in a fair and transparent way. The review panels are composed of a geographically diverse group of reviewers that are representative of different types of research facilities, and demographically diverse to capture different perspectives and expertise.

Check out this YouTube video: https://www.nsf.gov/about#how-we-work-58d,

NSF was critical in moving the research community toward more integrated and collaborative approaches to science. Beginning in the late 1990s, interdisciplinary research gained increasing traction, reflected in cross-cutting programs such as Biocomplexity in the Environment, Coupled Natural Human Systems (CNH), and later Dynamics of Integrated Socio-Environmental Systems (DISES). These programs encouraged researchers to examine the interconnections, feedbacks, and drivers linking human and environmental systems. DISES concluded in 2024, but the larger intellectual shift toward integrated socio-environmental research had become well established within NSF.

EduChange Integrated Science graphic, 2019.

I would argue that geography - the study of Earth’s lands, inhabitants, and relationships between people and their environments - is itself a science of integration and convergence. The evolution of NSF’s geography program reflects this broader shift as new technologies and methods expanded the discipline’s capacity to define place and understand relationships between human and physical systems. The program became Geography and Spatial Sciences in 2008 and, in 2020, Human-Environment and Geographical Sciences (HEGS), explicitly reflected this emphasis on human-environment interactions.

With the conclusion of DISES, opportunities for cross-disciplinary collaboration appear to continue through several NSF programs, but most are now listed as “archived funding opportunities.” Growing Convergence Research (GCR) remains active, while HEGS is listed as “waiting for a new publication,” with no defined upcoming submission date. These administrative notices may appear mundane, but collectively they describe a changing scientific landscape: research communities that developed around long-standing programs no longer know whether the institutional structures supporting their work will continue.

Notices on NSF website for the status of different programs.

The Trump Administration is redefining science having termed it – “Science: A new golden age.” The significance of this definition becomes clearer when contrasted with NSF’s traditional model. Authority that has historically been dispersed among program officers, independent reviewers, and panels drawn from institutions across the country could increasingly be decided through alternative funding mechanisms and administration-defined priorities. For example, the report describes a method to diversify funding mechanisms that “move beyond consensus-driven peer review by adopting a broader menu of selection mechanisms … where “golden tickets” that empower individual reviewers to champion ambitious proposals.”

NSF faces considerable uncertainty about the amount of funding that will be available for research, with a pending federal budget that would substantially reduce the agency’s resources. At the same time, existing funds are being redirected toward administration priorities. Approximately $1 billion of NSF’s $8 billion budget is being allocated to a White House Grand Research Challenge focused on advanced materials and artificial intelligence. These Grand Challenges are intended to “pull breakthroughs forward,” support industry consortia, and use federal resources to overcome shared bottlenecks in foundational research. The concept of a Grand Challenge is not new. President Obama launched the 21st Century Grand Challenges in 2013 to catalyze advances in human knowledge and address problems related to energy, health, education, environment, and global development. What is different now is the combination of a major administration-directed research initiative with substantial uncertainty about funding for NSF’s existing research programs.

Uncertainty also extends to proposals that have already passed through NSF’s merit-review process. Some remain in what researchers have called “pending purgatory”: proposals have been evaluated, but final funding decisions have not been approved. At the same time, NSF is reducing the number of awards and changing how grants are funded. Traditionally, many multi-year awards have been distributed through annual payments over a fixed number of years. Larger grants are being awarded with funding provided in a single lump sum, committing more of the available budget at once and potentially reducing the number of projects that can be supported. These changes are occurring as NSF undergoes a broader reorganization intended to align the agency more closely with Trump administration priorities, including a reduction in the number of directorates. Taken together, budget uncertainty, redirected research priorities, delayed funding decisions, and changes in how awards are structured are reshaping not only how much science NSF can support, but what science is supported and how broadly those resources are distributed.

Several organizations track the impact on science. Grant Witness provides an overview of federal science funding disruptions. The site describes impacts to research grants such as grant terminations, grant freezes, changes to existing grants and new awards in each state and across multiple agencies that include the National Institutes of Health to the Environmental Protection Agency. The site links to other organizations that are defending U.S. science and the rule of law, such as Stand up for Science!, SCIMaP: Science & Community Impacts Mapping Project, and the Public Data Observatory. The consequences are already measurable. New NSF grants have fallen 46 percent from the average during the Biden administration, bringing new awards to levels not seen since the 1980s.

Grant Witness – All NSF awards and obligations, August 2026.

But a national decline in funding is experienced locally. A decision made in Washington moves through a national geography of universities, laboratories, field stations, research centers, graduate programs, and international partnerships. The geographic impact is felt across the country but most specifically in California, Texas, Arizona, Colorado, and New York. The impact on higher education is felt – fewer graduate students (see the geography of … international students, June 5, 2025); fewer research jobs; less funding to support laboratory infrastructure. Examples include the defunding and dismantling of NCAR in Colorado, cuts to climate education programs in California, scrutiny of research funding in Texas because of research relationships with China, and the elimination of STEM grants in New York. These are just a few examples. Within NSF, the Directorate where HEGS is situated, Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences has no funding in the President’s Budget request for next year. If approved, no new SBE awards will be made in the next cycle. Other NSF projects that may be impacted are those that are jointly facilitated with the Fulbright program (see the geography of … the Fulbright Program, April 17, 2026). Opportunities include Iceland and Arctic research grants.

SCIMaP Impact Maps, 2026.

Funding decisions have a geography, but they also have a long temporal reach. Changes in science will continue to have an impact on scientific results. One important metric is publications. The National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics tracks indicators that visualize information on national and global trends. Federal science funding changes will potentially result in a lower U.S. publication output, will slow the process of sharing results, and impact early career scientists. Fewer opportunities for graduate students and early-career researchers today shape who will constitute the scientific workforce a decade from now.

NSF NCSES (National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics) Indicators Explorer: S&E research publications distribution by field, 2024.

There are several organizations tracking these changes to science. In effect, an independent monitoring infrastructure has emerged simply to document what is happening to the nation’s scientific infrastructure. The Silencing Science Tracker, a joint initiative of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law and the Climate Science Defense Fund, has tracked government actions affecting science since 2016. The FYI Federal Science Budget Tracker, sponsored by the American Institute of Physics, follows appropriations and budget outcomes for agencies supporting the physical sciences, while the Partnership for Public Service’s Costs of Cutting American Science documents the consequences of reductions in federal science by sector and community. These efforts provide different ways of tracing how changes made in Washington move through federal agencies and into scientific institutions, disciplines, and communities across the country.

Earlier posts in this series have traced different dimensions of the changing landscape of American science. The removal or restriction of federal data, including changes to the Famine Early Warning System (FEWS) where Afghanistan, Somalia, and Yemen were removed from network updates demonstrates how limiting access to information can affect vulnerable populations (the geography of … silencing science, May 11, 2025). The dismantling of USAID disrupted international scientific and humanitarian networks and reshaped vulnerabilities across the Global South (the geography of … Silencing Science, part 2, February 17, 2026). Attacks on scientific findings, anti-vaccine rhetoric, and the rise of pseudoscience have challenged public trust in science and government oversight of health (the geography of … Silencing Science, part 3, May 25, 2026). More recently, proposed changes to federal grant-making threaten to introduce political priorities more directly into decisions about which research receives support (the geography of … silencing science, part 4, June 5, 2026). NSF brings these threads together because it sits near the center of the infrastructure through which American science is funded and produced. Changes to NSF extend beyond a single federal agency: they affect the data, people, institutions, partnerships, and places that collectively constitute the geography of science.

Vannevar Bush called science “the endless frontier,” a frontier that NSF was created to explore by investing in ideas and people across the nation. Over seventy-five years, that investment created a scientific enterprise extending from universities and laboratories to field sites, communities, international partnerships, and generations of students. Yet that landscape is being reshaped by declining public trust, disinformation, political interference, the disruptive effects of AI, and reductions in federal funding. The question is larger than how many grants NSF awards in 2026. It is what kind of scientific landscape the United States is creating for the next seventy-five years and whether the endless frontier will still be ours to explore.

NOTES

https://www.nsf.gov/news/eight-nsf-research-institutes-propel-us-quantum-science-290m

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-02135-x

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-02574-6

https://repository.library.noaa.gov/view/noaa/55405

https://www.theassemblync.com/news/education/higher-education/federal-research-funding-problem-unc/

https://ecologyandsociety.org/vol27/iss3/art25/

We should not teach children the sciences; but give them a taste for them. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1762.

NOTE: This is a reflective essay that tells my personal story of my love of geography. I needed to take a break from all the madness.

I grew up in the East Bay in northern California - over the hills from San Francisco, Oakland, and Berkeley. We moved from southern California to a small suburban community on the edges of what would become the site of exploding urbanization. Our home backed onto expansive open space where deer, foxes, and the occasional mountain lions roamed. As kids we spent days running through those hills, playing our childhood games, traipsing through underbrush, climbing trees, and building hidden forts. We tracked tadpoles in small pools, collected snails to release in our garden (much to my mother’s chagrin), and watched for the hawks, owls, and eagles that returned to their nesting sites year after year.

We experienced the erosion of this landscape as development took over, open space dwindled, and rather than finding those trails just outside the back door, we had to visit regional parks to go hiking and catch the ever-rarer glimpse of deer, foxes, and mountain lions.

California is an amazing state in which to grow up. It has every ecosystem you can imagine oceans, beaches, estuaries, deserts, coastal forests, volcanic landscapes, vast agricultural lands, and granite mountains. A pivotal moment in learning about these landscapes was a class I took as an undergraduate at UC Berkeley - Field Methods in Geography. The class was taught by Doug Powell, a gruff, old mountain man, who took us on a series of field trips across the state that are as fresh in my mind fifty years later as they were at the time. He taught us how to read the landscape.

What do I mean by reading the landscape? I learned that reading the landscape meant that I had to acquire a set of building blocks to understand the world around me. In our field trips across California, we learned about the ecosystems from the coastal ranges to the Sierra Nevada mountains. Tracking these changing landscapes, we saw large-scale change in plant communities, but also the more subtle aspects of each place we visited. We were taught to observe - to look out the window as we drove from place to place and think about what we were seeing. We were encouraged to use our senses in experiencing different sites we visited - sitting amongst the alfalfa fields, feeling the thick glossy plants, smelling the rich earth of the Central Valley; tasting wild strawberries of the coastal foothills; listening to the wind move through the towering redwoods of the Pacific Coast, traipsing across the granite boulders of the Sierra Nevada mountains. We were taught to look at the topography - the shape and slope of hills, valleys, mountains, and plains and think about the processes that created those places.

California Life Zones, Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, https://mvz.berkeley.edu/life_zone_map/.

But reading the landscape also meant looking beyond what was immediately visible to understand the systems connecting one place to another. We visited the vast waterworks of the California waterscape that move water via canals and pipelines across the state redesigning nature to provide water for cities, agriculture, and power. I fell in love with rivers. I gained understanding of the linkages across time and space created by the intersection of rivers and canals. I learned about the importance of snowpack in the Western United States as a driver that feeds both river systems and competing water needs. I began to understand the cyclical nature of spring snowmelt as it recharged rivers, soil, and plants, juxtaposed against competing demands for water stored in reservoirs and used for hydroelectric power and irrigation.

U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.

Reading the landscape took on another dimension when I entered graduate school: landscapes also contained histories, with past human actions still visible decades later. While researching my master’s degree I spent time working for the US Forest Service in the southern Sierra. I managed high-alpine restoration projects. The historic past was evident in high-mountain meadows due to overgrazing by sheep and cattle at the turn of the last century. Mountain meadows experienced severe erosion from overgrazing, which disrupted and lowered water tables, allowing sagebrush to become established and displace once-lush meadows, seeps, and wetlands. I learned to read the long-term damage due to past human activities on these sensitive landscapes.

California Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Living on the east side of the Sierra Nevada mountains introduced me to another water transfer system where the water of the Owens Valley was purchased, canalized, and piped to the city of Los Angeles in the early 1900s. This project was expanded in the 1970s by extracting more water to be delivered to L.A. This expansion significantly impacted groundwater supplies - the sub-surface and underground water that is essential for soil moisture regimes and vegetation regeneration. When groundwater and high-water tables are disrupted natural plants, gardens, and stream flow are impacted. The communities from Lee Vining to Bishop to Lone Pine experienced the loss of community gardens, diminished stream flows as groundwater recharge declined, and the drying of riparian habitat. Groundwater is hidden and out of sight; the loss of groundwater is revealed through other visible parts of the ecosystem and reading the landscape to consider this cause and effect became an important skill for me.

Sources of Los Angeles Water Supply: Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

My dissertation research focused on groundwater contamination in the city of Tucson, Arizona. In the 1990s, Tucson was dependent solely on groundwater for its water supply. Past industrial practices and the long-term presence of military facilities resulted in the inadequate disposal of harmful chemicals throughout the desert environment. These chemicals seeped into the groundwater exposing the citizens of south Tucson to contaminated water supplies. Reading the landscape became not just about the physical manifestation of water loss or redistribution, but also about the human communities dependent upon that water supply. The residents of south Tucson at that time were poor and Latino. The residents responded by organizing to demand health studies, access to community health facilities, and efforts to clean up the aquifer. This was a classic case of environmental justice - and reading the landscape included understanding the social and political aspects of place - who benefits, who bears the costs, and how communities respond.

Tucson, Arizona. Wildermuth, L.M., et al., 2025, U.S. Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Report 2025–5017, 38 p., https://doi.org/ 10.3133/ sir20255017.

Reading the landscape is about connectivity and complexity. It means learning to see the layers of natural processes and human actions that create the places around us. Over time, I learned to see connections across space, from snowpack in the mountains to rivers, canals, farms, and distant cities, and across time, as the consequences of grazing, groundwater extraction, industrial contamination, and urban development were written into landscapes decades later. I learned that landscapes encompass complex ecologies and diverse communities, and that both reflect the decisions that have reshaped places and the unequal consequences of those decisions.

Perhaps that is what Doug Powell was teaching us all those years ago when he told us to look out the window. He was teaching us science not as a body of knowledge, but as a way of observing, questioning, and making connections. We learned to pay attention and to ask why a landscape looked the way it did, searching for the processes - natural and human, visible and hidden - that shaped it. In that sense, he gave us what Rousseau called a “taste” for science: the curiosity to keep looking and asking questions. The hills of my childhood first taught me to love landscapes; geography taught me how to read them. All these years later, I am still looking out the window.

Final note: A shout-out to all my teachers and students through the years who have taught me so much! Thank you!!

Other essays in this series have reflected on partner cities that include 2C partner city Kharkiv Ukraine (February 23, 2025), 2C partner city Pemba, Mozambique (March 24, 2025), 2C partner city Tijuana, Mexico (May 4, 2025),2C partner city Denpasar, Indonesia (June 3, 2025), 2C partner city Mekelle, Ethiopia (August 2, 2025), 2C partner city Port Harcourt, Nigeria (October 19, 2025), 2C partner city Bokè-Kamsar, Guinea (February 11, 2026), 2C partner city Douala, Cameroon (March 31, 2026), 2C partner city Santa Fe, Argentina, (May 6, 2026), and 2C partner city Medellín, Colombia (July 9, 2026). Each illustrates the critical geography of the world’s secondary cities - places that bridge rural and metropolitan systems, absorb population pressures, and shape resilience in the face of environmental and political change. Esmeraldas, Ecuador, provides another example, where multiple forms of vulnerability converge.

Esmeraldas is a port city on Ecuador’s northern Pacific coast near the Colombian border. Situated within the Chocó biogeographical region, one of the most biodiverse regions in the world, Esmeraldas combines extraordinary ecological richness with a long history of natural-resource extraction. The region produces and exports agricultural products such as bananas and rubber, while two major pipelines transport oil from the Amazon Basin across Ecuador to the country’s principal oil refinery and marine terminal in Esmeraldas. As one of Ecuador’s most important seaports, the city has become a major distribution point for the country’s natural resources. Its geography connects the Amazon interior to the Pacific Ocean and Ecuador to global markets.

Esmeraldas is situated within a broader northern South American region where physical geography, geopolitics, social instability, and environmental vulnerability increasingly overlap. Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela (see the geography of … Venezuelan oil, protected areas, and Indigenous Peoples, January 18, 2026) occupy a geographic confluence of these forces.

The South American continent is part of a dynamic seismic region. Along its western margin, the Nazca Plate plunges beneath the South American Plate, creating the South American subduction zone extending from the southern tip of Chile along the western coasts of Peru, Ecuador, and Colombia. Farther north, Colombia and Venezuela lie along the boundaries of multiple tectonic plates, including the Caribbean Plate, creating a complex seismic environment. All these countries have experienced significant earthquakes – Colombia and Venezuela in August and June respectively this year and Ecuador in April 2016.

Figure of earthquakes in Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela. Created using ChapGPT. M. Laituri, 2026.

The city of Esmeraldas, capital of Esmeraldas Province, reflects the social as well as the physical processes shaping this region. Esmeraldas is in one of Ecuador’s poorest provinces, in the northwestern corner of the country, where segregation, poverty, and natural-resource exploitation have long shaped the landscape. Similar processes are evident across Northern South America. Political leadership in Ecuador, Colombia, and Venezuela is right-wing, aligned with the U.S. administration, and newly elected - or appointed, in the case of Venezuela. All three countries contend with violence and conflict facilitated by rebel groups, criminal gangs, organized crime, and drug-trafficking networks.

Source: Significant Quake Database; Earthquake Hazards Program; Reliefweb; ACLED; InSight Crime. *As of August 2026. The toll is expected to increase. **Colombia has one of highest populations of internally displaced people (IDP) due to conflict, violence, and climate change. It is expected that the number of IDP will increase.

The continuing U.S. “war on drugs” adds another geopolitical layer to this regional geography. Since September 2025, the U.S. military has conducted strikes against vessels allegedly associated with drug-trafficking networks along routes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean. Nearly 200 people have been killed. These actions are not geographically distant from Esmeraldas. Ecuadorian fishermen have reported being followed by drones, taken aboard U.S.-flagged vessels, and transported to El Salvador. The coastal waters off Ecuador have thus become part of a larger militarized geography connecting local fishing communities, international trafficking routes, U.S. security policy, and regional political instability.

Mapping out US alleged drug boat strikes. Insight Crime, May 2026.

Esmeraldas occupies a particularly complicated position within these overlapping regional processes. Its proximity to the Colombian border and nearby coca-growing regions contributes to complex social dynamics and high levels of urban violence and crime. The city is an important destination for people escaping violence in Colombia and for people displaced by natural disasters elsewhere along Ecuador’s coast (see the geography of … earthquakes and conflicts, November 26, 2025). Migration, displacement, environmental hazards, and insecurity intersect within the city.

As of 2026, Esmeraldas had a population of 172,793 and a density of 5,547 people per square kilometer. More than half of its population is Afro-Ecuadorian. Its economy includes tourism, oil and gas development, fisheries, agriculture, low-skilled work, and seasonal employment. These economic activities create rural-to-urban migration pull factors that contribute to population growth, with most of the population concentrated in the urban center.

Esmeraldas’ economic importance has not translated into equal access to infrastructure and services. Vulnerable populations are exposed to floods, earthquakes, landslides, and other hazards, while access to potable water and electricity remains limited in parts of the city and its outskirts. In April 2016, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck the northwestern coastal region of Esmeraldas and Manabí, destroying homes, schools, and hospitals and causing more than 600 deaths. The earthquake demonstrated how a major physical event becomes a social disaster when it intersects with poverty.

Oil provides another example of this relationship between geography, infrastructure, and vulnerability. The Trans-Ecuadorian Pipeline System (SOTE—503 km) and the Oleoducto de Crudos Pesados (OCP—485 km) terminate at major oil facilities in the Esmeraldas area. The pipelines transport medium and heavy crude oil through a series of pumping stations from Ecuador’s Amazon region to the Pacific coast. They physically connect the resource-rich Amazon Basin to the refinery and marine terminal at Esmeraldas and, from there, to global petroleum markets.

This infrastructure has concentrated environmental risks in Esmeraldas, creating significant environmental justice concerns. In 2025, a landslide triggered by heavy rainfall ruptured oil infrastructure and released approximately 25,000 barrels of crude oil, contaminating the Esmeraldas River. Pollution associated with oil facilities and pipelines has occurred repeatedly, creating persistent environmental risks for both local communities and ecosystems. Since 1972, 77 pipeline ruptures have resulted in 75 oil spills. Esmeraldas is the endpoint of Ecuador’s petroleum infrastructure, concentrating locally the environmental costs of a national energy system connected to global markets.

Oil pipelines to Esmeraldas. https://www.bakerinstitute.org/sites/default/files/2023-03/The_Outlook_for_Ecuador_s_Petroleum_Sector_New_Investments_Opportunities_Oct17.pdf.

Urban growth compounds these environmental pressures. Poor city planning has contributed to the development of informal settlements on marginal lands where basic services are limited or absent. City expansion has tripled during the past 25 years, yet the physical geography of Esmeraldas constrains where that expansion can occur. Steep slopes in western Esmeraldas are prone to landslides, while informal settlements in the eastern part of the city extend into low-lying areas along the Esmeraldas River where flooding is a persistent hazard. Poorly constructed housing in both areas increases vulnerability to earthquakes.

The Esmeraldas River is a major geographic feature of the city. One of the largest rivers in the region, it empties into the Pacific Ocean through the low-salinity estuarine waters of the Esmeraldas River system. The river supports ecological and human communities, but settlement along its margins also exposes residents to flooding, inadequate sanitation, pollution, and other environmental risks. Poverty, inequality, disease, inadequate infrastructure, and exposure to hazards become mutually reinforcing rather than separate urban problems.

Climate variability further intensifies these conditions. Esmeraldas is strongly influenced by the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the interaction of Pacific Ocean currents (see the geography of … La Niña and El Niño, December 21, 2025). The warm, humid El Niño current moving from the north interacts with the colder, drier Humboldt Current moving northward along the South American coast. Changes associated with ENSO influence rainfall, temperature, coastal conditions, and extreme weather throughout the region.

Periods of intense precipitation associated with ENSO events can trigger flooding and landslides, while heat waves, storm surges, and sea-level rise create additional pressures along the coast. The 1997–1998 El Niño event was particularly damaging to Esmeraldas. These climatic processes do not affect all residents equally. They interact directly with existing social inequalities, economic vulnerabilities, housing conditions, and access to basic infrastructure.

Efforts to improve land-use regulation, building codes, and basic services have increased the city’s capacity to address some of these hazards, but urban resilience remains limited. Floods and landslides damage buildings, roads, and utilities, while expanding impervious surfaces reduce infiltration and groundwater recharge and increase runoff during heavy rainfall events. The result is a landscape in which natural processes, urban development, and social inequality continually interact.

This intersection between structural poverty and natural hazards became the focus of the 2C Esmeraldas’s project. Partner institutions included the Technical University Luis Vargas Torres of Esmeraldas (UTLVT) and the lead institution, Universidad San Francisco de Quito (USFQ). The Municipality of Esmeraldas, the National Secretariat for Risk Management, and several social organizations were also project partners. Working through local institutions was essential because the objective was not simply to create spatial data about Esmeraldas, but to develop local capacity to collect, interpret, and use those data for risk reduction.

Local university students collected geospatial information that could be used to examine the spatial relationships among structural poverty, natural hazards, and social vulnerability. The analysis identified areas experiencing multiple dimensions of social risk, places where people had relocated because of natural hazards, and areas where displacement and marginalization could increase vulnerability to violence. The neighborhood became an important scale of analysis because it is where broad processes—poverty, environmental risk, inadequate infrastructure, migration, and violence—become part of everyday life.

The project focused particularly on social-risk data, including indicators of structural violence and health outcomes associated with environmental and social vulnerability. In this way, the 2C Esmeraldas project demonstrated the relationship among geography, social conditions, environmental processes, and climate change. These relationships extend well beyond Esmeraldas. Poverty, displaced populations, uncertain economies, violence, and environmental change are expressed across northern South America, creating increasingly difficult conditions for national governments, local communities, and regional environments.

Esmeraldas River estuary and informal settlements. Photo: M. Laituri, 2016.

One of the most revealing parts of the Esmeraldas project was the participatory mapping of neighborhoods - the vernacular geography of the city. The students participating in the workshops were residents of Esmeraldas, including underprivileged undergraduates whose daily experiences reflected some of the infrastructure problems being studied. At the time of one workshop, for example, the university was not receiving a reliable water supply. The abstract problem of inadequate urban infrastructure was part of the students’ own everyday geography.

Students were asked to map their neighborhoods and identify both natural and social resources as well as places they considered vulnerable to natural hazards. They considered proximity to stores, schools, and health facilities; walkability and personal safety; and access to basic resources, open spaces, and parks. They mapped streets, buildings, and places - locations that revealed how they experienced the city.

Neighborhoods are places of interpersonal connection and individual experience, forming much of the social and physical framework of an urban area. Students’ knowledge of their immediate surroundings provided information that conventional datasets could not capture. Their maps linked the microscale of individual experience and neighborhood conditions with the macroscale of the city and with the regional processes affecting Esmeraldas. A landslide-prone slope, an unsafe street, an unreliable water supply, a distant health facility, or a flood-prone settlement may appear to be separate problems when viewed individually. Mapping them together reveals how multiple dimensions of vulnerability accumulate across time and space.

Participatory Mapping Workshop, Esmeraldas, 2017

The purpose of this participatory mapping effort was to understand vulnerability to natural hazards and environmental risk while giving local participants - students as well as government-agency representatives - an opportunity to examine the social processes underlying vulnerability and resilience. Measures of risk, exposure and susceptibility do not fully capture how the social cohesion of place - the relationships, knowledge, resources, and networks influence community experience with hazards and their response.

All 2C projects created Map Books from the data collected in the partner cities. Although the State Department website and the central digital archive of the 2C Initiative have disappeared, partner cities created their own Map Books and digital archives. The Esmeraldas Map Book includes maps of demographics, land use, social problems, and exposure to natural hazards. These maps preserve a geographic record of the city and are an important resource as Esmeraldas continues to confront the interconnected challenges of urban growth, environmental hazards, poverty, violence, infrastructure, and climate change.

2C Esmeraldas Map Book, 2017.

Esmeraldas illustrate why secondary cities matter. It is simultaneously a port, an oil-refining center, a destination for migrants and displaced populations, an Afro-Ecuadorian city, and a community situated within one of the most biodiverse yet hazard-prone regions of the world. Its location connects the Amazon Basin to the Pacific Ocean, Ecuador to Colombia, local fisheries to international waters, petroleum infrastructure to global markets, and neighborhood vulnerabilities to continental-scale tectonic and climatic processes.

The story of 2C Esmeraldas returns to where this essay began - with the disappearance of the 2C archive. A federal website can disappear when governments and institutional priorities change. The loss matters because digital archives are part of the infrastructure through which scientific knowledge is preserved, shared, and made publicly accessible. Their disappearance can erase evidence of collaboration and make years of locally generated knowledge more difficult to find.

But the Esmeraldas project demonstrates why knowledge cannot reside only in a central government archive. It remains in the Map Book, in local universities and institutions, in the data collected by students, in the maps drawn during participatory workshops, and in people’s knowledge of their own neighborhoods. Those neighborhood maps connected the small geographies of water access, safety, flooding, and landslides to the much larger geographies of urbanization, inequality, resource extraction, and political change.

These maps and the underlying data may be one of the most important legacies of the Secondary Cities Initiative. The maps were products, but the geographic knowledge behind them was the more enduring infrastructure. In Esmeraldas, understanding vulnerability began by asking people to map the places they knew. Those local geographies revealed how global and regional forces become embedded in everyday landscapes and why preserving locally produced knowledge is essential to understanding, planning for, and building resilience in a rapidly changing city.

NOTES

https://www.hrw.org/news/2026/07/21/us/ecuador-abuses-proliferate-as-security-cooperation-deepens

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/12/world/americas/ecuador-fishing-boat-strikes.html?eafs_enabled=false

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212094725000684

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12926290/

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Ecuadors-Oil-Industry-Hit-with-Worst-Environmental-Disaster-in-Decades.html

https://isvshome.com/pdf/ISVS_10-11/ISVSej_10.11.8.pdf

Water does not recognize international boundaries. Rivers cross borders, groundwater flows beneath them, floods ignore them, and drought affects communities regardless of nationality. Yet the ways societies capture, distribute, govern, and value water differ across political boundaries. Along the U.S-Mexico border this paradox is especially apparent. Two nations share the same rivers, aquifers, and climate, but they experience water through different institutions, technologies, economies, and cultures. Geography provides a framework for understanding these relationships through the hydro-social cycle, a concept that recognizes that water and society continually shape one another.

In The geography of … imaginary lines (December 30, 2025), I suggested that political boundaries are among the most powerful human inventions. They organize sovereignty, jurisdiction, and governance, yet they rarely correspond to the ecological systems they divide. Few places illustrate this more clearly than the U.S.–Mexico border, where an international boundary intersects rivers, watersheds, and aquifers that continue to function as integrated natural systems.

The international boundary between the United States and Mexico stretches 2,000 miles from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. It traverses ecological zones that connect four U.S. states, six Mexican states, fourteen pairs of sister cities, and numerous Native American Tribes and Indigenous communities whose homelands predate the international boundary. The border region - defined as extending approximately 100 kilometers on either side of the boundary - contains three major transboundary river systems, the Colorado River, Rio Grande, and Tijuana River, numerous smaller watersheds, and nearly thirty shared aquifers that sustain millions of people. Approximately fifteen million residents rely on groundwater as their principal source of water, making these invisible resources among the most strategically important components of the border landscape.

Figure created using ChatGPT. M. Laituri, 2026.

The institutional framework for managing these shared waters has been the International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC), established under the 1944 U.S.-Mexico Water Treaty. Through a series of negotiated Minutes, the Commission has adapted the treaty to changing environmental, engineering, and political conditions. Although the treaty is often associated with rivers, groundwater has become increasingly important as climate change, urban growth, and prolonged drought place greater pressure on limited water supplies. Effective management requires cooperation that extends beyond surface water to the broader hydrologic systems shared by both nations.

These interactions can be examined through the hydro-social cycle. Unlike the traditional hydrologic cycle, which focuses on the movement of water through evaporation, precipitation, runoff, infiltration, and groundwater, the hydro-social cycle recognizes that water is simultaneously a natural and social resource. Climate, rivers, aquifers, and ecosystems interact continuously with technology, infrastructure, governance, economics, culture, and community values. Decisions about infrastructure, water allocation, urban development, and scientific information have become part of the movement of water through society.

This perspective is particularly valuable along the U.S.–Mexico border because the international boundary creates two distinct systems of governance superimposed upon a single hydrologic landscape. The same watershed produces different social and environmental outcomes (see the geography of … Tijuana, Mexico, May 4, 2025).

The hydro-social cycle. Figure created using ChatGPT. M. Laituri, 2026.

The hydro-social cycle also provides a framework for understanding environmental justice. Communities experience drought, flooding, and water insecurity differently because access to infrastructure, services, and environmental protection varies across the watershed.

These relationships are particularly evident in Ambos Nogales - the twin cities of Nogales, Arizona, and Nogales, Sonora. The Santa Cruz River originates in the mountains of southern Arizona, flows south into Sonora, and then heads north toward Tucson. Separated politically yet connected by the Santa Cruz River and a connected transboundary aquifer, the two cities demonstrate how one hydrologic system can support markedly different social, economic, and institutional realities.

Santa Cruz River Basin, A. Duttachowdhury, 2023. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/398edd4d6a384554a9b2e1d116c0e86c.

Table 1 highlights the contrasting conditions that shape the hydro-social cycle in Ambos Nogales. Nogales, Sonora has more than thirteen times the population of Nogales, Arizona, and occupies a larger municipal area. In contrast, Nogales, Arizona has a higher population density. Although the poverty rates in Nogales, Arizona (26.1%) and Nogales, Sonora (27.1%) are similar, poverty is experienced in different institutional, economic, and infrastructural contexts. Similar rates of poverty do not necessarily translate into similar levels of access to water, sanitation, public services, or environmental protection. These statistics demonstrate that hydrology and demographics alone cannot explain hydro-social conditions.

Table 1: Comparison table of Ambos Nogales. *Gini coefficient: measure of income inequality. It ranges from 0 (indicating perfect equality) to 1 (perfect inequality). Data sources: https://www.citypopulation.de/en/mexico/cities/https://nogalesusa.com/community-profile.

This contrast becomes especially visible during periods of water scarcity. Much of Nogales, Arizona receives reliable municipal water supplied from wells within the transboundary aquifer. However, neighborhoods in Nogales, Sonora periodically experience interruptions in water service during dry summers. In some areas, households depend upon pipas - private water delivery trucks - and store water in 55-gallon cans from the regional dump or industrial sites.

Water insecurity is rarely distributed equally. Communities with fewer financial resources, aging infrastructure, or limited political influence are disproportionately exposed to environmental hazards. In Nogales, Sonora, informal settlements, or colonias, occupy steep hillsides and peripheral areas where municipal water, sewer, and stormwater infrastructure cannot keep pace with rapid urban growth. These neighborhoods are especially vulnerable to flash flooding, erosion, and water contamination during the summer monsoon season. Increased precipitation intensifies destructive floods and elevates the need for adequate preparation for future floods. Residents pay more for less reliable water service, illustrating that access to water is fundamentally a question of equity as well as resource availability.

Industrialization has reshaped the hydro-social landscape. Beginning in the latter half of the twentieth century, the expansion of the maquiladora manufacturing system attracted new industries and thousands of workers to the border region. Economic growth created employment opportunities while accelerating population growth beyond the capacity of municipal infrastructure in many communities. Increased water demand, wastewater generation, and solid waste production became intertwined with housing shortages and environmental quality.

Water sustains ecosystems that transcend the international boundary. Treated wastewater discharged below the International Wastewater Treatment Plant supports riparian vegetation and wildlife habitat that have disappeared elsewhere in the Sonoran Desert. These restored corridors demonstrate that engineered infrastructure can create ecological benefits while simultaneously providing opportunities for groundwater recharge and downstream water supply. Yet pollution from untreated wastewater, industrial discharges, and stormwater runoff continues to threaten both surface water and groundwater quality. Environmental restoration and environmental degradation highlight the need for integrated management across the watershed.

Image of Ambos Nogales. ©Google Earth, Airbus, 2026.

The international border wall forms part of this technological landscape. Constructed primarily as security infrastructure, the wall intersects drainage systems, alters surface-water flow during intense storm events, fragments wildlife habitat, and complicates emergency access in flood-prone areas. Although designed for political purposes, it is part of the hydro-social cycle that modifies ecological processes and influences how communities interact with the shared water resources. The wall reminds us that infrastructure created for one objective can have unintended consequences for water, ecosystems, and human security.

Ambos Nogales reflects a shared border culture that has evolved through generations of interaction and is rarely included in official accounts. Families celebrate holidays together, residents shop, work, and receive medical care across the border, and bilingual communication is part of everyday life. These social connections have created a regional identity that is distinct from either nation alone. Water is part of this shared culture.

This tradition of cooperation is reflected in the long history of collaborative water management in Ambos Nogales and embodies the term science diplomacy. Engineers, hydrologists, municipal officials, universities, federal agencies, and local communities have long worked together to solve shared problems. Early municipal water systems crossed the international boundary, firefighters routinely responded to emergencies on either side of “the line,” and cooperative flood-control and wastewater infrastructure were developed to protect both cities resulting in the Binational Emergency Response Program (2000) that allows US. fire units to provide water, equipment, and large capacity systems across the border. These practical partnerships demonstrate that collaboration along the border has been driven by the everyday realities of living within a common watershed.

The Ford Foundation Ambos Nogales Water Management Project represented one chapter within this longer tradition of cooperation. The project sought to develop one of the first comprehensive assessments of regional water quality while bringing together scientists, engineers, planners, universities, government agencies, and community organizations from both countries. Looking back, the project anticipated what is now widely recognized as an interdisciplinary approach to environmental problem-solving. The project demonstrated that scientific collaboration builds not only knowledge but also trust, relationships, and the institutional capacity necessary for long-term stewardship of shared resources.

That collaborative tradition continues today through organizations working across the border to strengthen watershed resilience and environmental stewardship. The Sonoran Institute, the Babbitt Center for Land and Water Policy, Water Smart Border Cities, and numerous community organizations are advancing cross-border initiatives focused on green infrastructure, stormwater management, watershed restoration, and public engagement. These partnerships recognize that sustainable water management depends upon integrating scientific knowledge with local experience and community participation.

Climate change is transforming the assumptions that guided water management throughout much of the twentieth century. Hydrologists once assumed that historical patterns of precipitation and streamflow provided a reliable basis for future planning. That assumption - known as stationarity - is increasingly inadequate. Longer droughts, more intense floods, changing snowpack, and higher temperatures are altering both the quantity and timing of water availability across the Southwest. Population growth, expanding urban development, and increasing demand continue to reshape the social dimensions of the hydro-social cycle. The challenge is to adapt to the institutions, infrastructure, and governance to changing hydrologic conditions. The hydro-social cycle provides a framework for understanding why stationarity has become inadequate. Both hydrologic processes and the societies that depend upon them are changing simultaneously.

These changes reinforce the importance of geospatial information and shared scientific data. An integrated binational database of groundwater conditions, water quality, climate observations, infrastructure, and ecosystem health would provide more than improved scientific understanding; it would become shared infrastructure supporting collaborative planning and adaptive management. Geospatial technologies, predictive modeling, and community-based observations offer opportunities to integrate knowledge across political boundaries while respecting the local contexts in which water is experienced. These technologies provide a framework for systematic data collection to inform early warning systems, flow reduction through reducing impermeable surfaces, and identification of vulnerable communities through citizen engagement.

The greatest lesson from Ambos Nogales is that the international boundary is simultaneously a line of separation and a place of connection and the interactions that occur there. As climate change accelerates, the future of the U.S.-Mexico border will depend less on reinforcing the imaginary line than on strengthening the partnerships that cross it. Along the U.S.–Mexico border, the most important resource shared by the United States and Mexico is not only water, but the collective capacity to understand it, govern it, and sustain it together.

The hydro-social cycle is not unique to Ambos Nogales. It provides a geographic framework for understanding transboundary watersheds around the world, where shared water resources continually reshape the relationships among nature, society, technology, and governance.

NOTES

https://www.sciencedirect.com/special-issue/10SXF1D7BGN

https://www.sciencediplomacy.org/sites/default/files/wilder_december_2019_0.pdf

https://www.everycrsreport.com/reports/R45430.html

https://wrrc.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/documents/ETapia_WRRCWebinar_03282025.pdf

https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2022/10/how-resilient-are-communities-along-border.html

https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/c11f7b5fd50644f098497fc7a430a9df

https://wrrc.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/2024-02/Transboundary-Aquifers-UNESCO-383775-Reaching-Groundwater-Agreements-USMX-Border.pdf

https://www.southernborder.org/border_lens_southern_border_region_at_a_glance

https://aliciapatterson.org/miriam-davidson/bridging-troubled-waters-in-ambos-nogales/

https://theconversation.com/for-native-americans-us-mexico-border-is-an-imaginary-line-111043

Global military spending is increasing. In 2025, worldwide military expenditures reached $2.7 trillion, while NATO European Allies and Canada collectively spent more than $570 billion, an increase of 19 percent over the previous year. During the same period, Official Development Assistance (ODA) declined to $174.3 billion, a decrease of more than 23 percent, and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) reduced its 2026 budget by 17 percent because of declining donor support. These numbers illustrate issues of scale where the geography of national security is juxtaposed with regional stability and embedded in the geography of local inequality. Intertwined with these investments are the complementary roles of development assistance and humanitarian aid. Humanitarian aid is explicitly local, responding to place-based disasters and conflicts, while development assistance seeks to strengthen countries over the long term.

Security is often viewed through the lens of the nation-state—protecting borders, maintaining military readiness, and deterring external threats. Military security and human security are not competing priorities but interconnected dimensions of the same geographic system. Decisions made by governments regarding defense spending influence regional stability, humanitarian needs, infrastructure, and the well-being of communities. Likewise, local conflicts and humanitarian crises can reshape national priorities and international security strategies.

Recent geopolitical instability has accelerated investment in the defense sector. Venture capital funding in Europe’s defense start-up sector reached $2.71 billion in 2025, while Germany plans to invest $39.5 billion in military space capabilities by 2030. The European Union’s Space Strategy for Security and Defense seeks to establish space domain awareness by 2035, and NATO’s 2025 Commercial Space Strategy coupled with NATO’s Innovation Fund emphasizes partnerships with commercial providers of ‘deeptech’, satellite systems, and services. These developments illustrate that modern securityextends beyond traditional military forces to include cyber capabilities, artificial intelligence, and space-based infrastructure (see the geography of … space as infrastructure, June 24, 2025).

https://www.sipri.org/databases/milex.

Since 1989, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) has maintained its Arms Industry Database, documenting public and private arms-producing companies around the world. The largest defense companies continue to expand production, enlarge manufacturing facilities, and establish new subsidiaries in response to growing demand. The United States remains the world’s largest exporter of major conventional weapons, accounting for 43 percent of global exports between 2020 and 2024. Europe received 35 percent of these exports, while 33 percent went to the Middle East. Saudi Arabia accounted for 12 percent of U.S. arms exports, and major purchasers also include Qatar, Kuwait, Israel, and Australia. Modern weapons systems, such as the F-35 aircraft, depend upon multinational production networks involving Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and BAE Systems, illustrating that the geography of defense extends far beyond national borders.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cp/ranked-worlds-largest-arms-companies-by-revenue/.

Growing military expenditures reflect genuine security concerns arising from armed conflict and geopolitical instability. They require societies to make difficult choices about national priorities. According to the United Nations, a one percent increase in military spending corresponds to approximately a one percent reduction in publicly financed health services in low- and middle-income countries. The accompanying map illustrates this relationship by combining World Bank income classifications with the locations of active armed conflicts. Many of today’s conflicts occur in countries already experiencing limited economic resources, weak institutions, and inadequate infrastructure. These overlapping conditions amplify humanitarian needs while reducing the capacity of governments to respond. These conditions frequently reinforce one another across regions and over time, creating landscapes of chronic insecurity that require both military and humanitarian responses.

World Bank world income categories, 2025. Red dots are areas of conflict. Visit the Global Conflict Tracker. Click on each dot and a pop-up provides a link to a description of the conflict.

The evolution of humanitarianism reflects more than a century and a half of changing ideas about war, civilian protection, international law, and international responsibility. Modern humanitarianism is traced to the Battle of Solferino in 1859, where Henry Dunant’s observations of wounded soldiers led to the creation of the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Geneva Conventions. During the twentieth century, humanitarian institutions expanded beyond battlefield relief to include refugee protection, food security, public health, disaster response, and post-conflict recovery through organizations such as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Food Programme, UNICEF, and the World Health Organization. Major humanitarian failures - including Biafra in the late 1960s, the Ethiopian famine of the 1980s, and the Rwandan genocide in 1994 - demonstrated both the necessity of humanitarian action and the limitations of the international system, prompting continuing reforms in coordination, accountability, and civilian protection.

Today’s humanitarian crises differ from those that shaped many of these institutions. Armed conflict intersects with environmental degradation and natural disasters to create overlapping crises that extend across national boundaries. Humanitarian response has evolved from the delivery of emergency relief to a geographically integrated system that aims to combine immediate assistance with longer-term efforts to restore livelihoods, strengthen institutions, and rebuild communities.

Global Humanitarian Overview, OCHA, 2026.

These changing realities are particularly evident during the current humanitarian funding crisis. In 2025, the suspension and subsequent termination of numerous United States Agency for International Development (USAID) programs removed support for an estimated 40 percent of globally funded humanitarian assistance. The consequences extended far beyond individual projects. Many of the organizations affected were deeply embedded within local communities, possessing years or decades of experience, trusted partnerships, and detailed knowledge of local social, cultural, and political conditions. The loss represents reduced financial capacity as well as the erosion of geographic knowledge and community trust that underpin effective humanitarian response. This further contributed to the erosion of support for humanitarian aid and has led to another reassessment of programs and processes.

Data source: Devex, E. Miolene, et al., The USAID award the Trump administration killed – and kept, 2025.

The Humanitarian Reset is a response to declining donor support and reflects growing recognition that existing humanitarian architecture needs to change. The imbalance between military expenditures and humanitarian assistance reflects competing budget priorities and represents fundamentally different approaches to achieving security and different geographies of investment. Defense expenditures support networks of research institutions, manufacturing centers, military installations, and advanced technology industries. Humanitarian assistance follows a very different geography. Resources flow toward places experiencing conflict and natural disasters that often result in forced displacement. Investments are directed toward sustaining communities through emergency relief, rebuilding infrastructure, and restoring public services.

The international humanitarian system stands at an important crossroads. The geography of security ultimately asks what societies choose to protect and where they choose to invest. Military expenditure remains essential for deterrence, national defense, and responding to an increasingly uncertain geopolitical landscape. Yet military power alone cannot create resilient societies. Communities require functioning institutions, healthcare, education, infrastructure, and humanitarian systems capable of responding when disasters and conflicts occur.

Infographic collaboratively designed with ChatGPT, M. Laituri, 2026.

Eisenhower warned of the dangers of allowing military power to overshadow other national priorities. More than sixty years later, the challenge is broader than balancing military strength with fiscal restraint. Geography reminds us that security depends upon protecting both states and the people who live within them. Military security and human security are not opposing choices but complementary investments whose consequences are measured across places, landscapes, and lives.

NOTES

See The Military Balance, 2026, International Institute for Strategic Studies.

https://www.cfr.org/articles/great-aid-recession-2025s-humanitarian-crash-nine-charts

https://www.cgdev.org/blog/disentangling-foreign-aid-and-development

https://www.urd.org/en/review-hem/what-the-reset-reveals-about-the-un-led-humanitarian-aid-system-lila-ricarts-point-of-view/

https://peaceful-world.org/true-cost-of-war

https://www.cgdev.org/blog/even-reform-humanitarian-assistance-needs-more-us-finance

https://www.nrc.no/perspectives/2026/how-does-military-spending-compare-with-humanitarian-aid-costs

https://www.unwomen.org/sites/default/files/2022-08/Comparing-military-and-human-security-spending-en.pdf

https://borgenproject.org/foreign-aid/

https://www.nationalpriorities.org/analysis/2023/warfare-state-how-funding-militarism-compromises-our-welfare/

https://www.sipri.org/media/press-release/2026/global-military-spending-rise-continues-european-and-asian-expenditures-surge

https://saludeverywhere.com/en/humanitarian-aid-and-international-development/history-and-evolution-of-humanitarian-aid/

https://humanitarianaction.info/document/mid-year-review-global-humanitarian-overview-delivering-people-crisis-against-odds

https://www.focus-economics.com/blog/the-poorest-countries-in-the-world/

https://foreignassistance.gov/

“Cruelty is not an accidental byproduct of this policy. Cruelty is the point.” Julianne Malveax. July 10, 2026.

As of March 31, 2025, approximately 1.3 million people held Temporary Protected Status (TPS) in the United States. The program began as part of the Immigration Act of 1990, sponsored by Senator Edward Kennedy and enacted under President George H. W. Bush.

The law authorizes temporary protection for people whose countries are experiencing “extraordinary and temporary conditions” that prevent their safe return, including armed conflict, environmental disasters, or situations in which governments are unable to protect or receive returning citizens.

TPS is fundamentally a geographic policy. It recognizes that places can become unsafe because of war, environmental disaster, political instability, epidemics, infrastructure failure, or combinations of these conditions. Rather than focusing solely on the legal circumstances of individual migrants, TPS acknowledges that safety is shaped by place and by the political, environmental, and social conditions operating within that place. The global distribution of TPS demonstrates that humanitarian crises requiring temporary protection are not isolated events but occur across multiple regions shaped by conflict, environmental hazards, political instability, and governance failures.

All countries with current TPS designation are scheduled to expire in 2026. *Terminated TPS countries identify all countries that have previously held TPS designation and have expired. Data Source: Temporary Protected Status (TPS): An Overview, American Immigration Council, https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/fact-sheet/temporary-protected-status-tps-overview/#fn2.

TPS has its own geography within the United States. The largest concentrations occur in states such as Florida, Texas, California, and New York, illustrating how federal immigration policy affects regional economies, labor markets, and communities rather than the nation uniformly. TPS allows people from designated countries to remain and work in the United States when they cannot safely return home. It does not create a pathway to permanent residency or citizenship, but designations can be renewed for periods ranging from six to eighteen months. The U.S. attorney general originally administered the program; that responsibility has shifted to the secretary of homeland security.

Map of Individuals with TPS. Source: https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/RS20844

Since 1990, TPS has been applied to countries experiencing a wide range of humanitarian emergencies. Although their circumstances differ, the geographic logic of these designations is consistent. Countries have received TPS because of armed conflict, natural hazards, epidemics, civil insecurity, or political instability made return dangerous. Some designations remained in effect for only a few years, while others have continued for decades, illustrating how supposedly temporary crises can become embedded in the political and social landscapes of particular countries.

¹Lebanon received Deferred Enforced Departure rather than a conventional TPS designation. ²Liberia received separate protections related to civil war and, later, the Ebola epidemic. Sources: American Immigration Council, June 25, 2026, Temporary Protected Status: An Overview. Library of Congress - Temporary Protected Status and Deferred Enforced Departure, J. Wilson, August 28, 2025.

Several geographic patterns emerge from these designations. Armed conflict and civil insecurity are the most common reasons for granting TPS, particularly across Africa, the Middle East, and parts of Europe. Environmental disasters - including earthquakes, hurricanes, and volcanic eruptions - represent another important category. The designations for Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone during the Ebola outbreak demonstrate that public-health emergencies can also make return unsafe.

These categories cannot always be separated. Conflict may destroy infrastructure and weaken government institutions before an earthquake or flood occurs. Environmental disasters may intensify poverty, insecurity, migration, and competition for resources. Epidemics may spread more rapidly where health systems have been damaged by conflict or economic collapse. TPS recognizes not only individual emergencies but also the compound geographies created when multiple crises overlap within the same place.

Central America has long accounted for a substantial portion of the TPS population. El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua have held designations or related protections since the late 1990s and early 2000s. Salvadorans initially received TPS in 1990 because of civil war. After Hurricane Mitch devastated Central America in 1998, TPS was granted to Hondurans and Nicaraguans, while deportations to El Salvador and Guatemala were temporarily halted because of the wider humanitarian conditions across the region.

The history of TPS in Central America demonstrates how migration is shaped by events operating across several geographic scales. A hurricane may destroy homes and infrastructure locally, but its effects extend across national economies, regional migration routes, family networks, and communities in the United States. TPS connects these places by recognizing that a decision about whether a person can safely return cannot be separated from conditions in the place to which that person would be sent.

Haiti, Syria, and Venezuela are of particular interest because each has experienced the intersection of major earthquakes with conflict, civil insecurity, or political instability. They demonstrate the “crisis within a crisis” that emerges when a natural hazard strikes a landscape already weakened by violence, damaged infrastructure, poverty, displacement, or ineffective governance.

¹Data source: https://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/hazel/view/hazards/earthquake/event-more-info/8732. ²Confirmed deaths as of July 12, 2026. USGS PAGER predicts that casualties and extensive damage are likely to increase.

The three countries differ in history, culture, governance, and physical geography, yet they illustrate the same underlying spatial process. Earthquakes struck places already characterized by displacement, insecurity, weakened public institutions, or damaged infrastructure. They disrupted livelihoods and transportation systems, destroyed buildings, displaced populations, intensified public-health needs, and complicated the distribution of humanitarian aid. Recovery includes the rebuilding of infrastructure, the restoration of governance, security, and essential services. These compound crises demonstrate why the end of a disaster—or even the end of a conflict—does not necessarily make a place safe for return.

Haiti experienced a magnitude 7.3 earthquake in January 2010 in which 316,000 people were reported to have lost their lives. Recovery was slow and, in many places, incomplete (see the geography of … Haiti, August 24, 2026). The earthquake produced massive internal displacement into both formal and informal settlements. Approximately 362,000 people remain internally displaced in Haiti, and many informal settlements are in areas exposed to flooding and landslides (see Haiti: Ten Year On, Doctors Without Borders, 2020).

This is an important geographic dimension of Haiti’s continuing crisis. Displacement did not move people out of danger; it often relocated them from one form of vulnerability to another. People who lost homes in the earthquake moved into settlements where they faced new exposure to inadequate sanitation, insecure tenure, gang violence, and limited access to public services.

The aftermath of the earthquake unfolded within a broader landscape of political instability and institutional weakness. Gang violence disrupted food supplies, and recurring disasters have expanded the humanitarian emergency. In 2021, Haiti experienced another major earthquake, this time of magnitude 7.2, causing extensive damage and approximately 2,500 deaths.

An estimated 200 gangs operate across Haiti, contributing to large-scale attacks on communities, increased violence, restrictions on movement, and continuing internal displacement. Roads, ports, neighborhoods, and access corridors are strategic spaces controlled or contested by armed groups. The geography of gang control affects where people can travel, where humanitarian organizations can operate, and whether food, fuel, and medicine can reach affected communities.

Ending TPS and returning Haitians to Haiti forces them into a landscape where personal safety cannot be assured, public institutions have limited capacity, essential infrastructure has been damaged, and violence controls access to parts of the country.

Map of Gang War in Haiti, grey shading areas of anti-government and gang activity. C. Mapping, 2024. CC BY-SA 4.0. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gang_war_in_Haiti.svg.

In February 2023, the Türkiye–Syria Kahramanmaraş earthquake sequence caused catastrophic damage across the international boundary separating the two countries. The sequence began with a magnitude 7.8 earthquake and was followed approximately nine hours later by a magnitude 7.5 earthquake. The disaster affected a broad region and compounded the devastation already produced by the Syrian civil war.

Syria’s civil war began in 2011 and produced one of the world’s largest humanitarian and displacement crises. Millions of Syrians sought asylum in neighboring Türkiye, and many were resettled in the southern Turkish provinces most severely affected by the 2023 earthquake sequence. Refugees who had already fled war found themselves located near the earthquake epicenters and were displaced again (see the geography of … earthquakes and conflicts, November 26, 2025).

The earthquake did not stop at a political border, but the ability to respond to it was profoundly shaped by borders, territorial control, damaged transportation routes, international sanctions, and unequal access to humanitarian assistance. The same physical hazard produced different recovery conditions across places governed by different authorities and connected to different aid networks.

Syria continues to face substantial humanitarian needs despite recent governance changes and the formal end of major phases of the civil war. In 2025, more than 3.4 million refugees and internally displaced people returned to their communities. Many returned to damaged neighborhoods without reliable water, electricity, housing, health care, or other essential services. In some areas, people literally live on top of rubble (see the geography of … rubble, October 11, 2025).

Environmental pressures compound these conditions. Syria is experiencing widespread drought, with food security threatened by uncertain wheat production and by the regional consequences of the continuing U.S.–Iran war. In May 2026, severe flooding damaged displacement sites and destroyed infrastructure. Humanitarian needs remain high because of displacement, earthquake destruction, drought, damaged public services, and socioeconomic insecurity overlap.

Syria illustrates why the end of active warfare does not automatically make a place safe. Political declarations may identify a conflict as concluded, but the geography of conflict remains visible in destroyed cities, contaminated land, fragmented infrastructure, displacement camps, interrupted livelihoods, and uneven access to state services. The map illustrates that acute food insecurity extends across most of Syria, demonstrating that humanitarian vulnerability continues long after the formal end of major military operations.

Syria acute food insecurity classification, 2026. https://fews.net/middle-east-and-europe/syria/food-security-outlook/february-2026,

In 2026, Venezuela experienced two major upheavals: the January U.S. invasion and effective takeover of the country (see the geography of … Venezuelan oil, protected areas, and Indigenous Peoples, January 18, 2026), followed in June by a devastating earthquake doublet.

Two earthquakes of magnitude 7.2 and 7.5 occurred less than one minute apart, striking the country’s densely populated northern coastal region. Approximately 4,500 deaths had been confirmed by July 12, 2026, while thousands more were injured, displaced, or missing. Because this corridor contains much of Venezuela’s population, infrastructure, industry, and governmental institutions, the earthquakes produced consequences far beyond the immediate impact zone.

The disaster struck a nation already weakened by decades of economic decline, deteriorating oil and electricity infrastructure, political upheaval, and extensive out-migration. Recovery involves rebuilding damaged buildings as well as institutions whose capacity had already eroded. This recovery will occur under a complex and novel political arrangement in which the U.S. secretary of state effectively functions as the “viceroy” of Venezuela, creating a colonial-like relationship between the two countries. The earthquake has intensified questions about sovereignty, authority, and who determines the priorities of reconstruction.

The expansion of the Tren de Aragua gang reflects another geographic dimension of Venezuela’s crisis. Criminal organizations control strategic territories associated with border crossings, transportation corridors, and illegal mining. Their influence may shape where humanitarian aid is delivered, how reconstruction proceeds, and whether relief resources are diverted before reaching affected communities.

The population-density map demonstrates why the earthquakes were so consequential. The epicentral region overlaps Venezuela’s principal urban corridor, where population, infrastructure, and economic activity are concentrated. Recovery becomes an engineering challenge and a question of political geography involving territorial control, governance, and the distribution of humanitarian resources.

Venezuela illustrates that disasters unfold within existing political landscapes. Humanitarian aid moves through territories governed by national authorities, local governments, military forces, commercial interests, and criminal organizations. These actors influence who receives assistance, where reconstruction occurs, and whether recovery reduces - or reinforces - existing inequalities.

Population density in Venezuela. Red circle highlights impact zone of earthquake. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/12/5/opening-pandoras-box-what-happens-if-the-us-attacks-venezuela.

The Supreme Court’s decision in Mullin v. Doe, issued on June 25, 2026, upheld the Trump administration’s authority to terminate Temporary Protected Status for Haitian and Syrian nationals. Approximately 350,000 Haitians and more than 6,000 Syrians consequently face the loss of work authorization and protection from deportation, despite continuing humanitarian crises in their respective countries.

The decision illustrates another geography created by TPS - a geography of connection between places of refuge and places of origin. Over many years, TPS holders have established homes, families, workplaces, businesses, religious communities, and social networks throughout the United States. Their lives are embedded in local communities while remaining connected to relatives and communities abroad through remittances, caregiving, and transnational family networks. Ending TPS affects individuals, neighborhoods, regional economies, and communities across multiple countries, including the U.S.

A decision issued in Washington, D.C., produces consequences that extend across geographic scales. It reshapes households in American cities, labor markets that depend upon immigrant workers, humanitarian conditions in Haiti and Syria, and communities that may be unable to absorb large numbers of returnees. Immigration policy and humanitarian geography become inseparable because decisions made in one place fundamentally alter lives in another.

For more than three decades, Temporary Protected Status has recognized a simple geographic reality: some places become temporarily—or persistently—unsafe because of armed conflict, environmental disasters, epidemics, political instability, or combinations of these crises make safe return impossible. As demonstrated throughout this essay, these conditions increasingly overlap. Earthquakes occur within conflict zones. Political instability complicates disaster recovery. Criminal organizations shape humanitarian access. Infrastructure destroyed by war magnifies the effects of drought, flooding, or earthquakes. Geography reminds us that disasters are rarely isolated events; they unfold across landscapes already shaped by social, political, and environmental vulnerability.

Eliminating TPS ignores these geographic realities. It assumes that because an administrative designation has ended, the conditions that justified protection have also disappeared. Yet damaged infrastructure, gang-controlled neighborhoods, drought-stricken agricultural regions, destroyed cities, and displaced communities do not disappear through executive action or judicial opinion. Human security cannot be restored by administrative decree.

This is the geography of cruelty. It begins with the refusal to recognize places - to acknowledge that landscapes of conflict, disaster, and displacement, and recovery continue long after public attention has shifted elsewhere. It treats forced movement as an administrative outcome rather than the uprooting of people from families, homes, livelihoods, neighborhoods, schools, and communities. Geography reminds us that people are never displaced from abstract locations; they are displaced from places that define their identities and sustain their lives.

Temporary Protected Status is not simply an immigration policy. It is a recognition that geography matters - that human security depends upon place and that places are shaped by the interaction of natural hazards, conflict, governance, infrastructure, and society. The Supreme Court’s decision reflects a different vision, one in which legal authority overrides geographic reality. The question is whether public policy will recognize the geography of human security - or choose instead to ignore it.

NOTES

https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/fact-sheet/temporary-protected-status-tps-overview/#fn2

https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/RS20844

https://www.cfr.org/backgrounders/what-temporary-protected-status

https://welcomelawfirm.com/blog/gang-violence-and-the-deteriorating-situation-in-haiti/

https://globalinitiative.net/analysis/haiti-gangs-organized-crime/

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/dispatches/venezuelas-earthquakes-have-deepened-this-centurys-biggest-economic-crisis/

https://www.chn.org/voices/the-supreme-court-has-sided-with-cruelty-over-compassion/

https://www2.law.temple.edu/lppp/cruelty-ending-temporary-protective-status/

Other essays in this series have reflected on partner cities that include 2C partner city Kharkiv Ukraine (February 23, 2025), 2C partner city Pemba, Mozambique (March 24, 2025), 2C partner city Tijuana, Mexico (May 4, 2025),2C partner city Denpasar, Indonesia (June 3, 2025), 2C partner city Mekelle, Ethiopia (August 2, 2025), 2C partner city Port Harcourt, Nigeria (October 19, 2025), 2C partner city Bokè-Kamsar, Guinea (February 11, 2026), 2C partner city Douala, Cameroon (March 31, 2026), and 2C Santa Fe, Argentina, (May 6, 2026). Each illustrates the critical geography of the world’s secondary cities - places that bridge rural and metropolitan systems, absorb population pressures, and shape resilience in the face of environmental and political change. Medellín, Colombia offers one of the clearest examples of how geography can simultaneously constrain development and create opportunities for innovation.

The geography of Medellín explains both the city’s remarkable transformation and its continuing challenges. Physical geography, social geography, and political geography intersect to shape patterns of urban growth, inequality, migration, and environmental risk. To understand Medellín is first to understand its landscape.

Situated within the Aburrá Valley, Medellín forms the core of a metropolitan region of ten municipalities with more than 4.2 million people (Macrotrends, 2026). As the capital of the state of Antioquia, it is Colombia’s second-largest city and one of the country’s principal economic and cultural centers. Streams descending from the surrounding Andes feed the Medellín River (also known as the Porce River), which flows along the valley floor amidst terrain that rises sharply into steep hillsides. The Cordillera Occidental, the western portion of the Andes, is the lowest and narrowest of Colombia’s three Andean ranges, yet it has profoundly influenced how the city has developed.

The city’s social geography mirrors this topography. Wealthier neighborhoods occupy the valley floor where employment, infrastructure, and services are concentrated, while poorer communities have historically settled on the surrounding hillsides where development is difficult and public investment limited. The landscape reinforces patterns of social exclusion, creating a geography in which elevation corresponds with economic opportunity.

These patterns have been intensified by Colombia’s long history of armed conflict, drug cartels, paramilitary violence, and forced migration. According to the United Nations Refugee Agency, more than 82 percent of Colombia’s population lives in urban areas. By the end of 2022, the country had the world’s second-largest population of internally displaced people, with approximately 6.8 million individuals forced from their homes. Since 2014, millions of Venezuelans have fled economic collapse, political instability, violence, and shortages of basic services. More than three million have sought refuge in Colombia, with Medellín becoming one of the principal destinations and home to over 250,000 Venezuelan migrants.

These demographic pressures transformed the city’s urban geography. During the early 1990s, Medellín was widely regarded as one of the most violent cities in the world. Violence associated with guerrilla movements, paramilitary organizations, and drug trafficking destabilized rural Colombia while accelerating migration toward cities perceived to offer greater security and opportunity. The same conflicts that devastated much of the country also fueled Medellín’s rapid expansion.

Much of that growth occurred outside formal planning. Constrained by the valley floor, development climbed the steep peripheral hillsides where migrants established informal settlements in areas vulnerable to landslides, flooding, and other natural hazards. Approximately thirty percent of Medellín’s housing remains informal. These neighborhoods are characterized by narrow, unplanned streets, limited access to water, sanitation, electricity, and other essential services, while unstable slopes increase exposure to erosion, landslides, and disaster risk. In Medellín, physical geography and social inequality remain inseparable.

Medellín’s informal settlements (in purple), 2015. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3492703

Beginning in the early 2000s, however, the city embarked on one of the world’s most celebrated programs of urban transformation. A coalition of academics, business leaders, community organizations, and civic officials formed the Compromiso Ciudadano (Citizen Commitment), promoting participatory governance and innovative approaches to urban development. Their work helped create what became known internationally as the “Medellín Miracle“—a model of social urbanism that sought not simply to modernize infrastructure but to reduce inequality by reconnecting marginalized neighborhoods to the rest of the city.

Central to this transformation was the recognition that the city’s poorest hillside communities could no longer remain isolated from urban planning. Medellín introduced a series of Integral Urban Projects (Proyectos Urbanos Integrales) that combined transportation improvements with public spaces, libraries, schools, parks, and community services. Mobility was viewed not simply as an engineering challenge but as a means of social inclusion.

The most visible symbol of this transformation was the Metrocable, an aerial cable-car system linking hillside barrios with the Metro network in the valley. Residents who once spent hours navigating difficult terrain gained reliable access to employment, education, healthcare, and government services. Medellín expanded public transportation, invested in green infrastructure, and adopted climate adaptation policies that attracted worldwide attention. In 2013 Medellín was named the World’s Most Innovative City, one of many awards acknowledging its achievements in urban planning, transportation, and sustainability.

Yet the transformation remains unfinished. Economic disparities continue to reflect the city’s topography, with wealth concentrated along the valley floor while poverty persists on the surrounding hillsides. (Many other social challenges exist – see on Substack - Medellín: The two faces of Urban Tranformation). Many informal settlements still lack reliable access to basic public services, and governments remain cautious about investing in neighborhoods officially designated as high-risk because of their susceptibility to landslides and flooding. Continued migration and population growth ensure that development continues to spread into these environmentally fragile landscapes.

These unresolved geographic challenges created an ideal opportunity for the Secondary Cities Initiative. The project began by examining urban expansion using high-resolution satellite imagery together with the Global Human Settlement Layer. These datasets revealed a continuing pattern of growth spreading outward from the valley floor onto increasingly marginal lands surrounding the city. Remote sensing provided a regional perspective, identifying where change was occurring and where more detailed investigation was needed.

High resolution imagery with spatial extent of Medellín. The city’s built-up area expanded between 1990 – 2015 on peripheral, steep mountain slopes. Analysis of Global Human Settlement data overlaid on Google earth imagery © by S. Chignell, 2C Colorado State University Team.

Yet satellite imagery could only reveal where development was taking place - not how people experienced these neighborhoods. Questions about environmental quality, access to services, perceptions of safety, and the daily movement of materials required a different approach. The project shifted from regional-scale observation to neighborhood-scale investigation, integrating scientific analysis with the lived experiences of residents.

This work was made possible through an interdisciplinary partnership involving Ecocity Builders (ECB), the Medellín Planning Department, the Urban Planning Department (URBAM) at Universidad EAFIT, and the community-based organization Low Carbon Cities (LCC). Together they combined expertise in urban planning, environmental science, geospatial analysis, and community engagement. Ecocity Builders also led similar projects in Santa Fe, Argentina; Cusco, Peru; and Santiago, Dominican Republic, allowing methods and lessons learned to be shared across several Latin American secondary cities.

Rather than focusing exclusively on transportation or other large infrastructure systems, the 2C Medellín project examined a less visible but equally important component of urban sustainability: the movement of waste and materials through neighborhoods. Material flows influence public health, water quality, flooding, environmental quality, and neighborhood resilience. Understanding where waste originates, how it moves, and where it accumulates provides valuable insight into the functioning of the city as an interconnected system.

Field investigations concentrated on the Boston neighborhood near Medellín’s city center. Although centrally located, Boston reflected many of the environmental conditions found elsewhere across the metropolitan region. Teams documented waste accumulation in streets, parks, and waterways while evaluating existing recycling practices and disposal systems. Quality-of-life surveys gathered information on environmental conditions, neighborhood safety, access to healthcare, and the availability of waste management services.

The research documented six material waste streams - plastics, paper, organics, glass, mixed waste, and used oils - were examined as components of what Ecocity Builders describe as the city’s urban metabolism. Rather than viewing waste simply as a disposal problem, the project analyzed the pathways through which materials moved from source to use, collection, recycling, and disposal. Mapping these flows revealed where infrastructure functioned effectively and where environmental or operational gaps emerged.

One of the project’s most innovative contributions was the application of Ecocity Builders’ Urbinsight methodology. The approach recognized neighborhoods as an important geographic scale that is often overlooked in conventional planning. Although neighborhood boundaries rarely appear on official maps, residents possess detailed knowledge about local environmental conditions, informal pathways, areas of risk, neighborhood boundaries, and places considered safe or unsafe. This vernacular geography provides information unavailable through traditional government datasets.

Community participation was central to the research. Through neighborhood meetings, focus groups, workshops, and citizen mapping activities, residents worked alongside researchers to identify local environmental issues, map material flows, locate recycling centers and waste collection sites, and document how these conditions affected daily life. These collaborative activities transformed local experience into geographic information that could be integrated with remotely sensed imagery and municipal datasets.

Combining these multiple sources of information produced a far richer understanding of the city than any single dataset could provide. Overlaying satellite imagery, community mapping, field surveys, infrastructure inventories, and material-flow analyses revealed where waste accumulation, inadequate services, flood hazards, and vulnerable populations intersect. The resulting maps identified opportunities for improved collection routes, expanded recycling programs, composting facilities, and targeted infrastructure investments while supporting more informed community-based planning decisions.

Infographic collaboratively designed with ChatGPT, M. Laituri, 2026.

Communication formed an equally important part of the process. Maps and infographics translated complex analyses into information that local governments, community organizations, and residents could readily understand and use. Scientific knowledge became a shared public resource rather than remaining within technical reports or government agencies.

Infographics on waste management issues, 2C Medellín teams, 2017.

Perhaps the project’s most important lesson was that resilient cities are built through the integration of multiple ways of knowing. Satellite imagery revealed patterns of urban growth; field investigations documented neighborhood conditions; community mapping captured local experience; and spatial analysis integrated these complementary perspectives into practical planning tools. The combination of scientific analysis, local knowledge, and collaborative partnerships produced a more complete understanding of the city and identified pathways toward greater resilience.

These examples from the Secondary Cities Initiative explain why secondary cities deserve greater international attention. While global discussions focus on the world’s largest metropolitan areas, secondary cities frequently experience the fastest rates of urban growth with fewer financial, technical, and institutional resources to respond. They serve as critical links between rural regions and national economies, absorbing migrants, supporting regional commerce, and confronting the increasingly interconnected challenges of climate change, environmental degradation, public health, and natural hazards. It is within these cities that many of the defining geographic challenges of the twenty-first century are unfolding.

Equally important, the project illustrated the enduring value of science diplomacy. Universities, municipal governments, community organizations, and international partners worked together not simply to exchange technical expertise, but to co-produce knowledge that addressed locally identified priorities. The resulting maps, datasets, and analyses became shared public resources that improve local capacity while creating knowledge that could inform other secondary cities facing similar challenges.

Across partner cities - from Kharkiv and Pemba to Tijuana, Denpasar, Mekelle, Port Harcourt, Bokè-Kamsar, Douala, Santa Fe, and Medellín - the projects revealed different landscapes, cultures, and development trajectories. Yet together they demonstrated remarkably consistent themes: rapid urbanization, migration, environmental change, governance, and human security. The geography differed from city to city, but the value of combining scientific analysis with local knowledge remains.

Much of the public record documenting these collaborations has disappeared. The removal of the Secondary Cities archive from the U.S. Department of State website represents more than the loss of reports, maps, and photographs. It reminds us that scientific knowledge depends not only on research, but also on the institutions that preserve and share it. Knowledge infrastructures are every bit as important as roads, bridges, electrical grids, and communication networks. They preserve institutional memory, support future research, and allow successful ideas developed in one city to inform decisions in another. When these archives disappear, so does part of our collective capacity to learn from experience.

NOTES

https://www.architectmagazine.com/design/building-the-future-how-medellins-social-urbanism-is-blueprinting-urban-revitalization_o

https://prizeforcities.org/project/metrocable

https://www.metrodemedellin.gov.co/en/travel-with-us/maps

https://www.planete-energies.com/en/media/article/medellin-public-transportation-social-change

https://rapidtransition.org/stories/the-medellin-miracle/

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1056819024000216

https://ecocitybuilders.org/participatory-urban-metabolism-medellin-phase-2/

In previous essays, I suggest that outer space is becoming humanity’s newest global commons and that satellite constellations and orbital networks are rapidly evolving into essential infrastructure supporting everyday life. Yet there is another geographic perspective that is equally important. Space exploration is transforming landscapes in two directions simultaneously. It reshapes landscapes on Earth through the construction of launch facilities, manufacturing plants, data centers, energy systems, and transportation networks. Coincidentally, satellites and space exploration fundamentally change how we see landscapes, allowing us to observe Earth and other planets in ways that were once unimaginable.

The geography of space begins and ends on Earth. Ambitious plans for lunar settlements, satellite constellations, artificial intelligence, and missions to Mars depend upon terrestrial landscapes. The terrestrial infrastructure is composed of launch facilities, communications networks, transportation corridors, and skilled labor. The environmental and social consequences of these developments are concentrated in local communities far removed from the excitement surrounding rocket launches and visions of interplanetary civilizations (see the geography of … Elon Musk, June 21, 2026).

The space economy leaves a terrestrial footprint. Launch complexes, satellite production facilities, power plants, and massive data centers create new technological landscapes. These landscapes alter ecosystems, transform local economies, and raise important questions about environmental justice and the relationship between technological innovation and community well-being. Geography reminds us that every activity occurring in orbit depends upon places, people, and landscapes on Earth.

The famous “Blue Marble” photograph taken by the Apollo 17 astronauts in 1972 offered the first complete portrait of Earth floating alone in space. The image became one of the defining symbols of the modern environmental movement, reminding humanity that political boundaries disappear when viewed from space and that our planet is both finite and shared. Thirty years later, NASA’s Blue Marble (2002), produced from observations collected by the Terra satellite, presented Earth as a seamless digital composite rather than a single photograph. Blue Marble: Next Generation (2004) transformed the planet again by portraying seasonal change throughout the year, revealing Earth as a dynamic system rather than a static image. NASA’s Black Marble (2012) shifted attention to the Earth’s night side, mapping the geography of human settlement through patterns of urbanization of night lights. Images from the Artemis II mission (2026) viewed Earth from space, showing a moonlit planet whose illuminated cities remained visible across the dark hemisphere.

These images illustrate changing geographic perspectives. Earth evolved from a single iconic photograph into a continuously monitored, digitally constructed, and analytically interpreted landscape. As our methods of observation changed, so too did our understanding of the planet.

Evolution of the Blue Marble series illustrating geographic perspectives of Earth from a single photograph to continuous observation, digital visualization, and moonlit view of Earth from space. Images from NASA (see text for links) and collaborative designed using ChatGPT, M. Laituri.

Satellites collect enormous volumes of data as part of the modern geospatial revolution, enabling us to observe landscapes far beyond the limits of human vision. Radar, thermal sensors, LiDAR, hyperspectral imaging, and other technologies reveal dimensions of Earth’s surface that cannot be detected by the human eye.

The launch of Landsat in 1972 initiated continuous observation of Earth over time. Satellite imagery has monitored deforestation, urban expansion, seasonal vegetation change, and the growth of informal settlements. Following the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident, satellite imagery and atmospheric data tracked the movement of radioactive contamination across Europe. Nighttime imagery maps the human footprint across the globe while high-resolution commercial imagery documents rapidly expanding cities and changing patterns of urbanization (see the geography of… series on secondary cities (2C) on Substack).

These technologies have progressively changed not simply what we see, but how geography is practiced. Improvements in spatial resolution allow smaller features to be distinguished. Commercial providers such as Maxar and Planet, cloud computing platforms including Google Earth Engine, open-source initiatives (GitHub), and artificial intelligence have dramatically increased both access to satellite imagery and our ability to analyze it. AI increasingly performs image interpretation in orbit before information is transmitted to Earth, identifying environmental change, reducing bandwidth demands, and enabling more rapid responses during disasters.

https://www.earthdata.nasa.gov/learn/earth-observation-data-basics/remote-sensing-resolution.

Remote sensing creates entirely new digital landscapes built from continuous streams of geospatial data. These data reveal processes that are invisible from the ground while allowing landscapes to be monitored historically, compared globally, and analyzed across multiple scales.

This capability is important for humanitarian response and environmental management (see the geography of …humanitarian aid, February 7, 2025; the geography of … conflict and humanitarian aid, July 25, 2025). Satellite imagery documents conflict, mass displacement, destruction of cultural heritage sites, famine, and natural disasters. Organizations such as FEWS NET – the Famine Early Warning Systems Network and UNOSAT – the United Nations Satellite Center rely upon remote sensing to support humanitarian assistance and disaster response. New forms of “destruction data” now document the evolution of conflict across Gaza, Lebanon, Ukraine, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (see the geography of … rubble, October 11, 2025). During recent conflicts, Lebanese villagers reportedly pooled funds to purchase commercial satellite imagery simply to determine whether their homes still existed. From orbit, landscapes become records of both environmental change and human suffering.

Change detection analysis of villages in Southern Lebanon, N. Houssari, June 13, 2026, Arab News, https://www.arabnews.com/node/2646950/middle-east.

The same technologies have transformed our understanding of the broader solar system. Voyager, Mariner, and more recent planetary missions revealed landscapes on Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Mercury, Venus, Mars, and countless moons. Geography is no longer confined to Earth. Planetary landscapes have become objects of scientific investigation, extending geographic inquiry across the solar system.

Color composite of Jupiter captured by Voyager 1, 1979. https://www.planetary.org/articles/voyager-wide-angles-jupiter.

The technologies that create these new ways of seeing landscapes also generate entirely new landscapes on Earth. One of the newest proposals illustrating this relationship is the concept of orbital data centers. Elon Musk has suggested that future generations of Starlink satellites could incorporate artificial intelligence capabilities, creating orbiting data centers powered by solar energy. Although attractive because they may reduce some terrestrial land requirements while increasing computing capacity, the proposal raises important geographic questions.

As discussed previously (see the geography of … cryptocurrency, AI, and cloud computing, February 3, 2025), digital technologies often appear virtual despite depending upon extensive physical infrastructures consuming enormous quantities of energy, water, and land. Relocating some computing capacity into orbit does not eliminate environmental impacts. Instead, it redistributes them into new environments where governance structures remain uncertain.

For the near future, artificial intelligence remains firmly grounded on Earth. Massive terrestrial data centers demonstrate how closely the digital economy and the space economy have become intertwined. Their locations are rarely accidental. Elon Musk’s xAI Colossus facility in Memphis and Meta’s proposed data center in rural Richland Parish, Louisiana illustrate how these infrastructures frequently locate within economically disadvantaged communities where environmental burdens are disproportionately borne by largely Black populations (see the geography of … environmental justice, July 7, 2025). Like Cancer Alley in Louisiana and the Flint Michigan water crisis, these developments reveal that the landscapes supporting digital innovation are landscapes of environmental justice.

Data Centers growth: https://straitsresearch.com/statistic/countries-with-the-most-data-centers, July 2025.

The proposal for orbital data centers illustrates a broader geographic reality. Artificial intelligence, satellites, cloud computing, and national security form interconnected infrastructures operating across multiple scales. On the global scale they drive geopolitical competition. On the national scale they shape industrial and defense policy. Regionally they require expanding energy and transportation systems. Locally they reshape communities, landscapes, and ecosystems.

Starbase offers another example. The construction of launch facilities required extensive landscape modification including drainage systems, launch pads, and fuel storage. Rocket launches generate noise, debris, and habitat disturbance. These examples demonstrate how space exploration reshapes patterns of land ownership, transforms local economies, and changes relationships between people and place.

The geography of space is a geography of power. Who decides where launch facilities are built? Who benefits from technological innovation? Whose landscapes are transformed? These questions echo into longstanding debates surrounding mining, dams, highways, pipelines, and industrial development that have shaped landscapes throughout history.

As discussed previously (see the geography of … the Moon and war, April 8, 2026), expanding human activity into space carries geopolitical implications involving resource extraction, strategic competition, and future settlements beyond Earth. Geography provides an essential framework for understanding these developments because it connects places, people, technologies, and power across multiple scales.

Space is simultaneously a global commons, an increasingly complex infrastructure, and a changing landscape. The landscapes of Earth make space exploration possible, while observations from space fundamentally reshape how humanity understands landscapes on Earth and throughout the solar system.

The future of geography may lie not only in mapping our planet, but in understanding an expanding network of interconnected terrestrial, orbital, and planetary landscapes. As humanity reaches farther into space, the challenge is whether we can pursue exploration while protecting landscapes, communities, and shared environments that make those ambitions possible. The view of Earth from space reminds us that our planet remains our most important landscape.

Infographic collaboratively designed with ChatGPT, M. Laituri, 2026.

NOTES

https://science.nasa.gov/earth/earth-observatory/history-of-the-blue-marble/

https://www.fastcompany.com/90771913/how-satellites-revolutionized-the-way-we-see-and-protect-the-natural-world

https://community.esri.com/t5/esri-young-professionals-network-blog/the-future-of-remote-sensing-seeing-more-doing/ba-p/1680010

https://earth.esa.int/eogateway/news/meet-the-future-of-earth-observation-super-resolution-data

https://maxpolyakov.com/the-commercial-remote-sensing-satellite-market/

https://eo-college.org/resource/the-future-of-remote-sensing-with-artificial-intelligence/

https://un-spider.org/news-and-events/news/social-impact-through-satellite-remote-sensing-%E2%80%93-visualizing-acute-and-chronic

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2950629824000043

https://spaceinsider.tech/2024/08/30/space-infrastructure/.

Many infrastructures such as roads, railways, ports, pipelines, electric transmission lines, fiber optic cables, and water systems support everyday life. They are so embedded in everyday life that their services are often taken for granted. Another form of infrastructure operates overhead. Satellites orbiting above the Earth’s surface are essential to communication, navigation, environmental monitoring, commerce, and national security.

The geography of space operates across scales. Decisions made by governments, private companies, and international partnerships operating in Earth’s orbit affect local communities, while local events increasingly depend upon technologies operating in space. Satellites have transformed the relationship between places and people, creating networks that connect neighborhoods and nations worldwide.

Satellites perform a remarkable range of functions. They provide communication services for radio, television, telephone systems, and the Internet. Earth observation satellites monitor forests, glaciers, oceans, weather systems, agricultural production, and natural disasters using increasingly sophisticated sensors. Navigation satellites underpin global positioning systems that support transportation, emergency response, agriculture, and everyday smartphone applications. Astronomical satellites continue to expand our understanding of the universe.

Different satellites occupy different orbital spaces, visit the eoPortal – Types of Earth Orbits and their Applications for a full description. Some examples include the following:

· Geostationary satellites (GEO), approximately 36,000 kilometers above the Earth, remain fixed relative to a particular location and provide weather forecasting and climate monitoring by observing clouds, water vapor, wind patterns, and solar activity.

· Medium Earth orbit satellites (MEO), typically between 5,000 and 15,000 kilometers above the Earth’s surface, support navigation systems including the United States GPS network, Europe’s Galileo system, Russia’s GLONASS, and China’s BeiDou constellation.

· The most dynamic transformation is taking place much closer to Earth. Low Earth orbit (LEO), generally between 500 and 1,500 kilometers above the planet, has become the center of the Space 2.0 revolution. Advances in rocket technology, miniaturized electronics, and lower launch costs have made possible proliferated low Earth orbit (PLEO) constellations composed of thousands of relatively small satellites working together as integrated networks.

Types of earth orbits: https://www.eoportal.org/other-space-activities/orbit-types#orbitregimes.

At the forefront of this transformation is SpaceX. Elon Musk’s role in orbital infrastructure is two-fold. Starship, coupled with reusable Falcon rockets and Dragon spacecraft, provide lower-cost transportation for astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station while supporting future lunar and Mars missions. Equally significant is Starlink, a vast constellation of satellites intended to provide high-speed internet connectivity across the globe.

Beginning in 2019, Starlink sought to provide affordable internet access to remote and underserved regions. Individual satellites, approximately the size of a small table and weighing about 260 kilograms, orbit roughly 550 kilometers above the Earth. Each satellite has an anticipated lifespan of approximately five years. The long-term vision includes a mega-constellation of 42,000 satellites. As of June 2026, more than 10,000 Starlink satellites orbit the Earth.

The concept is straightforward but transformative. Rather than relying entirely on ground-based infrastructure and fiber optic cables, information can travel through the vacuum of space, faster than terrestrial systems. Consumers access the network through relatively simple equipment consisting of a small satellite dish, router, cables, and power supply. From a geographic perspective, Starlink is reconstructing the spatial architecture of the Internet in orbit.

Starlink Constellation Ground Segment. https://www.eoportal.org/satellite-missions/starlink#ground-segment.

On the global scale, satellite constellations create communication networks that transcend political boundaries. On the national scale, governments must determine regulatory frameworks and integrate these systems into existing infrastructure. At the regional scale, remote communities gain access to education, health care, and commerce. At the local scale, households and businesses gain connectivity that was previously unavailable.

The benefits become particularly evident during emergencies. Starlink case studies demonstrate the usefulness and accessibility of the technology. In 2024, the Tongan government granted Starlink operational approval while maintaining oversight of the system.

In Haiti, Starlink has provided reliable internet access that supports communication, livelihoods, and access to information during periods of instability and disaster. Yet the absence of effective oversight has also encouraged smuggling of Starlink equipment, inflated fees, and criminal enterprises exploiting what should function as a public resource. As discussed in the geography of … the public square (September 7, 2025), digital connectivity increasingly represents another form of the commons requiring thoughtful governance.

In remote regions of Australia, Starlink has become an important resource during floods, heavy rains, and other emergencies. Yet the experience of First Nations communities reveals another aspect of infrastructure geography. Limited supporting infrastructure, high costs, and inadequate technical support create barriers to adoption of this technology. Many households continue to rely upon prepaid mobile phone plans despite slower speeds and inconsistent coverage.

A digital divide emerges not simply between urban and rural areas but within communities themselves. Connectivity has become an essential service, highlighting the need to strengthen what might be termed the local commons. Collaborative approaches demonstrate how public institutions and private companies can work together to improve connectivity while maintaining accountability, as illustrated by the First Nations Digital Inclusion Dashboard.

Starlink Progress Report, 2025, page 41.

The ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine illustrates the dual-use nature of satellite systems. Starlink initially provided emergency communications and connectivity for Ukrainian civilians and government agencies. Military applications soon followed, demonstrating that technologies developed for civilian purposes can rapidly become strategic assets. SpaceX restricted access to Russian forces while concerns emerged regarding unauthorized Starlink terminals reaching the battlefield. These developments illustrate the complex relationship between private companies, governments, and armed conflict. Governance frameworks must evolve to address technologies that simultaneously support humanitarian relief and military operations while respecting international law and human rights.

Another proposed development extends this dual-use concept even further. Starshield represents a militarized version of Starlink with enhanced encryption and security features. Planned for deployment under United States government control and supporting the National Reconnaissance Office, Starshield would expand communications and imaging capabilities while reinforcing the growing relationship between commercial innovation and national security.

The geography of infrastructure creates environmental and governance challenges. Low Earth orbit is becoming increasingly crowded. Space debris, competition for radio frequencies, and light pollution represent emerging concerns requiring international cooperation. Starlink satellites constitute one of the largest contributors of collision risk in low Earth orbit.

Low Earth Orbit with most concentrated orbital debris, February 2024. https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/photo-gallery/.

New satellites increasingly require cradle-to-grave planning. SpaceX incorporates end-of-life deorbiting strategies that direct failed satellites toward Earth’s atmosphere where they burn up. Other objects remain in orbit as space debris. These objects are monitored by the United States Space Surveillance Network to reduce risks to operational satellites and spacecraft.

Many deorbited satellites eventually fall into the Pacific Ocean in an area commonly referred to as the Spacecraft Cemetery. Materials released during atmospheric reentry may alter upper atmospheric chemistry. Aluminum satellites produce aluminum oxide particles that could influence the atmosphere’s ability to reflect heat and potentially affect the ozone layer.

Satellite constellations also contribute to light pollution, complicating astronomical observations from ground-based telescopes. Radio astronomy faces similar challenges as communication frequencies overlap with scientific research.

Starlink satellite “streak” in image of Andromeda galaxy, May 2021, Zwicky Transient Facility, an observational facility to study the night sky. https://www.eoportal.org/satellite-missions/starlink#mission-status.

These unintended consequences remind us that infrastructure is never neutral; it reshapes environments, redistributes risks, and alters landscapes across multiple scales. Satellite constellations create multiple benefits yet generate environmental, political, and social challenges that extend across scales.

The geography of orbital infrastructure demonstrates that the space age must include stewardship, collaboration, and new governance strategies. As discussed in the geography of … space as a global commons, outer space is a shared environment that demands international cooperation. Yet it is also becoming a critical layer of infrastructure upon which everyday life depends.

Collaborative diagram created with ChatGPT, M. Laituri, 2026.

Communications, navigation, disaster response, environmental monitoring, commerce, and national security rely upon networks extending beyond the Earth’s surface. Decisions derived from orbital systems shape opportunities, vulnerabilities, and inequalities on the ground. Understanding space as infrastructure reveals a fundamental geographic reality: the connections between places, people, and environments are no longer confined to the Earth but extend into orbital space.

NOTES

https://www.clarus-networks.com/2024/05/28/the-power-of-starlink-for-humanitarian-efforts/

https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-satellites.html

https://sciencetrek.org/topics/satellites

Executive Order 14369, “Ensuring American Space Superiority,” calls for Americans to return to the Moon by 2028 through the Artemis Program, to establish the initial infrastructure of a permanent lunar base by 2030, and to enable the next steps to Mars exploration. Elon Musk, the world’s first trillionaire, has proposed a self-sustaining colony of one million people on Mars within the next thirty years, developing a permanent settlement on the Moon as steppingstone to Mars (see the geography of … Elon Musk, June 21, 2026).

Space is considered the final frontier, representing a new global common where scientific discovery, commercial enterprise, national security, and geopolitical competition intersect across multiple scales. Decisions made on Earth shape activities in space that reverberate back to local communities, communications systems, environmental impacts, weather forecasting, military operations, and economic opportunities.

Space, the final frontier. https://www.custercountychief.com/news/space-the-final-frontier/article_84c0bc84-2d27-11ec-bf51-63232a2485d6.html,

Geographers have long studied the commons. From shared grazing lands (see Garret Hardin’s Tragedy of the Commons and Elinor Ostrom’s response) to the atmosphere, the oceans, Antarctica (see the geography of … Antarctica, April 13, 2025), and cyberspace, commons are places that transcend traditional political boundaries and require collective stewardship. Outer space represents the most expansive of these shared environments. As humanity extends its reach beyond Earth, the challenge becomes both - how to explore space and how to govern it.

Mars, the “Red Planet,” is the fourth planet from the Sun and the seventh largest in our solar system. About half the size of Earth, Mars has a similar axial tilt of approximately twenty-five degrees, creating distinct seasons. Two small moons orbit the planet. Canyons, volcanoes, and evidence of ancient rivers and lakes reveal a dynamic landscape shaped by geological and climatic processes. The planet’s thin atmosphere consists primarily of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and argon, with temperatures ranging from about 70 degrees Fahrenheit to -225 degrees Fahrenheit.

NASA currently operates five active missions on Mars where robotic explorers investigate the planet’s geology and history. The journey to Mars takes approximately seven months, and evidence collected by these missions suggests that the planet was once warmer and wetter than it is today. Scientists seek evidence of ancient microbial life while simultaneously developing technologies that may someday support human exploration. Learning to drill for rock samples, analyze ancient environments, collect high-resolution imagery, and understand the mineral composition of Mars advances scientific knowledge while expanding technological capabilities.

Curiosity Mars Rover, Active Mission. Launch: November 26, 2011; Mars Landing August 6, 2012. https://science.nasa.gov/mars/.

Mars and the Moon contain many of the same minerals and chemical compounds found on Earth, raising the prospect of future resource extraction. Understanding how these resources might be identified and utilized could open new avenues for economic development beyond our planet. Space tourism, once confined to science fiction, is becoming a commercial reality. Research into weightlessness, low-gravity environments, and the effects of space radiation provides critical information for future exploration.

Science and discovery go hand in hand with technological innovation and international cooperation. Space provides opportunities to understand the origins of the universe and the possibility of life beyond Earth. Numerous space probes, including the Mars Exploration Rovers operating from 2004 to the present, the Hubble Space Telescope deployed in 1990 and repeatedly serviced by astronauts, and the International Space Station constructed between 1998 and 2009, have fundamentally altered our understanding of the cosmos.

Space is both scientific frontier and a tangible geographic space that resembles other global commons. Antarctica, the deep seabed, the atmosphere, and outer space share important characteristics. They lie beyond conventional territorial boundaries, support scientific inquiry, provide resources and services of global importance, and require international cooperation to manage competing interests. Each of these unique environments inspired specific treaties that prioritized the notion of the commons for peace, research, and environmental preservation.

The 1967 United Nations Outer Space Treaty was negotiated during the Cold War and the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union. Its central purpose was to ensure that outer space remained a realm of peaceful exploration rather than military confrontation. The treaty prohibits national claims of sovereignty over celestial bodies, bans the placement of weapons of mass destruction in space, and establishes responsibility for damage caused by space objects.

The Outer Space Treaty mirrors the principles embodied in the Antarctic Treaty of 1959, emphasizing peaceful cooperation and scientific investigation rather than territorial competition and militarization.

Outer Space Treaty status of nations, 2015. Public domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Outer_Space_Treaty_parties.svg.

Other international agreements reflect similar efforts to govern shared environments. The High Seas Treaty, formally known as the Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction Agreement, seeks to protect marine biodiversity in areas beyond national control. The Seabed Arms Control Treaty of 1971 prohibits the placement of nuclear weapons on the ocean floor beyond national coastal waters. The Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963 ended high-altitude nuclear testing because of the dangers posed by radioactive fallout (see the geography of … “Hard Rain,” July 17, 2025).

These agreements recognize a simple but profound geographic reality: some places are too important to belong to any one nation. Their stewardship requires international cooperation because the benefits and risks extend across political boundaries and generations.

Outer space is changing rapidly, potentially becoming contested space. As dependence on space-based infrastructure grows, so too does the strategic importance of controlling access to space and the technologies that operate there. What was once largely the domain of national governments and scientific agencies is an increasingly competitive commercial frontier. Companies such as Elon Musk’s SpaceX, Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin, and Peter Beck’s Rocket Lab are reshaping the economics and geography of space exploration. Private launch systems, commercial satellites, lunar missions, and the prospect of mining asteroids or establishing settlements on the Moon and Mars have blurred the distinction between scientific exploration and commercial enterprise.

Infographic of SpaceTech companies, 2021. https://analytics.dkv.global/spacetech/SpaceTech-Q3-2021-Onepager.pdf.

The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 anticipated private participation by assigning responsibility for commercial activities to national governments. Nations remain accountable for ensuring that private actors comply with international law. Yet the scale and scope of modern commercial space activities were unimaginable in 1967. Commercial launch systems and satellite networks are rarely purely commercial enterprises. Governments increasingly rely on private companies to provide communications, launch capacity, remote sensing, and intelligence capabilities, creating new partnerships between corporations, defense agencies, and national governments.

The emergence of trillionaire entrepreneurs, reusable rocket technologies, satellite mega-constellations, and proposals for permanent human settlements beyond Earth suggest that existing governance structures may require substantial revision. International agreements must balance scientific research, environmental stewardship, commercial innovation, and national security while recognizing that outer space is simultaneously a global common and an increasingly valuable economic frontier.

As humanity looks toward permanent settlements on the Moon and Mars, geography offers an important reminder: frontiers are never empty spaces waiting to be claimed. They are landscapes shaped by relationships among people, resources, and power. Musk’s vision of a self-sustaining Martian colony illustrates both the possibilities and contradictions of contemporary space exploration. The technologies that make such ambitions conceivable raise questions about ownership, governance, and power in a realm that international law has historically treated as a shared commons.

A cooperatively designed graphic using ChatGPT. M. Laituri, 2026.

Space is increasingly becoming a hybrid domain where scientific discovery, commercial investment, national security, and geopolitical competition interact. Governments depend upon private corporations for launch systems, satellite networks, communications, and intelligence capabilities, while corporations rely upon governments for regulation, contracts, and protection. This new space race differs from that of the Cold War. Competition is no longer solely between nation-states but among states, corporations, and some of the wealthiest individuals in history. As economic and environmental transformation extends beyond Earth, the challenge for the twenty-first century will not simply be reaching new worlds but ensuring that the governance of the global commons keeps pace with the expanding geography of human activity. The final frontier will require new agreements, institutions, and forms of international cooperation capable of addressing the unequal distribution of power that increasingly shapes the future of space exploration.

NOTES

https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/ten-events-great-significance-space-exploration-during-twenty-first-centurys

https://www.unoosa.org/oosa/en/ourwork/spacelaw/treaties/status/index.html

https://www.cardozociclr.com/post/exploring-outer-space-the-role-of-private-companies#:~:text=Article%20VI%20of%20OST%20does,non%2Dgovernmental%20entities.%E2%80%9D%5B

History remembers the wealthiest individuals by what they built, the byproducts and the (un)intended consequences of their enterprises . The merchant families of Renaissance Europe, the early industrialists of England, the American railroad barons and oil magnates transformed landscapes across the globe. Their fortunes changed the geography of the places leaving behind a legacy of altered landscapes that continue to shape our world.

Elon Musk is part of this tradition, but on a different scale. His influence extends beyond a single industry or even a single country. The companies he controls manufacture electric vehicles (Tesla), launch rockets (SpaceX), build satellite networks (Starlink), develop artificial intelligence (xAI), and intersect with government and national security (Starshield and Grok). Geography offers a way to think about this concentration of wealth and influence and how it reshapes places and connects distant places. The story of Elon Musk is about how extraordinary wealth and technological innovation is embedded in the geography of the twenty-first century.

One of the most remarkable aspects of Musk’s influence is that it operates across scales. Few individuals in history have exercised this kind of geographic reach, where local landscapes become connected to global infrastructure and where activities on Earth are linked to ambitions that extend to the Moon and Mars. Musk’s enterprises operate across multiple scales and beyond – into space. The geography of Elon Musk is about how power, infrastructure, and influence move across scales.

Comparison of the relative size of the Earth-Mars-Moon. The European Space Agency, 2004. Https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2004/08/Earth_compared_in_size_to_Mars_and_the_Moon.

This story reveals linkages between places that seem disconnected. In Memphis, Tennessee, a massive data center, Colossus was constructed to support Musk’s artificial intelligence company, xAI. The facility represents the physical infrastructure that underpins virtual technologies. Artificial intelligence depends on electricity, water, land, buildings, and transportation networks. It requires servers that generate heat and power systems capable of sustaining enormous computational demands.

As discussed in the geography of … cryptocurrency, AI, and cloud computing (February 3, 2025), digital technologies leave environmental footprints. In Memphis, those footprints have become part of a broader debate about environmental justice. Powered by methane gas turbines, Musk’s facility has generated concerns regarding air quality and public health in surrounding neighborhoods. Powered by methane gas turbines that release nitrogen oxides and poisonous formaldehyde on a continuous basis, the data center’s turbines are unpermitted, and the facility was constructed with limited oversight. Residents and advocacy organizations argue that communities burdened by environmental hazards should not shoulder additional risks associated with technological innovation. The NAACP filed a civil action lawsuit against the xAI data center. But the Department of Defense intervened claiming that the center is critical to national security. The controversy illustrates a geographic pattern in which the benefits of new technologies are widely dispersed while many of the environmental costs remain concentrated in places.

Memphis illustrates the local scale of Musk’s influence. The impacts are experienced by nearby residents and in neighborhoods. Yet the data processed within the facility serves users far beyond Tennessee. The Colossus data center demonstrates how local landscapes become embedded within global technological systems.

Location of xAI data center and public schools in Memphis. https://earthjustice.org/case/xai-illegal-gas-power-plant-data-center-colossus.

Along the Gulf Coast of Texas, near the mouth of the Rio Grande River, wetlands and wildlife refuges share the landscape with rocket launch towers and industrial facilities. Starbase is Musk’s SpaceX headquarters, a commercial spaceport for orbital missions, a launch site, and a company town. The spaceport hosts rocket production and testing capacities with the aim of being the departure point for commercial astronauts and for missions to Mars. Environmental activists are concerned about pollutants and greenhouse gases, noise pollution from rocket launches, and launch debris damaging the marine and terrestrial ecosystems. The spaceport footprint required soil drainage, concrete pads, buildings, a launch tower, and onsite fuel mixing and storage. The water deluge system used to manage wastewater from rocket launches creates toxic wastewater to cool launch pads and rocket engines after testing in violation of the Clean Water Act.

Starbase, Texas – SpaceX company town - is located in southern Texas in the Lower Rio Grande Valley near the mouth of the Rio Grande River on the Gulf Coast. It occupies a 1.5 square mile footprint with a population of approximately 500. SpaceX purchased the existing ranch homes in the small village. Four state and federal wildlife protection areas surround Starbase. During launches, the access road to Boca Chica Beach and Boca Chica State Park is shut down. Access to Boca Chica Beach and State Park is posted on the Starbase city website. SpaceX has provided some employment opportunities, but mainly for custodial jobs.

Starbase, Texas and SpaceX headquarters. 2026 Airbus, © Google Maps.

Boca Chica is a place where different geographies overlap. It is a coastal ecosystem that provides habitat for endangered species; a cultural landscape with deep historical significance to the Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe of Texas and a recreational resource for surrounding Hispanic communities. It is also a launch site for one of the most ambitious technological enterprises ever undertaken by a private company driven by Musk’s priorities. Rocket launches temporarily close roads and beaches while expansion plans involve land exchanges with public agencies responsible for managing wildlife refuges and state parks.

Draft Environmental Assessment: Lower Rio Grande Valley and Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuges Boca Chica Land Exchange, March 2026, pg 3. https://www.fws.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2026-04/draft_ea-sotx-landex-041426.pdf.

The same desire to push beyond existing boundaries has shaped Musk’s work in communications. Starting in 2019, Starlink is SpaceX’s satellite network – a constellation of small satellites providing low-cost internet to remote locations. There are plans to expand the constellation from the current 10,397 satellites to approximately 42,000 dramatically expanding the capacity to connect to the internet.

Starlink enables remote communities to gain access to communication systems that were previously unavailable. Emergency responders can maintain contact during natural disasters such as during flooding and storms in Tonga. Yet these same systems have become entangled in geopolitical conflicts. Starlink has played an important role in the war in Ukraine, demonstrating how civilian communication technologies can rapidly become strategic military assets. The development of Starshield, a more secure version of the system designed for the U.S. government, blurs the distinction between commercial enterprise and national security.

As discussed in the geography of … the public square (September 7, 2025), access to information and communication networks are an essential public resource. The growing influence of private companies over these systems raises important questions about governance and accountability, particularly when infrastructure extends beyond national boundaries. For example, Musk’s role in dismantling USAID reflects his skepticism toward governance and raises broader questions about the balance between private power and the collective good.

The progression from Memphis to Starbase to Starlink reveals a widening geographic footprint. Musk has created an interrelated network of data centers, launch facilities and satellite constellations dependent upon local resources and labor operating at increasingly larger scales.

No project captures the scale of Musk’s ambitions more clearly than his long-standing vision for human settlement beyond Earth. The idea of establishing permanent communities on the Moon and Mars has moved steadily from science fiction toward engineering challenge. President Trump’s inaugural call to plant the Stars and Stripes on Mars and Executive Order 14369 “Ensuring American Space Superiority” calls for human return to the moon by 2028 and the initial phase of the establishment for a permanent lunar base by 2030.

As discussed in the geography of … the Moon and war (April 8, 2026), space is becoming an increasingly important arena for scientific discovery, commercial activity, and geopolitical competition. Musk’s vision of self-sustaining settlements on Mars represents an extension of that process. Throughout history, frontiers have encouraged innovation while also creating new conflicts over resources, governance, and environmental stewardship. Geography reminds us that frontiers are places where human ambitions encounter ecological realities and where competing interests must be negotiated.

What makes Elon Musk unusual is not simply the scale of his wealth but the breadth of his influence across these different landscapes. Artificial intelligence links him to neighborhoods in Memphis. Rocket launches connect him to the wetlands of south Texas. Satellite constellations tie his companies to communities around the world and to military operations in distant conflicts. Plans for the Moon and Mars suggest that his influence may eventually extend beyond Earth.

The technologies of the twenty-first century are creating different landscapes. Data centers, satellite networks, and launch facilities are the infrastructure of a new era. Increasingly, private wealth plays a significant role in determining where these landscapes emerge and how they function, blurring the boundaries between public and private, local, and global, Earth and space.

As discussed in the geography of … extreme wealth (February 6, 2026), the growing concentration of economic power raises important questions about the relationships between governments, corporations, communities, and the environment. Those questions are unlikely to disappear as technological innovation accelerates. They are increasingly significant as artificial intelligence, satellite communications, and space exploration become integrated into everyday life.

Elon Musk provides a lens through which to examine how power and ambition extend across an extraordinary range of landscapes and infrastructures. Geography helps explain a new form of private power that operates across unprecedented scales. It suggests that the defining challenge of the twenty-first century is how societies choose to govern the growing reach of private power across landscapes and the new frontiers we are beginning to explore.

NOTES

https://www.democracynow.org/2026/6/16/elon_musk_south_texas

https://maxpolyakov.com/the-commercial-remote-sensing-satellite-market/

https://www.texastribune.org/2024/04/10/space-x-texas-boca-chica-state-park/

https://www.fws.gov/sites/default/files/documents/2026-04/draft_ea-sotx-landex-041426.pdf

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jun/10/spacex-trump-administration-texas-land-swap

Geography is often associated with landscapes and places, but it is equally the study of power. Few places illustrate this better than Washington, D.C., where boundaries determine citizenship, representation shapes democracy, and monuments define collective memory. The nation’s capital provides a unique lens through which to understand the geographic consequences of decisions embedded in political boundaries, governance, and the symbolic landscapes that commemorate the American past while shaping its future.

Map of location of the Signers Memorial, the National Mall. https://www.nps.gov/coga/planyourvisit/maps.htm.

From 1774 to 1789, the Continental Congress met in several different cities, including Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, which was the capital until 1800. The City of Washington was founded in 1790 on a site selected by President George Washington as a planned city distinct from any state. Importantly, the capital needed to be centrally located between the northern and southern states at the time. Situated along the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers on the eastern seaboard, the federal district occupies a strategic location between Maryland and Virginia.

Map of Washington, D.C., 1795, John Russell. https://uniquemaps.com/.

The boundaries of Washington established a unique political geography that continues to shape debates over citizenship, representation, and federal authority more than two centuries later. The district originally encompassed 100 square miles of land ceded by Maryland and Virginia. In 1846, however, the 31 square miles south of the Potomac River were returned to Virginia. In 1871, the City of Washington and the Territory of Columbia were consolidated into a single governmental entity, the District of Columbia. The truncated diamond shape of the district visible on maps today reflects these historical decisions, leaving Arlington and Alexandria outside the federal district.

Map of District of Columbia and surrounding areas. https://www.alamy.com/terms/us/.

Maps were instrumental in the creation of the capital and instruments of nation-building. In 1791, Pierre L’Enfant, a French engineer, was appointed to design Washington. He studied the urban layouts of London, Madrid, Paris, Amsterdam, Naples, Venice, and Florence. Broad ceremonial avenues, open vistas, and carefully organized public spaces projected the aspirations and authority of the new republic.

Washington became the first meridian for the United States, with alphabetically named streets running north and south and numbered streets running east and west. Grand diagonal avenues named for the states intersect the grid at circles and plazas honoring notable Americans, creating an urban landscape that combines practicality with symbolism. The city is divided into four quadrants and more than 120 neighborhoods, each contributing to the complex geography of the capital.

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/articles/early-capitals-united-states.

The creation of the District of Columbia created a democratic paradox. Once the district ceased to belong to any state, its residents lost voting representation in Congress, the Electoral College, and participation in the constitutional amendment process. Congress retains legislative authority over district affairs, although local government operates under limited home rule, with residents electing a mayor and a thirteen-member council. Congress, however, must approve local legislation and the district’s budget.

The District of Columbia has one non-voting delegate in the House of Representatives and no representation in the Senate. Washington, D.C., is one of six non-voting congressional districts in the House. These delegates serve on committees, speak on the House floor, introduce legislation, and propose amendments, but they cannot vote on final passage of bills.

Data source: https://ballotpedia.org/United_States_congressional_non-voting_members.

In geographic terms, Washington represents a striking contradiction. The political center of the nation occupies the electoral margins of American democracy. Since 1801, residents have sought equal representation. Washington, D.C., has a population of approximately 693,700, larger than several states, and the highest percentage of Black residents of any state-equivalent jurisdiction at 43.4 percent. Residents pay federal taxes, serve in the military, and comply with federal law while lacking full congressional representation. Repeated attempts to grant statehood through the Washington D.C. Admission Act have failed. Similar issues affect Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, where limitations on representation influence elections and raise broader questions about democratic participation and political equity.

https://statehood.dc.gov/page/about-dc-statehood.

The unresolved question of local sovereignty extends beyond elections and taxation. It also shapes who controls public safety and the use of military force within the nation’s capital. In August 2025, President Trump invoked Section 740 of the 1973 Home Rule Act and signed Executive Order 14333, Declaring a Crime Emergency in the District of Columbia, taking control over the Metropolitan Police Department. This action challenged local autonomy and established a precedent for expanded presidential intervention. Following the ambush attack that killed two National Guard members in November 2025, approximately 2,500 National Guard personnel remained deployed in the city. Their continuing presence during the 2026 election season raises concerns about the relationship between military authority, public space, and democratic participation. Because the president exercises direct control over the D.C. National Guard, and because the federal district occupies a unique constitutional position, local officials possess limited authority to resist such deployments.

The debate over local governance continues to evolve. More recently, the president questioned the future of home rule in Washington while commenting on the city’s upcoming mayoral election, stating, “Well, I wouldn’t like it, and maybe we’d take back Washington and run it on a federal basis.”

In April 2026, the “Make D.C. Square Again Act” proposed reversing the 1846 retrocession and restoring the original square configuration of the federal district. Such a move would effectively transform Arlington and Alexandria into parts of the District of Columbia, depriving many Virginia residents of their existing congressional representation. The proposal emerged partly in response to Virginia’s congressional redistricting controversies, although the Virginia Supreme Court subsequently overturned the redistricting amendment.

Landscapes are texts through which societies tell stories. Washington’s monuments, memorials, museums, and public spaces are more than tourist attractions. They are expressions of national identity and collective memory. Washington, D.C., serves as the cultural center of American political life. More than one hundred monuments and memorials commemorate leaders, events, and ideals from the United States and around the world. The National Mall and surrounding landscapes preserve the nation’s history while providing public spaces for reflection and civic engagement. Recent efforts by the Trump administration seek to reshape these symbolic landscapes through executive authority.

· Executive Order 14252, “Making the District of Columbia Safe and Beautiful,” combines public safety initiatives with beautification projects affecting federal buildings, parks, monuments, and roadways.

· Executive Order 14253, “Restoring Truth and Sanity to American History,” specifically targets the Smithsonian Institution. Section 2, Saving Our Smithsonian, directs federal agencies to prohibit exhibitions perceived as degrading shared American values, promoting racial division, or failing to recognize biological sex distinctions.

Founded in 1846, the Smithsonian Institution is the world’s largest museum complex, encompassing twenty-one museums, fourteen education and research centers, and the National Zoo. Financed through the bequest of James Smithson, its mission was “the increase and diffusion of knowledge.” Executive Order 14253 argues that the institution has embraced a divisive, race-centered ideology, resulting in the closure of diversity offices and criticism of exhibits at the American Women’s History Museum, the American Art Museum, and the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

Restoration efforts are underway throughout the National Mall and Memorial Parks. Long-neglected fountains at Meridian Hill Park, Columbus Circle, John Marshall Park, Freedom Plaza, Rawlins Park, and the Korean War Veterans Memorial. The Reflecting Pool has been repainted, and similar improvements have been proposed for the World War II Memorial, although funding sources remain uncertain.

National Mall; Red circle: selected Smithsonian Museums. Public domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NPS_national-mall-3d-map.jpg.

The administration’s initiatives fall into three broad categories: reconfiguring commemorative landscapes, repurposing public spaces, and rebranding symbolic sites of government. Projects include:

· A proposed 250-foot Triumphal Arch near Arlington National Cemetery located at the western end of Memorial bridge near the entry to Arlington National Cemetery. The Arlington Memorial Bridge was designed to commemorate the reunification of North and South after the Civil War linking the Lincoln Memorial in Washington to the Robert E. Lee Memorial in Arlington, Virginia.

· Restoration and regilding of the Arts of War and Arts of Peace sculptures located on Memorial Bridge and Rockway Parkway, respectively.

· Construction of the National Garden of American Heroes in West Potomac Park with plazas and 250 statues of notable Americans. The park currently has mostly sports fields and is near the National Mall and the Potomac River. Two executive orders pertain to this project: EO 13934 – Building and Rebuilding Monuments to American Heros and EO 13978 Building the National Garden of American Heroes.

· The transformation of East Potomac Golf Links into a championship golf course. The East Potomac proposal has generated opposition because of its historical role as an important recreational space for African Americans and because of ongoing legal disputes involving the National Links Trust. Debris from the East Wing demolition of the White House have been dumped on the golf links. Local groups and the D.C. Preservation League have sued the administration for undermining the East Potomac as a public park.

· Additional projects include painting the historic Eisenhower Executive Office Building despite preservation concerns and extensive alterations to the White House grounds, including changes to the Oval Office (the geography of … the Oval Office, March 1, 2025), demolition of the East Wing for a ballroom proposal (the geography of … WTF, October 24, 2025) paving portions of the Rose Garden, and construction of the temporary UFC “Claw” event structure.

Geography and governance intersect through executive authority. Many of these initiatives have been advanced through executive orders, allowing the president to direct federal agencies without new legislation. Executive orders cannot appropriate funds, but they can reshape how federal landscapes are managed, interpreted, and transformed. The costs of these projects are estimated in millions of dollars, and funding mechanisms remain uncertain. In several cases, including the ballroom and the Garden of American Heroes, the administration has explored combinations of public and private financing.

Washington, D.C., has always been more than the seat of the federal government. It is a carefully constructed political landscape where geography, architecture, and memory converge to express national ideals. The city’s boundaries reflect compromises made at the nation’s founding, its residents embody continuing debates over citizenship and representation, and its monuments tell evolving stories about who Americans are and what they value.

The recent assertion of federal authority over the District, proposals to alter its boundaries, and efforts to reshape monuments and public spaces demonstrate that the geography of the capital remains contested. They are attempts to redefine the symbolic and political meaning of the nation’s capital and, in turn, the story Americans tell about themselves.

Washington, D.C., is being rebranded by Trump. The UFC Claw remains in place, looming over the White House. The Kennedy Center has had the Trump name removed, but a tarp remains in place so that no signage can be seen. The United States Institute of Peace has been renamed the Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace. The Departments of Labor and Justice display banners of the president. Individually, these may appear to be isolated changes to buildings and public spaces. Collectively, they reveal how landscapes can become expressions of political authority and instruments for shaping public memory and national identity.

The recent assertion of federal authority over the District, proposals to alter its boundaries, and efforts to reshape monuments and public spaces demonstrate that the geography of the capital remains contested. They are attempts to redefine the symbolic and political meaning of the nation’s capital.

Perhaps, the most fitting place to reflect upon these changes is where this essay began: the quiet Signers’ Memorial in Constitution Gardens. Unlike the towering monuments and grand memorials that dominate much of Washington, the Signers’ Memorial is understated in its design. It does not celebrate a single president, military victory, or larger-than-life hero. Instead, it honors fifty-six individuals who came from different colonies, occupations, religions, and walks of life to undertake the uncertain task of creating a new nation.

They were merchants and farmers, lawyers and physicians, plantation owners, and tradesmen, representing communities scattered along the Colonies. They brought regional interests and competing visions of the future, yet they found common purpose in a shared experiment in self-government. Their signatures symbolized the willingness to forge a nation from diverse places and perspectives.

As the United States approaches its 250th anniversary, the Signers’ Memorial offers a quiet reminder that the strength of the republic has never rested solely in its monuments or the grandeur of its capital. It has rested in the ability of people from different regions, backgrounds, and beliefs to create and sustain common institutions. Washington, D.C., remains the geographic heart of that experiment - a city where boundaries, landscapes, and public spaces continue to reflect the ongoing work of American democracy. In its simplicity, the Signers’ Memorial may carry one of the capital’s most powerful messages: that the nation was built many voices joined together in a common cause.

NOTES

https://www.loc.gov/ghe/cascade/index.html?appid=3084b0ebb9f94436ad8648c48e02284e

https://www.foxessellfaster.com/blog/make-dc-square-again-bill-explained/#:~:text=The%20legislation%20aims%20to%20reverse,made%20nearly%20two%20centuries%20ago.

https://ggwash.org/view/100485/how-the-anacostia-tunnel-system-is-transforming-water-quality-and-river-access-in-dc

https://www.lcv.org/blog/why-d-c-statehood-is-even-more-critical-after-the-supreme-court-gutted-the-voting-rights-act/

https://www.virginiaplaces.org/boundaries/dcboundarypotomac.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2026/01/02/park-service-dc-fountains-budget/

https://boundarystones.weta.org/2020/09/23/whats-name-state-avenues#footnote-1

https://www.arlnow.com/2026/05/06/make-dc-square-again-follows-several-doomed-attempts-to-reunite-arlington-and-d-c/

“This would be the end of American science as we know it.” Cole Donovan, Stand up for Science.

The comment deadline is July 13, 2026. Submit comments here.

This latest proposal represents another step in the ongoing transformation of the American scientific enterprise that were discussed in prior blogs: The geography of … silencing science, May 11, 2025; the geography of … silencing science, part 2, February 17, 2026; and the geography of … silencing science, part 3, May 25, 2026.

At stake is far more than a change in administrative procedures. The proposed rule would reshape the geography of knowledge production in the United States by altering who can conduct research, what topics are studied, how scientific findings are communicated, and whether independent scientific judgment remains insulated from political influence. The impacts are already reverberating across universities, federal agencies, local communities, international collaborations, and the global scientific community.

For more than seventy years, federal research funding has been guided by a system built on peer review, open competition, institutional autonomy, and scientific independence. Research proposals are evaluated by experts in their fields, grants are awarded based on intellectual merit and broader impacts. Scientific inquiry proceeded largely free from direct political intervention. This system has enabled the United States to become a global leader in innovation, medicine, engineering, agriculture, environmental science, and technology.

The proposed rule would fundamentally alter that relationship. Under the new framework, political appointees would participate in grant reviews alongside traditional peer review panels and would have the authority to override scientific recommendations. The rule further states that federally funded grants must “advance the President’s policy priorities,” introducing a political criterion into what has historically been an independent scientific evaluation process.

These changes follow a series of grant terminations, proposed budget reductions, workforce reductions, and restrictions on research programs across federal agencies. The cumulative effect has not simply reduced funding but is a restructuring of the institutions that produce scientific knowledge.

The administration has simultaneously targeted higher education institutions that receive federal research support. Grants have been terminated or reduced across public universities, private universities, liberal arts colleges, and community colleges. Particularly notable is that half of Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and two-thirds of public land-grant universities have been affected, often at rates higher than private institutions.

The implications extend well beyond individual campuses. Research universities serve as economic engines, innovation hubs, and workforce training centers. Reductions in federal support affect local economies, graduate education, scientific discovery, America’s long-term competitiveness and leadership in science.

Federal grant funding to universities and colleges that the Trump administration has targeted for termination, by state and undergraduate and graduate student population, 2025. https://www.americanprogress.org/article/mapping-federal-funding-cuts-to-us-colleges-and-universities/.

At the same time, other nations are actively positioning themselves to attract American researchers. France has established a “Safe Place for Science” initiative and has expanded opportunities for U.S. students and scientists. These developments come at a particularly significant moment as China continues to expand investments in research and development. Over the past twenty-five years, Chinese scientific output, technological innovation, and research capacity have grown dramatically, challenging longstanding American leadership in science and technology.

China’s High-Tech Drive in 10 Charts, S. Kennedy, April 10, 2026. https://www.csis.org/analysis/chinas-high-tech-drive-10-charts.

These developments are occurring alongside broader changes to the federal workforce. The administration has reclassified approximately 8,000 federal positions into categories that effectively function as political appointments, allowing employees to be removed more easily. These positions include senior leadership roles, researchers, and grant managers. The dismantling of civil service protections, the loss of institutional knowledge, the appointment of inexperienced personnel, and the demoralization of the remaining workforce collectively weaken the government’s capacity to fulfill essential governance functions.

Key characteristics of the proposed rule changes:

The proposed changes contain several provisions that would significantly alter federal research funding:

• OMB guidance would become a single regulatory framework governing federal grant programs across all agencies.

• Peer review would be subject to oversight from political appointees who could override scientific recommendations.

• Grants would be required to “advance the President’s policy priorities.”

• Agency leaders could terminate grants at any time and for any reason.

• Grants involving Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives or gender-related research would be prohibited.

• Researchers or institutions with current or past affiliations with designated “anti-American” organizations or countries could become ineligible for funding.

These provisions challenge one of the central foundations of science: peer review. Scientific research depends upon a system in which experts evaluate research proposals, publications, methodologies, and findings to ensure rigor, transparency, innovation, and integrity. While imperfect, peer review remains the cornerstone of modern scientific practice.

The following should be reviewed to understand the broader context:

· EO 14332: Improving Oversight of Federal Grantmaking

· EO 14303: Restoring Gold Standard Science

· Regulations for Federal Financial Assistance; At a minimum read the executive summary.

I recommend the work Elizabeth Ginexi on Substack:

· Summary of Key Changes in OMBs Proposed Federal Financial Assistance Rule. This is an excellent and compelling summary about proposed rule changes that will impact the integrity, innovation, and intellectual merit of science in the United States.

· What We Need to Do Next: A step-by-step guide on how to submit a public comment with the link on where to submit. The Administration Procedure Act requires that OMB respond to every significant comment before finalizing the rule. Individual substantive comments are essential and effective.

The consequences of these changes will be felt across multiple geographic scales.

Nationally, universities are already experiencing disruptions in research funding. NSF has placed future awards on hold for Duke, Harvard, Princeton, and Yale Universities. In 2024, these four institutions received a combined total of 218 new NSF grants. During the current fiscal year, only 13 new grants have been awarded.

The proposed rule would also restrict entire areas of research. Funding limitations involving Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives and gender-related topics would apply across agencies and programs. Public communication and outreach costs would be prohibited unless specifically required by statute, limiting the ability of researchers to communicate findings to policymakers, journalists, and the public.

Particularly concerning is the characterization of climate science, public health research, and equity-related research as forms of “divisive ideology.” Such classifications risk narrowing the scope of inquiry on some of the most pressing challenges facing society.

The implications extend far beyond U.S. borders.

Climate change, infectious diseases, ocean health, biodiversity loss, and disaster management are inherently global challenges. Scientific understanding depends upon international collaboration, shared data systems, coordinated monitoring networks, and cross-border research partnerships.

One example is the NSF Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI), a global network of more than 900 ocean sensors that has collected real-time environmental data for over a decade. The system monitors ocean circulation, marine ecosystems, climate change, and extreme weather. It provides open-access data to researchers worldwide and was designed to operate for decades into the future. The dismantling of such programs weakens not only American science but global scientific capacity.

NSF Ocean Observatories Initiative Sensor Network: ttps://oceanobservatories.org/about-ooi/.

The proposed rules would also reduce international collaboration by restricting federally funded partnerships involving sanctioned countries, designated “covered foreign countries,” or affiliated entities. Because the language is broad, many international research initiatives could become subject to heightened scrutiny or termination. International projects would require individual justification, creating additional barriers to collaboration.

Scientific communication depends on international networks. Conferences, professional society memberships, scientific journals, workshops, and collaborative research initiatives provide the mechanisms through which discoveries are shared, theories are debated, and peer review occurs. These activities require funding for travel, membership dues, publication costs, and collaborative activities. Restricting these opportunities risks isolating American scientists from global scientific discourse.

Locally, the effects may be less visible but equally significant. The National Association of Counties maintains the 2025 Federal Funds Tracker, which documents disruptions to federal funding programs that support county operations. Many of these programs depend directly on scientific research and technical expertise, including:

• Environmental Quality Incentives Program

• Conservation Technical Assistance Program

• Wildfire Hazardous Fuels Management

• Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC)

These programs support communities confronting drought, wildfire, flooding, infrastructure vulnerabilities, and environmental degradation. Reduced scientific capacity translates into reduced community resilience.

Science is made up of laboratories, grants, and technical expertise. Geography reminds us that science is an infrastructure of places, networks, and institutions.

Scientific knowledge is produced through universities, federal laboratories, observing systems, satellites, field stations, climate-monitoring networks, ocean observatories, publications, conferences, and international partnerships. Together these entities form a knowledge infrastructure that enables societies to manage water resources, forecast severe weather, monitor climate change, protect public health, steward public lands, and respond to disasters.

The proposed OMB rule changes are not simply administrative reforms. They represent a fundamental shift in the governance of science.

Researchers, universities, scientific organizations, and advocacy groups have mobilized in response. Among the organizations providing guidance, analysis, and public engagement are:

• Stand Up For Science – https://www.standupforscience.net/

• The Union of Concerned Scientists – https://www.ucs.org/

• 500 Women Scientists – https://500womenscientists.org/

Across disciplines, scientific societies representing geographers, ecologists, physicians, engineers, chemists, meteorologists, and public health researchers have raised concerns regarding the future of scientific independence and research funding.

The July 13, 2026 deadline to submit comments on the proposed rules represents one opportunity for scientists, universities, professional organizations, local governments, and citizens to respond to the proposed rule.

The United States has led the world in scientific discovery because research has been guided by peer review, open competition, institutional autonomy, and the free exchange of ideas. These principles have produced extraordinary advances in medicine, agriculture, engineering, environmental stewardship, disaster management, and technological innovation.

The challenge now is not simply how grants will be managed. It is whether scientific inquiry will continue to be governed primarily by evidence, expertise, and independent evaluation, or whether it will be shaped by political priorities.

The consequences will be geographic in every sense of the word. They will affect universities and laboratories, rural counties and urban communities, climate monitoring systems and ocean observatories, public lands and public health, local resilience, and international cooperation. They will influence who produces knowledge, as well as what and how knowledge is produced and shared.

Once weakened, scientific institutions, monitoring systems, and research networks cannot be rebuilt quickly. The choices made today will shape not only the future geography of science in the United States, but also the nation’s ability to understand and respond to the complex environmental, technological, and social challenges of the twenty-first century.

NOTES

https://progressivereform.org/cpr-blog/the-next-step-in-trumps-war-on-science/

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aej3572

https://www.americanprogress.org/article/mapping-federal-funding-cuts-to-us-colleges-and-universities/

Additional organizations advocating scientific integrity – this is not an exhaustive list:

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS),

https://www.aaas.org/

American Association of Geographers (AAG),

https://www.aag.org/

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM),

https://www.nationalacademies.org/

American Geophysical Union (AGU),

https://www.agu.org/

American Meteorological Society (AMS), https://www.ametsoc.org/ams/

Ecological Society of America (ESA),

https://esa.org/

Association of American Universities (AAU),

https://www.aau.edu/

Council on Governmental Relations (COGR), https://www.cogr.edu/

Scholars at Risk,

https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/

International Science Council (ISC),

https://council.science/

Note: Two previous posts focus on the Trump administration attack on science research: the geography of … silencing science, 11 May 2025; the geography of silencing science, part 2, 17 February 2026.

Science, secrecy, and silence have a complex relationship. We are experiencing an assault upon science of unprecedented proportions in the United States. Efforts to silence science have long been part of the evolution of scientific knowledge. New thoughts and ideas challenge existing philosophies, political systems, economic interests, and religious doctrines. Yet science is also inherently collective, global, and geographic. Scientific ideas emerge from particular places, circulate unevenly across the world, and are shaped by the political and economic structures in which they are embedded. Geography has played a foundational role in the development of science through exploration, discovery, trade, empire, and the circulation of knowledge across cultures.

The geography of science matters because scientific knowledge is never produced outside of place, power, institutions, and political systems. Access to scientific funding, technologies, laboratories, and education is unevenly distributed across the world. The suppression of science has geographic consequences about how hazards are defined, who is exposed to environmental risk and disease, and how public policy will be implemented.

Science is an approach to understanding the world’s phenomena through systematic observation, experimentation, skepticism, and evidence-based inquiry. The European Scientific Revolution of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries heralded a worldview grounded in the scientific method that challenged religious and philosophical doctrines of the time. The theory of a heliocentric universe resulted in claims of heresy against those who proposed such ideas. Copernicus and Galileo had books banned for asserting that the Earth revolved around the Sun. The history of science reveals an evolving process of exploration and discovery rooted in observation and experimentation while embedded within shifting political and societal structures.

Geocentric universe – Ptolemy’s map of the Earth. From Andreas Cellarius Harmonia Macrosmica, 1660. Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cellarius_ptolemaic_system.jpg.

Another example of the clash between science and religion was the Scopes Trial (1925) where creationism and evolution went head-to-head. The trial illuminated emerging fault lines within the United States regarding science, education, and religion. Tennessee’s Butler Act prohibited public schools from denying the biblical account of creation or suggesting that humans had evolved from lower life forms. Although the trial upheld the law banning the teaching of evolution, the decision was overturned in 1968. Debates about creationism and evolution continued through the creationist adoption of “intelligent design,” the idea that “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause.” This culminated in Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District (2005), a landmark case that reaffirmed that intelligent design could not displace science and evolution within public school curricula.

The scientific method, codified by Francis Bacon in the 1620 Novum Organum, did not emerge solely from Europe. Scientific approaches were shaped by discoveries and intellectual traditions from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East (see the geography of the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hammas, March 27, 2025). Modern science was not a singular European invention but rather a culmination of ideas that circulated among cultures and across geographic space.

Selected scientific contributions from around the world. The red circle identifies the Islamic countries. Indigenous peoples are found throughout the world. Selected countries on the African continent reflect the extensive reach of scientific contributions.

The Scientific Revolution cannot be disentangled from the European Age of Exploration, which enabled the cross-fertilization of ideas and discoveries from around the world while simultaneously ushering in colonialism and the subjugation of people and territories. Scientific discovery, colonial expansion, and economic gain became deeply intertwined. Geography was central to this process because exploration created new forms of spatial knowledge and control. The resulting colonial systems often obscured or erased the original sources of scientific and Indigenous knowledge while elevating European claims to discovery and authority.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_map_1750.png. CC 4.0.

Advances in cartography, navigation, and mapmaking transformed the ability to represent and measure the globe. During the Age of Exploration, maps became instruments of state power, scientific control, and economic competition. Geographic knowledge about trade routes, coastlines, and resource-rich territories was treated as a state secret. Many maps were accessible only to government officials and were literally kept under lock and key. The geography of secrecy became part of the geography of empire.

Map of coasts of North and South America, Juan de la Cosa, 1500. The map was kept secret and was only discovered in the 19^th century. Public domain.

Science has always been entangled with politics, religion, economics, disease, and war. Technology and science evolve together; religion and science have frequently maintained antagonistic relationships; and politics and science are deeply connected to conflict and state power. Wartime can accelerate scientific advancement while simultaneously shrouding research in secrecy.

The Manhattan Project exemplifies this relationship. The three-year secret program stretched geographically across London, Montreal, and the United States and culminated in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945. The geography of the project included the secret cities of Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where enriched uranium was created; Los Alamos, New Mexico, where scientists designed the bomb; Hanford, Washington, where plutonium was produced; and the Trinity Site in New Mexico, where the first atomic bomb was tested. The Nevada Test Site later became the location for extensive atmospheric and underground nuclear testing.

These landscapes of secrecy produced another geography: the geography of exposure and sacrifice. Communities living near testing areas became known as “downwinders,” populations exposed to radiation from nuclear tests. The scientific achievements associated with nuclear weapons were accompanied by long-term environmental and public health consequences borne disproportionately by regions and populations. Although atmospheric testing ended in 1992 and the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was passed in 1990, no comprehensive long-term health study of all exposed communities has been undertaken. Scientific silence persists regarding the full human and environmental consequences of nuclear testing. The geography of nuclear science reveals how scientific advancement can distribute risks unevenly across landscapes and populations while secrecy obscures accountability.

Manhattan Project sites. Nevada Test Site: red dot added. https://ethos.lps.library.cmu.edu/article/id/35/

The end of World War II ushered in an era of expanded scientific investment. The National Science Foundation was established (1950), national laboratories proliferated, and universities became major research hubs. By the 1970s and 1980s, scientific research had become deeply embedded within American higher education and federal policy. Prior to World War II, however, corporations often led scientific research at the forefront of technological innovation. Laboratories at GE, DuPont, and AT&T’s Bell Labs were major innovators during the twentieth century.

Yet corporate science was shaped by commercial interests. The tobacco industry provides one of the clearest examples of efforts to undermine peer-reviewed scientific evidence regarding the harm of smoking. Scientific inquiry became entangled within struggles between public health and economic profit. The tobacco industry adopted strategies designed to erode public trust in science by amplifying uncertainty, cultivating skepticism, influencing media narratives, and funding research that challenged established scientific findings. One of the central strengths of science - disciplined skepticism - was used to create confusion and delay regulation.

https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-cancer-deaths-attributed-to-tobacco.

This same approach was later adopted by the oil and gas industry and automobile manufacturers to challenge the link between fossil fuels and climate change. Internal industry documents reveal that companies understood as early as the 1950s that climate change was real and driven by human activities, yet public communications frequently promoted doubt and uncertainty regarding climate science. Economic interests contributed to the silencing and distortion of scientific evidence.

The geography of climate change further illustrates the unequal consequences of suppressing science. Climate impacts are not distributed evenly across the planet. Polar regions, coastal areas, arid lands, and vulnerable urban environments face disproportionate risks. Populations with fewer resources experience the greatest exposure to extreme heat, sea-level rise, drought, pollution, and disaster vulnerability. Silencing climate science becomes not only a political act but an issue of environmental justice.

Warming temperatures, IPCC Working Group I, 2021, UCAR Center for Science Education. https://scied.ucar.edu/learning-zone/climate-change-impacts/regional.

Misinformation and disinformation have become additional mechanisms for undermining science. The COVID-19 pandemic and the current HHS approach to vaccinations have muddied public understanding of the importance of public health. False health information spreads rapidly and can produce profound harm. There are numerous sites that help the concerned public about how best to identify disinformation. The pandemic exposed both the strengths and limitations of scientific communication during periods of uncertainty. Scientists, public officials, and health practitioners were forced to make decisions in real time while knowledge about the virus evolved rapidly (see the geography of … hantavirus and COVID-19, May 10, 2026).

Scientific uncertainty is a normal part of inquiry; however, misinformation creates uncertainty and erodes trust in expertise and institutions. Vaccines remain among the most effective public health interventions ever developed, yet vaccine hesitancy has become a global challenge shaped by misinformation, political polarization, distrust, and unequal access to healthcare systems. U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Department made changes to about vaccine guidance for childhood vaccinations. Declining vaccination rates represent not only a public health problem but also a failure to communicate the tangible benefits of science to the public.

The World Health Organization has documented declining vaccine coverage that has not returned to pre-pandemic levels. Vaccination programs have been disrupted by conflict, disasters, vaccine hesitancy, and political instability. These challenges are compounded by the dismantling of USAID, the U.S. withdrawal from WHO, and the retreat from Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. The geography of public health is increasingly fragmented at the very moment when global cooperation is most necessary.

https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/tracking-vaccination-coverage-shortfalls.

Science is not a belief system; it is a structured process for understanding phenomena through evidence-based inquiry. The twenty-first century has ushered in extraordinary scientific and technological breakthroughs, including advances in medicine, fusion research, astronomy, biotechnology, and artificial intelligence (AI). These developments are reshaping every branch of science and accelerating the production of knowledge at unprecedented scales.

Yet scientific advancement depends upon institutions, funding systems, educational infrastructures, open data, public trust, and international collaboration. The erosion of these systems has profound long-term consequences. Silencing Science Tracker was created to document efforts since 2016 to suppress or distort scientific information at federal, state, and local levels. These actions include censorship of scientific findings, self-censorship among researchers, budget cuts, dismantling of scientific institutions, restrictions on research methods, interference with education, and deliberate misrepresentation of scientific evidence.

Similarly, the Partnership for Public Service has documented the dismantling of the federal scientific landscape through the Federal Harms Tracker. The tracker identifies disruptions across biomedical research, public health, food and agriculture, environmental management, public lands, and scientific innovation. These efforts extend beyond individual policies; they represent transformations in the infrastructure of science itself.

Science has always been contested, imperfect, and shaped by systems of power. Yet science remains essential to addressing the complex environmental, technological, and social challenges of the twenty-first century. The United States has long served as a global leader in scientific research, standards, and evidence-based policy through its universities, laboratories, public agencies, and international collaborations. The weakening of these institutions represents more than a budgetary or administrative shift; it is a restructuring of the scientific landscape and a narrowing of the nation’s capacity to understand and respond to emerging crises.

The consequences are already visible across the geography of American science. These include the dismantling of major climate and atmospheric research programs centered in Boulder, Colorado; the firing of members of the National Science Board overseeing the National Science Foundation (NSF); the elimination of personnel and research bureaus within NSF; changes to FDA guidelines allowing certain nicotine-based products to enter the market before full regulatory vetting; and reductions in force and closures of Forest Service Research Labs responsible for research on critical public lands (see the geography of … American public lands, June 24, 2025). These changes weaken the institutional infrastructures that support climate science, public health, environmental stewardship, and long-term scientific innovation.

The silencing of science is not simply about censorship or political disagreement. It is also about the erosion of the institutions, data systems, expertise, and collaborative networks that sustain scientific inquiry over generations. The impacts will unfold unevenly across places and populations, shaping who benefits from scientific advances and who becomes increasingly vulnerable to environmental hazards, health crises, and economic instability. Geography reveals that the loss of science is never abstract; it is experienced materially across landscapes, communities, and everyday lives.

And there is artificial intelligence (AI), rapidly emerging as a transformative force that may fundamentally reshape the praxis of science. AI has the potential to accelerate discovery, expand analytical capacity, and deepen scientific understanding at scales previously unimaginable. Yet it also carries the capacity to amplify misinformation, reproduce inequalities, centralize technological power, and further destabilize public trust in expertise and evidence. The geography of AI - who controls it, who benefits, whose knowledge is incorporated, and who is excluded - will profoundly influence the future of science and society. That geography will become part of another blog - soon.

NOTES

N. Enrich. Into the wood chipper: A whistleblower’s account of how the Trump administration shredded USAID. 2026. NY: Summit Books.

M. Lewis. The Fifth Risk. 2018. NY: Norton & Co.

M. Lewis. Who is government? The untold story of public service. 2025. NY: Riverhead Books.

M. Mann & P. Hotez. Science under siege: How to fight the five most powerful forces that threaten our world. 2025. NY: PublicAffairs.

https://silencingscience.org/

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8793038/pdf/main.pdf

https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/cost-trump-administrations-attacks-research-funding

https://eos.org/research-and-developments/science-agencies-shuttered-in-government-shutdown

https://www.aip.org/fyi/agencies-closing-science-advisory-committees

https://theconversation.com/self-censorship-more-stress-tougher-recruiting-we-asked-us-researchers-how-the-trump-administrations-science-policies-have-affected-them-280968

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.276.5321.1951

https://www.nber.org/papers/w34694

https://policylabs.frontiersin.org/content/commentary-what-is-science-and-who-is-a-scientist-in-the-21st-century

https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/science/causes-effects-climate-change

https://www.nature.com/immersive/d41586-019-01124-7/index.html

https://asm.org/articles/2025/november/indigenous-knowledge-connecting-data,-land-and-sto

https://www.who.int/teams/health-promotion/tobacco-control/global-tobacco-report-2025

Taiwan, or the Republic of China (ROC), represents the complex geography of the intersection of location, history, politics, and power. Taiwan occupies a strategic geographic position in the Western Pacific off the southeastern coast of China and near key U.S. allies and partners, including Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines. Critical waterways surround Taiwan, including the Taiwan Strait, the Luzon Strait, and the East and South China Seas. These maritime corridors are among the most strategically important shipping routes in the world and are central to military, commercial, and geopolitical interests throughout East Asia.

Taiwan’s physical geography is equally significant. The island is mountainous, with a rugged eastern spine that covers approximately 60% of the island. More than 258 peaks rise above 3,000 meters (9,842 feet), creating dramatic terrain that has historically shaped settlement, transportation, agriculture, and defense. The flatter western lowlands contain the majority of Taiwan’s urban development, transportation infrastructure, ports, industries, and agricultural lands, including rice paddies and terraced farming systems. Approximately 23.3 million people live in Taiwan, with 15 million concentrated in the major western cities and coastal lowlands. Taiwan is one of the most densely populated places in the world, with approximately 658 people per square kilometer and 78% of the population living in urban areas. This geography would make Taiwan an extraordinarily difficult conflict zone should China attempt an invasion.

https://www.tcml-mandarin.org/feature-story/unveiling-taiwans-geography

Taiwan is the main island and is part of a broader island chain extending along the eastern coast of China. In addition to the main island, the ROC administers 168 islands, including the Penghu archipelago and the islands of Kinmen and Matsu located near the Chinese mainland. These outlying islands hold strategic military importance and form part of the broader geography of deterrence and regional security in the Western Pacific. Taiwan’s location is also central to the “first island chain,” a geopolitical and military concept describing the arc of islands stretching from Japan through Taiwan and the Philippines, that has become increasingly important in both U.S. and Chinese strategic planning.

The name Taiwan reflects the multicultural and layered historical development of the island. Taiwan’s population is composed of Indigenous peoples, Han Chinese migrants, and colonial settlers. Indigenous Austronesian peoples inhabited the island before Han Chinese merchants, the Dutch East India Company, and the Spanish established settlements during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Portuguese sailors referred to the island as Formosa, meaning “Beautiful Isle.” The Dutch East India Company later established a colony that attracted large numbers of Chinese laborers and settlers. Over centuries, the interaction and mingling of Indigenous, Chinese, European, and later Japanese influences contributed to the cultural and linguistic complexity of Taiwan.

The island’s naming also reflects its contested political status. Following World War II, the name Taiwan became widely adopted internationally, although other names continue to carry political significance. These include the Republic of China (ROC), Nationalist China, and Chinese Taipei, the latter used in international sporting events and organizations where Taiwan’s sovereign status is diplomatically sensitive. The People’s Republic of China (PRC) strongly prefers the term Chinese Taipei rather than Taiwan, reflecting its insistence that Taiwan is part of a single Chinese nation.

The combination of Dutch, Indigenous, and Chinese language resulted in the name Taiwan. https://islandfolklore.com/taiwan-names-formosa/.

Taiwan’s political and historical development reflects the strategic importance of its location as a regional crossroads. In 1683, the Qing Dynasty took control of parts of Taiwan, and in 1885 Taiwan formally became a province of the Qing Empire. Following the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895), Taiwan was ceded to Japan and remained a Japanese colony for fifty years. During this period, Japan developed transportation systems, urban infrastructure, and industrial agriculture that transformed the island’s economy and landscape.

The Chinese Revolution of 1911 overthrew the Qing Empire and established the Republic of China (ROC). At the end of World War II in 1945, Taiwan returned to Chinese control. However, the Chinese Civil War dramatically altered Taiwan’s political future. In 1949, the Chinese Communist Party established the People’s Republic of China (PRC) on the mainland, while the nationalist government of the Republic of China fled to Taiwan along with more than one million soldiers, officials, and civilians. These events created political conditions that continue to shape the Taiwan issue today.

The civil war produced competing claims over sovereignty that remain unresolved. The PRC claims Taiwan as part of China because the ROC lost the civil war and argues that reunification is inevitable. Taiwan, meanwhile, historically maintained that the PRC was an illegitimate government occupying mainland China. Over time, however, Taiwan has developed a distinct political identity, democratic system, and increasingly separate sense of nationhood. Polling indicates that many residents now identify primarily as Taiwanese rather than Chinese, reflecting evolving generational and political changes on the island.

Both the PRC and ROC historically asserted that there is only “one China,” leading to intense pressure on the international community to recognize only one legitimate Chinese government. The PRC adopted the “One China” policy and refuses to accept Taiwan’s sovereignty or independence. Taiwan retains the official name Republic of China, although its international diplomatic space has narrowed significantly. In 1971, the United Nations passed Resolution 2758 recognizing the PRC as the sole legitimate representative of China, leading the ROC to withdraw from the United Nations. As of 2026, only thirteen UN member states and Vatican City formally recognize Taiwan as a sovereign state.

Despite diplomatic isolation, Taiwan has maintained substantial international economic and cultural relationships. Taiwan joined the World Trade Organization in 2002, and in 2015 the leaders of the ROC and PRC met for the first time in sixty-six years. Taiwan has also become globally important economically, particularly through its dominance in semiconductor manufacturing. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company produces a large share of the world’s advanced semiconductors, making Taiwan central to global technology supply chains and increasing the island’s strategic significance far beyond East Asia.

https://www.iiss.org/charting-china/2025/01/varying-national-approaches-to-the-recognition-of-taiwan/.

Relations between the United States, Taiwan, and the PRC are characterized by strategic ambiguity and carefully managed diplomatic language. In 1979, the U.S.–PRC Joint Communiqué shifted diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing, recognizing the PRC as the sole legal government of China while acknowledging the Chinese position that Taiwan is part of China. At the same time, the United States maintained unofficial relations with Taiwan through the American Institute in Taiwan.

This diplomatic framework was intentionally flexible and “malleable,” enabling both the United States and China to pursue differing priorities while avoiding direct confrontation. The PRC expects eventual peaceful reunification, while the United States seeks to maintain stability and security in East Asia without explicitly endorsing Taiwanese independence. The unresolved issue of arms sales to Taiwan is a continuing source of tension between Washington and Beijing.

Although the United States does not formally recognize Taiwan diplomatically, it maintains strong unofficial economic, political, and military relationships with the island. Taiwan is one of the United States’ largest trading partners and an important democratic ally in the region. Under the Taiwan Relations Act, the United States is committed to providing Taiwan with defensive weapons and services sufficient to maintain self-defense capabilities and preserve Taiwan’s social and economic systems. Arms transfers, military training activities, and defense dialogues have become central elements of U.S.–Taiwan relations. Between 2015 and 2025, approximately $39 billion in U.S. foreign military sales were approved for Taiwan. In 2025, the Trump administration announced plans for an additional $14.1 billion weapons package, the largest U.S. arms sale to Taiwan to date.

At the same time, the PRC has intensified pressure on Taiwan. Although China continues to state that peaceful reunification is its preferred outcome, Beijing has repeatedly refused to renounce the use of force. In recent years, the PRC has increased large-scale military exercises, naval patrols, drone incursions, and air operations around Taiwan. Chinese military activities increasingly simulate blockade and invasion scenarios designed to pressure Taiwan psychologically, politically, and militarily. Taiwan has responded by strengthening civil defense systems, extending military preparedness programs, and deploying rocket and missile systems to outlying islands to create defensive zones intended to deter invasion.

https://www.aei.org/articles/china-taiwan-update-may-15-2026/.

The Taiwan issue has also become increasingly central to the broader geopolitical competition between the United States and China. In May 2026, a summit between President Trump and President Xi underscored the growing tensions surrounding Taiwan. Trump characterized a potential multi-billion-dollar weapons sale to Taiwan as a “negotiating chip” and continues to temporarily delay the sale. The implications of this position remain unclear, but the possibility of withholding military support raised questions about the long-term reliability of U.S. commitments to Taiwan and to broader East Asian security relationships.

Three key issues emerge from this evolving U.S.–China relationship. First, President Xi’s warning to the United States regarding Taiwan was unusually direct and reflected China’s increasing confidence and global influence. The warning highlighted Taiwan’s significant role in China’s geopolitical ambitions and demonstrated the seriousness with which Beijing views external involvement in the Taiwan Strait.

Second, uncertainty regarding U.S. policy toward Taiwan signals potential changes in the post–World War II security architecture in East Asia. For decades, U.S. support for Taiwan and regional allies formed a cornerstone of stability in the Pacific region. Any weakening of these relationships could significantly alter regional power dynamics and reshape future alliances and partnerships throughout East Asia.

Third, the Taiwan issue intersects with broader concerns regarding human rights and global governance. China’s treatment of the Uyghurs in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region represents one of the most significant contemporary human rights crises. Since 2016, the Chinese government has subjected Uyghurs to mass detention, imprisonment, surveillance, forced labor, and cultural suppression. During Trump’s first administration, the United States imposed sanctions on Chinese officials, restricted imports linked to forced labor and formally declared China’s actions against the Uyghurs to constitute genocide. Yet international attention to these issues has faded as China’s economic and political influence has expanded globally. Increasingly, strategic and economic interests override human rights concerns, reflecting shifting geographies of power and influence in the international system.

Taiwan illustrates the geography of contested sovereignty in the twenty-first century. Its strategic location at the center of the Western Pacific places the island at the intersection of maritime trade, military power, democratic governance, and great-power rivalry. Geography is central to Taiwan’s significance. The island anchors critical sea lanes linking Northeast and Southeast Asia, while its mountainous terrain, dense urban corridors, and surrounding island chains create both defensive advantages and vulnerabilities in the event of conflict. Taiwan is not simply an island adjacent to China; it is a geopolitical location between competing visions of regional and global order.

The tensions surrounding Taiwan are deeply historical, rooted in colonialism, civil war, migration, and shifting international recognition. Yet the issue is also profoundly contemporary. China’s growing economic and military power is reshaping global relationships and altering long-standing assumptions about the balance of power in East Asia. Uncertainty surrounding U.S. commitments to allies and partners raises new questions about the durability of the post–World War II security architecture in the Pacific region.

Taiwan represents a broader ideological geography. The island has evolved into a vibrant democracy with distinct political and cultural identities shaped by Indigenous histories, Chinese migration, Japanese colonialism, and global economic integration. Increasingly, many residents identify as Taiwanese rather than Chinese, reflecting the emergence of a separate civic and political identity that complicates Beijing’s narrative of reunification. Yet the risks associated with a formal declaration of independence remain high given the PRC’s repeated threats to use force.

Taiwan is more than a diplomatic dispute between the United States and China. It is a geographic flashpoint where questions of democracy, sovereignty, security, identity, technology, and global power converge. The future of Taiwan will influence not only East Asia, but also the broader geopolitical landscape of the twenty-first century. Geography matters profoundly: the island’s location, physical terrain, political history, and strategic relationships combine to make Taiwan one of the most consequential places today.

NOTES

http://twgeog.ntnugeog.org/en/general/

https://www.stimson.org/2025/taiwan-up-close-why-geography-complicates-invasion/

https://www.tcml-mandarin.org/feature-story/unveiling-taiwans-geography

https://www.taiwan.gov.tw/content_3.php

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-that-recognize-taiwan

https://guidetotaipei.com/article/what-is-chinese-taipei#:~:text=The%20choice%20to%20use%20%22Chinese,or%20Chinese%20culture%20and%20nation.

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-that-recognize-taiwan

A cruise ship passed through multiple ports where passengers disembarked prior to the deaths of three passengers due to hantavirus. Hantavirus is usually transmitted through inhalation of contaminated particles from infected rodents; however, the Andes virus associated with the cruise ship can spread between people. Hantavirus does not pose the same outbreak risk as SARS or COVID-19 according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control. Nevertheless, the outbreak is a reminder that changing environmental conditions, evolving epidemiological patterns, and shifting exposure scenarios continue to reshape the geography of disease risk.

Douglas, et al., 2022. Influence of climatic factors on human hantavirus infections in Latin America and the Caribbean: A systematic review. Pathogens,11(1), 15, https://doi.org/10.3390/pathogens11010015.

Agricultural expansion, rainfall variability, and land use alters rodent habitats and increases the likelihood of human exposure. Global mobility systems, including cruise ship tourism and international travel, create new pathways for disease transmission. The incubation period for hantavirus is one to six weeks, meaning symptoms may develop far from the site of exposure, obscuring transmission pathways and complicating public health responses. While hantavirus differs significantly from COVID-19, both diseases reveal how environmental change, human mobility, and uneven public health systems create shifting and interconnected geographies of vulnerability.

We are reminded of the COVID-19 pandemic. Geography is central to the COVID-19 story, the underlying science of pandemic exposure and spread, and the profound inequalities revealed around the world. The pandemic demonstrated the geography of scale - from global mobility systems to local neighborhoods and even molecular interactions within the virus. A global pandemic was declared on March 11, 2020, and downgraded to a global health threat on May 5, 2023. According to the World Health Organization, in April 2026 there were 653 deaths due to COVID-19, with 524 occurring in the United States. The pandemic represented a significant moment when the world came together to address a global problem, and collaborative science played a critical role.

WHO appointed COVID-19 laboratories, 2020. https://www.who.int/groups/who-coronavirus-network.

The total global deaths due to COVID-19 since the pandemic was declared exceed seven million people. A highly contagious disease, the rapid transmission of the virus resulted in immediate first-order impacts including increasing numbers of cases and fatalities, stressed hospital capacity, and government responses in the form of border restrictions, lockdowns, quarantines, and public health guidance. The rapid development and dissemination of COVID-19 vaccines demonstrated both the capacity of global scientific cooperation and the persistent inequalities surrounding access to public health resources.

Hotez, et al. Global public health security, and justice for vaccines and therapeutics in the COVID-19 pandemic. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eclinm.2021.101053.

The worldwide scale of second-order impacts soon became evident, including a global economic crisis affecting all aspects of society while exacerbating chronic conditions of food insecurity, limited access to healthcare, and loss of livelihoods. The rapid spread of the virus exposed the spatial vulnerabilities of urban systems, particularly densely populated areas characterized by social inequality, informal housing, and uneven access to healthcare. Efforts to contain the virus focused on vaccine development and public health measures such as quarantine, social distancing, and school closures. Geospatial data became essential for characterizing and tracking the virus through dashboards, mobility analysis, and contact tracing.

Johns Hopkins University (JHU) COVID-19 Dashboard, November 1, 2020. Note: JHU stopped collecting data on March 10, 2023. https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html.

Building on the U.S. Department of State’s Secondary Cities (2C) Initiative, a global network of geospatial partners, the Cities’ COVID Mitigation and Mapping (C2M2) program was launched to address the long-term secondary impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. (2C cities stories are highlighted throughout this blog series - see the geography of … Santa Fe, Argentina for links to past 2C posts). Using geospatial tools, the virtual pandemic traced the consequential geography of places impacted by COVID-19 through maps and dashboards. The 2C Initiative identified geospatial experts from partner countries to generate baseline geospatial data in under-examined secondary cities for emergency preparedness, human security, and resilience. These experts formed the basis of the C2M2 regional hubs in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The C2M2 Program focused on vulnerable urban populations in lower- and middle-income countries related to economic disruption, school closures, domestic violence, and access to food and water security.

COVID Mapping and Mitigation Program (C2M2) – 3 regional hubs, 12 partner cities, 10 countries, 2021.

NOTE: The C2M2 Program was implemented by the U.S. Department of State’s Office of the Geographer and Global Issues and was part of the MapGive Initiative that enabled the creation of open geographic data to support humanitarian relief and development programs. The U.S. Department of State websites that described and supported these efforts are no longer online and no archived versions can be found.

The C2M2 Project revealed different outcomes across the three regional hubs. The Africa Hub, focusing on the cities of Bukavu, Democratic Republic of Congo; Nairobi, Kenya; and Pemba, Mozambique examined second-order impacts concerning access to education, water, and health services. Field mappers collected data to assess the distribution of healthcare centers in Bukavu, schools with access to remote learning facilities in Pemba, and water access points in Nairobi’s informal settlements.

Waterpoints by type and ownership and mobile locational app. J. Kim, et al., 2022. An examination of water, sanitation, and hygiene accessibility and opportunity in urban informal settlements during the COVID-19 pandemic: Evidence from Nairobi, Kenya. DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.153398.

The Asia Hub included Kathmandu, Nepal; Dhaka, Bangladesh; and Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Like the Nairobi project, the Ulaanbaatar effort examined access to healthcare services in the surrounding ger communities (informal settlements on the margins of Ulaanbaatar) where transportation networks were necessary to reach medical facilities. Kathmandu experienced severe social and economic impacts due to the collapse of tourism, while Dhaka experienced significant reverse internal migration as workers returned to rural villages.

Tourism and COVID-19 in Nepal, 2021. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/e5727482aa3c431e8c001b97a5c81934.

Issues of tourism loss and migration were also evident in the Latin America Hub cities of Santa Cruz and Quito, Ecuador; Cusco and Lima, Peru; Ouro Preto, Brazil; and Santiago, Chile. Other second-order impacts included changing geographies of crime and domestic violence. Gang-related violence, property crime, and burglaries increased in peripheral areas rather than city centers, while reported domestic violence declined during lockdowns and mobility restrictions likely reflecting reduced access to reporting systems rather than a reduction in actual violence events.

Heat map of location of domestic violence events in Quito, Ecuador. 2022. C. Mena, et al., https://research.usfq.edu.ec/en/publications/covid-19-and-domestic-violence-complaints-in-quito-ecuador-tempor/.

Beyond the immediate health crisis, COVID-19 also transformed everyday spatial practices and social relationships. In April 2020, Julio Vincent Gambuto framed this shared experience as “The Great Pause.” He wrote:

“The crisis has given us a once-in-a-lifetime chance to see ourselves and our country in the plainest way. At no other time, ever in our lives, have we gotten the opportunity to see what would happen if the world simply stopped.”

The Great Pause enabled reflection on the limitations of a globalized economy and the inequalities exposed by the pandemic. Researchers examining the impacts of reduced human mobility and wildlife activity proposed the term Anthropause. The changes were at first subtle - the silence of empty streets accompanied by intensified birdsong, clearer skies due to reduced traffic, and quieter urban environments. The Great Pause transformed everyday geography as people rediscovered neighborhoods and local communities. Social distancing “shrunk everyone’s physical world into an extremely local space.” COVID-19 created a highly circumscribed geography in daily life manifested through stay-at-home orders, quarantine, and altered patterns of mobility.

The pandemic also transformed the geography of work. Questions about “where I work” evolved into broader reflections on “why do I live here?” Newly remote workers, primarily white-collar employees, reconsidered their relationship to place as teleworking and virtual communication expanded. Some chose to relocate closer to family or smaller communities rather than remain tied to traditional urban employment centers (see the geography of … RTO, December 18, 2025).

Global COVID-19 Emergency Response by selected countries. https://data2.unhcr.org/en/situations/covid-19#_ga=2.891038 96.2058851336.1599778234-65635711.1599778234.

Lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic require reflection and assessment that were never fully undertaken. Importantly, short-term programs cannot address long-term structural problems. The C2M2 program continued to develop a global geospatial network based on the 2C Initiative, but issues of continuity and sustainability remain. Long-term funding and institutional support are essential to sustain these networks and address crucial geographic data gaps on scale.

Place-based projects illuminated the importance of geography and demonstrated how geospatial approaches can address local needs when investments are made in long-term data development and local expertise. Various locations possess distinct cultural, political, and economic conditions requiring tailored approaches rather than universal solutions. Vulnerable populations in both formal and informal urban environments face unique challenges that demand participatory approaches capable of amplifying local priorities and lived experiences. Partnerships among governments, universities, NGOs, technology companies, and community organizations can leverage resources, strengthen networks, and expand opportunities for local participation. Connections with organizations such as CDC regional offices, NASA’s SERVIR program, U.S. Embassies, YouthMappers, and the geospatial technology industry can strengthen awareness, collaboration, and local capacity building.

However, responses to COVID-19 became deeply politicized, raising questions about public health policy, scientific expertise, and vaccine safety. The geography of infectious disease is increasingly shaped by the intersection of environmental change, global mobility, urban vulnerability, and political fragmentation. The hantavirus cluster linked to cruise ship travel is not simply an isolated epidemiological event; it reflects broader shifts in ecological conditions, human movement, and weakened public health coordination that continue to redefine patterns of disease risk. COVID-19 demonstrated both the extraordinary capacity of collaborative international science and the profound inequalities embedded within global health systems.

Yet many of the lessons of the pandemic remain only partially addressed. The politicization of public health responses, attacks on scientific expertise, and erosion of trust in vaccines and health institutions have weakened preparedness for future outbreaks. Under the current conditions of the Trump administration, the CDC has lost significant expertise, scientific capacity has been reduced, and the United States has withdrawn from the World Health Organization. These developments occur precisely at a moment when emerging diseases, climate change, migration, and environmental disruption require stronger global cooperation rather than fragmentation.

The dismantling or disappearance of collaborative programs and archives associated with initiatives such as 2C and C2M2 also reveals the fragility of knowledge infrastructures themselves. Geography reminds us that disease outbreaks are never purely biological events; they are shaped by uneven landscapes of exposure, governance, infrastructure, and power. Future preparedness depends upon sustained international partnerships, open scientific collaboration, geospatial data sharing, and long-term investments in local capacity building. International health organizations increasingly occupy a critical role in coordinating surveillance, communication, and response across borders in a world where the geographies of disease are becoming more interconnected, unpredictable, and politically contested.

NOTES

M. Laituri, et al., 2022. The Geographies of COVID-19: Geospatial Stories of a Global Pandemic. Springer Nature Switzerland.

Javier Milei was elected President of Argentina in 2023. He has been called the “Argentine Trump,” advancing an agenda as an anti-establishment outsider. The restructuring of the Argentine government has resulted in the rollback of climate and environmental policies. The Climate Action Tracker rates Argentina’s climate targets and policies as “critically insufficient.”

Aside: On February 7, 2025, I wrote “The geography of … humanitarian aid” describing the U.S. Department of State’s Secondary Cities (2C) Initiative, a program that demonstrated the role of science in diplomacy. The 2C Initiative focused on rapidly growing, under-examined cities to strengthen emergency preparedness, human security, and resilience through geospatial technologies and data-driven decision-making. The data collected were once hosted on the State Department’s website - a digital archive of collaboration among scientists, universities, and local governments. That archive is gone. The disappearance is an example of digital erasure and a reminder that knowledge infrastructures are political geographies. When institutional priorities shift, scientific collaboration and public knowledge can disappear from public space.

Other essays in this series have reflected on partner cities that include 2C partner city Kharkiv Ukraine (February 23, 2025), 2C partner city Pemba, Mozambique (March 24, 2025), 2C partner city Tijuana, Mexico (May 4, 2025),and 2C partner city Denpasar, Indonesia (June 3, 2025), 2C partner city Mekelle, Ethiopia (August 2, 2025), 2C partner city Port Harcourt, Nigeria (October 19, 2025), and 2C partner city Bokè-Kamsar, Guinea (February 11, 2026); 2C partner city Douala, Cameroon (March 31, 2026). Each illustrates the critical geography of the world’s secondary cities - places that bridge rural and metropolitan systems, absorb population pressures, and shape resilience in the face of environmental and political change.

Many of the 2C Initiative projects emphasized water systems tied to major rivers or coastal environments. The cities of Denpasar, Pemba, Port Harcourt, Douala, Tijuana, and Bokè-Kamsar exemplify urban “ocean cities” located in coastal regions contending with sea-level rise, strong storms, and the developmental colonization of coastal regions. Kharkiv, located in eastern Ukraine, is unique because of its subsurface waters and numerous urban springs situated across the city. Santa Fe, Argentina, is similarly defined by water. The city is surrounded by wetlands formed by rivers and lagoons that make up 70% of its total area (see the geography of … wetlands, May 30, 2025). These wetlands underpin the environmental health, freshwater resources, biodiversity, and tourism economy of the city. Yet they also create vulnerability. Heavy rainfall, rising river levels, climate change, and unplanned urban growth combine to intensify flood risk across the urban landscape.

Santa Fe, Argentina, is the capital of the province of the same name, located at the junction of the Salado and Paraná Rivers. It is the oldest port city in Argentina and the first settlement on the Río de la Plata, founded in 1573. Santa Fe serves as a strategic urban center - socially, culturally, economically, and politically - for the surrounding agricultural region.

Located 466 kilometers north of Buenos Aires, Santa Fe has a population of 602,564. The city’s location between the Paraná and Salado Rivers creates an extensive wetland environment while simultaneously making the city highly flood prone. Flooding increases the risk of vector-borne diseases such as dengue fever and leptospirosis. Of the 115 informal neighborhoods in Santa Fe, 28 (24%) are located on floodplains. The city exists within a territory exposed to frequent and extreme hydro-meteorological events, conditions that have required the development of long-term resilience planning.

Floods in 2003 and 2007 fundamentally reshaped the city’s approach to risk management. In 2003, 30,000 people were evacuated and 23 people died. Another major flood in 2007 exposed the city’s vulnerability and underscored the need for stronger public policies focused on risk management and mitigation. In response, Santa Fe established the Municipal Risk Management System in 2008 to provide a comprehensive framework for prevention, preparedness, and response. In 2014, the city became part of the 100 Resilient Cities Program, and in 2018 Santa Fe joined the 2C Initiative. One important outcome of the 2C Santa Fe project was the establishment of the Spatial Data Infrastructure Office to develop geospatial data layers for the city and surrounding communities.

Santa Fe, Argentina City Waste Management Profile, June, 2025, page 10.

Water management in vulnerable neighborhoods became a central focus of the 2C Santa Fe project, like projects in Santiago, Dominican Republic, and Esmeraldas, Ecuador - cities to be covered in later posts. In partnership with Ecocity Builders, Atlas Smart Cities, the Santa Fe Ministry of Health, and La Universidad del Litoral (UNL), the 2C Santa Fe team developed mapping projects in informal neighborhoods focused on the impacts of flooding on health. These included mapping exposure to mosquito-borne diseases, identifying flood-prone zones in informal settlements, and locating reservoirs of bacteria associated with micro-landfills and rodent populations. Lessons learned emphasized mitigation and adaptation strategies necessary to meet the needs of residents while aligning with the Provincial Climate Change Response Plan.

Santa Fe has experienced catastrophic flooding repeatedly. To address this persistent threat, the city developed a complex and costly flood protection system requiring constant maintenance. The city now maintains 66 kilometers of levees, 152 pumps, 250 hectares of reservoirs and detention ponds, and 13 meteorological stations.

Disaster risk management systems, early warning systems, evacuation plans, and public education programs have also been implemented. By 2017, the city had relocated 368 families living in areas exposed to unmitigable flood risk. Nevertheless, high-water events continue to directly affect low-lying areas and neighborhoods located outside the ring levees. Older informal settlements beyond the protected areas still require long-term relocation solutions.

Santa Fe Resilience Plan, 2017, page 33. Arrows indicate where new neighborhoods have been established to relocate families from water risk areas.

Santa Fe has emerged as a leader in disaster risk management and has developed internationally recognized best practices. The city received the 2011 UN Sasakawa Award for Disaster Risk Reduction. Mapping shelters and transportation routes became critical components of emergency planning. Shelters were deliberately located along public transportation routes and on roads passable during rain events to ensure accessibility during emergencies. Participatory mapping with local communities incorporated local knowledge, community priorities, and neighborhood concerns into the planning process.

2C Santa Fe emergency shelters. 2C Santa Fe Final Report, 2019.

Mapping and surveys were conducted in two neighborhoods - Jesuitas and Vuelta del Paraguayo. Jesuitas involved the relocation of families due to high-water risk, while Vuelta del Paraguayo was an informal settlement located outside the levee protection system. Both neighborhoods became part of broader citywide efforts to provide relocation and housing solutions for populations affected by flooding. At the time of the 2C project, solutions for Vuelta del Paraguayo were still under assessment. Additionally, the 2C team collected data on public transportation, schools, health centers, water access, garbage collection, and water and wastewater networks.

Flooding events in December 2018 and May 2019 further demonstrated the interconnected nature of water, health, and infrastructure. During these floods, the 2C Santa Fe team coordinated with the municipality and the university to map outbreaks of dengue fever. One response strategy involved desacharrización - the removal of water-holding containers from household yards and interiors to reduce mosquito breeding sites.

2C Santa Fe Dengue Fever heat map enabled the targeting of vulnerable neighborhoods. 2C Santa Fe Final Report, 2019.

The 2C Santa Fe project laid the groundwork for continued regional data development centered on water security. Yet the geography of water in Argentina extends far beyond Santa Fe’s floodplains and wetlands. The same political and environmental tensions shaping flood management in Santa Fe are visible in the glacier-fed landscapes of the Andes. Water connects these distant geographies. The wetlands and rivers surrounding Santa Fe are part of larger hydrological systems shaped by upstream environmental change, national policy decisions, and competing economic priorities.

Regional concerns regarding water security now span the entire country as Argentina’s changing national government advances new priorities. Concerns have intensified because the national government’s retreat from climate action weakens public awareness while dismantling institutional and budgetary protections. Environmental safeguards have similarly been reduced. Most significant are the proposed changes to the Glacier National Protection Law (National Law 26.639 — Minimum Standards for the Preservation of Glaciers and the Periglacial Environment), a pioneering law that defined glaciers and periglacial landscapes as public assets and strategic water reserves intended to protect water resources from damaging commercial activity. Argentina has approximately 17,000 glaciers that are critical to the water supply of 16% of the country’s population.

Source: Inventario Nacional de Glaciares, 2026.

The proposed changes to this law reveal the intertwined nature of geography, economics, politics, and environmental governance. Politically, the reforms shift decision-making authority regarding industrial activity to provincial governments. The original law established a national minimum environmental standard applied equally across the country. It also created a science-based framework that defined protected areas, established the National Glacier Inventory, and sought to prevent damage to water-sensitive landscapes.

Economically, the structural reforms associated with President Milei’s agenda open previously restricted areas to mineral exploration and extraction. Argentina possesses major geological resources of lithium, gold, copper, and silver concentrated in the arid Andean regions. Geographically, however, glaciers function as essential water sources for downstream agricultural systems, ecosystems, cities, and communities. Mining in these fragile environments could produce long-term consequences for regional water security.

The story of Santa Fe’s floods and the story of glacier protection in the Andes are not separate environmental issues. They are connected through the geography of water and through political decisions about environmental stewardship. In Santa Fe, extensive investments in levees, pumps, evacuation systems, participatory mapping, and public health interventions demonstrate the enormous social and economic costs of managing water insecurity as environmental risks intensify. In the Andes, weakening glacier protections may increase pressures on downstream water systems before those impacts fully emerge. Both landscapes reveal how water insecurity is shaped not only by climate change, but also by governance structures, infrastructure priorities, economic development models, and uneven political power.

Argentina exemplifies the tensions between economic development and environmental protection at a moment when the scientific foundations of climate change are increasingly challenged politically. Mining operations may expand into ecologically sensitive glacier and periglacial areas of the Andes. Argentina could become increasingly important within the global mineral supply chain while simultaneously compromising long-term protection of a critical resource: water. Further, Indigenous communities and rural populations in Andean regions rely on glacier-fed water systems for agriculture, cultural practices, and drinking water. The devolution of decision-making authority from the Argentine Institute for Snow, Ice and Environmental Sciences to provincial entities fundamentally alters the framework of the original law.

Port investments in cities such as Santa Fe, Timbúes, and Rosario seek to boost operational efficiency and improve logistics by linking regional export supply chains and positioning these cities as major export outlets for the Argentine interior. In 2025, terminals managed agro-industrial shipments while also increasing the movement of lithium cargo, a trend expected to expand in coming years.

The geography of Santa Fe reveals the interconnected of diverse systems - wetlands, rivers, glaciers, mining corridors, disease ecologies, and economies into a single interconnected environmental landscape. The city’s experience demonstrates that water is not simply a local resource or a technical management issue. The flood defenses of Santa Fe and the glaciers of the Andes are part of the same national environmental infrastructure.

Santa Fe demonstrates that adaptation has limits. Levees can be raised, pumps expanded, and evacuation systems improved, but long-term resilience depends on decisions about environmental governance, climate policy, and stewardship of upstream ecosystems. The geography of water reveals how distant landscapes remain interconnected through hydrological systems and political choices. The distrust of science, the weakening of environmental protections, and the prioritization of extractive economies over long-term sustainability are not isolated policy shifts. They reshape the geographies of risk that future generations will inherit.

Ultimately, Santa Fe illustrates a larger global reality: secondary cities are often where the consequences of environmental change become most visible. They are places where climate change, infrastructure needs, inequality, governance, and public health intersect. The wetlands surrounding Santa Fe and the glaciers of the Andes together reveal that environmental stewardship is inseparable from questions of justice, resilience, and survival.

NOTES

https://es.mongabay.com/2024/12/balance-ambiental-argentina-2024-presidente-negacionista-sostiene-que-economia-esta-por-encima-de-naturaleza/

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212096322000043

https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R48303

https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2026/04/02/argentina-reforms-glacier-protection-law/

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj947487wzyo

Fulbright alumni include 44 heads of state or government, 62 Nobel Laureates, 90 Pulitzer Prize winners, 82 MacArthur Fellows and many other leaders that contributed to the Fulbright Mission.

Fulbright, KSU, 2026.

In August 2025, the Office of Management and Budget proposed cuts to Congressionally appropriated FY25 awards for 22 Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) international exchange programs - approximately $100 million. These programs enable over 55,000 students, scholars, and professionals to participate each year and support more than 8,000 American livelihoods through U.S.-based partner organizations. Public response was overwhelming, and Congress rejected the cuts. Yet the renewed proposals for 2026, combined with expanded travel bans and pauses in immigrant visa processing affecting over sixty countries, signal a sustained erosion of international exchange. These actions are not simply budgetary adjustments; they disrupt a long-standing geography of connection that has shaped U.S. engagement with the world since the mid-twentieth century.

Fiscal Year 2026 International Education Appropriations Request: https://www.nafsa.org/fy2026-funding-international-education-and-exchange-programs. These programs are included in the request:

• Title VI: Civil Rights Act, 1964 prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, and national origin in programs and activities receiving Federal financial assistance.

• Fulbright-Hays: Training, Research, and Seminars Abroad for teachers, researchers

• Gilman: Go-Global grants for high school students and college students

• Stevens Initiative: Virtual exchange to connect young people around the world managed by the Aspen Institute.

Established in 1946, the Fulbright Program was designed to promote peaceful relations between the people of the United States and those of other countries. Funded initially through the sale of surplus war materials after World War II, the program reflects a transformation of the geographies of war into geographies of exchange. Senator J. William Fulbright, while a complex figure who opposed civil rights domestically, advanced a global vision grounded in intellectual exchange and famously warned against “the arrogance of power” in U.S. foreign policy.

The Fulbright Program operates in over 160 countries through partnerships with binational Fulbright commissions and U.S. embassies. Administered by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, it supports students, scholars, educators, and professionals in teaching, research, and applied projects. More than 450,000 Fulbrighters – those who have received an award - have participated in this network of exchange, building relationships that extend far beyond the duration of their award periods.

The program’s structure reflects multiple scales of engagement. The Fulbright U.S. Student Program supports emerging scholars and professionals, while the Fulbright Scholar Program enables faculty and experienced practitioners to conduct research and teaching abroad. The Hubert H. Humphrey Fellowship Program, established in 1978 as a Fulbright exchange, brings mid-career professionals to the United States for ten months of non-degree study and professional development, emphasizing leadership, public service, and institutional exchange. These programs form a global infrastructure of knowledge circulation and cultural diplomacy.

Countries with active bilateral Fulbright Student and Fulbright Scholar programs with the US (as of 2020). Light shading indicates countries with just Fulbright Scholar programs. Fulbright Program, Wikipedia, Accessed 15 April 2026. CC BY-SA 4.0.

It is within this infrastructure that individual experiences become geographic narratives. My participation in three Fulbright awards - a study tour to India, a Senior Specialist assignment in South Africa, and a Scholar award in Botswana - did not simply add international experiences to my career. They reoriented how I understood place, scale, and connection. Fulbright is not only a program; it is a spatial practice that situates individuals within networks of knowledge, culture, and policy.

My first Fulbright experience, a five-week study tour to India in 2001, illustrates how these exchanges operate on the ground. Traveling with twenty educators - five high school teachers and fifteen university faculty - we moved across diverse regions of the country, engaging in its physical and cultural geographies. We visited historic sites, attended cultural and ceremonial events, and participated in seminars on politics, religion, and the environment. We were invited into villages, traveled extensively by rail, and observed engineering and infrastructure projects.

States and Cities visited on Fulbright India Study Tour, 2001.

My research focus during this tour centered on water - its presence, absence, and uneven distribution across landscapes. Water became both a material reality and an organizing lens through which to understand India’s geography. Water management and conservation is embedded in India’s ancient Vedic culture, the foundation of Indian society and culture from 1500 BCE. From the outset, our awareness of water was personal. We were cautioned about water quality, instructed to brush our teeth with bottled water, and even advised showering with our mouths closed. These practices heightened our awareness of water as both a necessity and a risk.

At broader scales, the complexities of water were evident everywhere. In Varanasi, one of Hinduism’s most sacred cities, the Ganges River embodies profound cultural and spiritual significance. Pilgrims bathe in its waters and cremate their dead along its banks. Yet the river is also among the most polluted in the world. We watched boatmen drink from water coated with an oily film, despite scientific evidence of dangerously high levels of E. coli. Religion and science appeared to coexist in tension, revealing different ways of knowing and valuing water. A visit to a wastewater treatment facility further exposed infrastructural limitations—it operated intermittently and could not meet demand, especially during the monsoon season, allowing untreated sewage to flow through open drains into the river.

In Delhi, the geography of water shifted from quality to access. The Yamuna River provides approximately 40% of the city’s water supply, yet distribution is uneven and infrastructure incomplete. Rapid urban growth has left many neighborhoods without pipelines or drainage systems, increasing groundwater contamination while also contending with the impacts of climate change. Informal settlements, home to roughly 30% of the population, often lack reliable access to running water, forcing residents to purchase water from private vendors. Questions of access became questions of equity: Who has water in their homes? Who can afford it? Who relies on communal taps? The city’s pledge of Jal Swaraj—self-governance of water—frames access to clean water as both a public responsibility and a human right.

The rural landscapes we visited offered a different perspective. In villages, water access often depended on communal infrastructure, such as public taps or hand pumps, with water collection typically carried out by women and children. Hospitality was expressed through shared tea, raising questions for us about safety and trust. We drank the tea—and did not get sick. Access to safe drinking water in rural villages remains challenging; in 2019 only 16% of rural households have household tap connections. In 2023, most Indians had access to clean drinking water; however basic drinking water is better in urban areas than rural areas. Hand pumps or tube wells are the largest source of drinking water for rural Indians, while piped water is the biggest source for urban Indians. Bottled water is a key source of drinking water – serving 15% of urban households. This context underscored the social dimensions of water: its role in daily life, its gendered labor, and its cultural meaning.

Tap water supply in India, 2020. https://www.reddit.com/r/unitedstatesofindia/comments/16hgi34/tap_water_supply_in_rural_households_of_india/#lightbox.

In Kerala, the intersection of water and tourism revealed another layer of complexity. Resorts catering to international visitors consume large quantities of high-quality water, often sourced from groundwater reserves that local communities also depend upon. This disproportionate use highlights tensions between economic development and resource equity, particularly in regions already stressed by population growth and climate change. As the largest user of groundwater globally, India’s groundwater extraction, largely governed by outdated legal frameworks such as the 1882 Easements Act, has led to overuse, land subsidence, and saltwater intrusion in coastal aquifers (see the geography of … water and sand, December 15, 2025). Traditional norms of shared water use are increasingly strained as access becomes privatized.

Coastal regions in Tamil Nadu exposed yet another dimension, where inadequate waste management systems contribute to environmental degradation. Beaches and estuarine areas have become dumping grounds, with plastics - including water bottles - entering marine ecosystems during periods of heavy rainfall (see the geography of … Denpasar, Indonesia, June 3, 2025). These local practices connect to global systems of consumption and waste, reinforcing the multi-scalar nature of water issues

Litter and transport processes of plastics in marine system, 2022. Sivadas, et. al., Litter and Plastic Monitorin in the Indian marine environment. https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0025326X22001060-gr1.jpg.

In Rajasthan, water scarcity is addressed through large-scale infrastructure such as the 649-kilometer Indira Gandhi Canal, completed in 2005. While the canal has expanded irrigation in the Thar Desert, it has also introduced ecological challenges, including waterlogging and soil salinity. At the same time, traditional practices persist - water transported by camel (yet another reminder of water – those efficient beasts known for their ability to go for long periods without water), stored in wells, and rationed carefully. Even in a desert ecotourism camp, water was delivered by truck and conserved through bucket bathing. These experiences reinforced water as both a scarce resource and a shared necessity.

India’s mega-projects, such as the Sardar Sarovar Dam on the Narmada River, further illustrate the tensions between development and displacement. While providing irrigation and hydroelectric power, such projects have displaced communities and transformed ecosystems, prompting resistance movements like the Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save the Narmada Movement). These conflicts reveal the political geographies of water, where decisions about infrastructure reshape landscapes and livelihoods.

Across all these places in India, water served as a unifying thread - linking urban and rural environments, economic systems, cultural practices, and ecological processes. India’s geographies of water are marked by extremes: abundance and scarcity, access and exclusion, tradition and modernization. These dynamics are not unique to India, but the scale and intensity of these challenges make it a critical site for understanding global water futures.

India’s Water Conservation Efforts, 2023. https://globalsouthpolicy.org/a-map-of-indias-most-remarkable-water-conservation-efforts-from-kashmir-to-tamil-nadu/

This Fulbright experience did more than expose me to these complexities; it reshaped my research trajectory and teaching. It laid the foundation for long-term international collaborations and influences how I train the next generation of environmental managers. The experience illustrates a central principle of the Fulbright Program: its impact is not contained within individual participants. There were nineteen other educators on that tour, each carrying forward their own interpretations and applications. The effects are cumulative and exponential.

On March 19, 2026, the Fulbright Association held Advocacy Day in Washington, D.C., bringing alumni together to meet with Members of Congress and advocate for sustained funding. This moment underscores the continued relevance of the program and the risks posed by its erosion.

The geography of the Fulbright Program is ultimately a geography of connection. It links individuals to places, places to ideas, and ideas to policy. It transforms abstract notions of diplomacy into lived experience and shared understanding. The proposed cuts to Fulbright are not simply reductions in funding; they represent a contraction of the spaces where mutual understanding is cultivated.

At a time when global challenges - climate change, water scarcity, conflict - are inherently transboundary, the need for such activities is more urgent than ever. My Fulbright experiences demonstrate how knowledge is produced not only in laboratories and classrooms, but through travel across different landscapes, encounters with different cultures, and sustained engagement with local communities.

To diminish Fulbright is to narrow the geography of possibility. To sustain it is to invest in a world where understanding is built through connection, and where geography - experienced, and shared - remains central to shaping our collective future.

NOTES

https://us.fulbrightonline.org/

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10708-025-11287-8

https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sustainable-tourism/articles/10.3389/frsut.2024.1384962/full

We are living within a stark geographic juxtaposition. On one scale, humanity extends outward - toward the Moon - through a techno-scientific project of exploration, curiosity, and collective achievement. At another, across the Earth’s surface, wars produce landscapes of destruction, displacement, and loss. These are not separate geographies. They are simultaneous, overlapping expressions of how science, technology, and power are mobilized across space.

This moment evokes an enduring cultural metaphor: the “dark side of the Moon,” popularized by Pink Floyd in their 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon. The phrase refers to a way of describing what is hidden, obscured, or psychologically fraught. Geography, too, reveals that what appears whole and illuminated at one scale may conceal different realities at another.

Two photographs from space missions, Apollo 17 and Artemis II, bookend this moment. The 1972 “Blue Marble” revealed Earth as singular, suspended in a vast black expanse, helping catalyze modern environmental consciousness. The 2026 “Hello, World” image captures zodiacal light - sunlight scattered by interplanetary dust - as Earth eclipses the Sun. Both images include the African continent, vast blue oceans, and the swirling atmospheric systems that sustain life. From this vantage, Earth appears unified, whole, and borderless.

The Earth–Moon relationship is a foundational geographic system, linking celestial mechanics to terrestrial life. Selenography examines the Moon’s surface features, while the Earth–Moon system reflects deep gravitational and geological connections. The Moon’s gravitational pull shapes ocean tides—an everyday manifestation of planetary interdependence. This same gravitational relationship enables the Artemis mission’s “free return trajectory,” where momentum is exchanged between Earth and Moon to guide astronauts safely home

The Moon’s synchronous rotation - its orbital period matching its axial rotation - means one side always faces Earth. What we call the “dark side” is more accurately the far side, unseen from Earth. The “phases of the Moon” emerge from the shifting geometry between Earth, Moon, and Sun. These are spatial relationships, dynamic and cyclical, which connect planetary motion to human perception.

The Artemis mission represents the culmination of centuries of scientific inquiry and technological innovation. It extends human presence farther into space than previous missions and offers direct human observation of regions known only through remote sensing.

https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/artemis-ii-missionmap-public-082025.jpg.

The astronauts have taken pictures of features such as the Mare Orientale basin – a 600-mile crater. The mission allows us, once again, to see Earth from a distance - to recognize its fragility, its beauty, and its singularity. This trip to the Moon demonstrates how the world is turned on its head by scientific breakthroughs and reveals this moment as the pinnacle of science and technology – to the moon and back. Visit the Artemis Image Gallery to view the amazing photos.

View of Mare Orientale, April 6, 2026. https://images.nasa.gov/details/art002e009277.

But this outward gaze is mirrored by another set of technologies looking inward - toward Earth’s zones of conflict. The same geospatial infrastructures that enable lunar navigation—satellites, sensors, imaging systems—are also used to map and monitor war. Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) time-series data can estimate building damage in near real time. High-resolution satellite imagery tracks troop movements, infrastructure destruction, and environmental degradation. These tools reveal the spatial patterns of violence: where bombs fall, where cities collapse, where people flee. They illuminate war, even as its human consequences – the dark side of war - remain partially obscured.

Rapid Damage Mapping Tool, 2025. https://olidietrich.users.earthengine.app/view/ukraine-damage-explorer.

The ongoing war involving Ukraine and Russia is one among severale3 global conflicts that produce geographies of devastation. These wars violate the principles of the Geneva Conventions, the United Nations Charter, and broader frameworks of humanitarian and human rights law. They generate cascading spatial effects: internal displacement, cross-border migration, and intensified pressure on water, food, and shelter systems.

Conflict Watchlist 2026, ACLED. https://acleddata.com/series/conflict-watchlist-2026.

Since 2023, violations against children have increased dramatically. In Gaza, children are killed or injured by incoming ordnance, exposed to hunger and malnutrition, and denied access to humanitarian aid. Their lives are shaped by forces beyond their control—violence, famine, and the collapse of basic services. In 2026, UNICEF launched its Humanitarian Action for Children appeal, seeking to reach 73 million children across 133 countries. The scale is global; the impacts are intensely local.

https://reliefweb.int/map/sudan/sudan-conflict-and-population-displacement-december-2025-dg-echo-daily-map-09012026.

The conflict involving Iran further illustrates how geography structures global risk. The Strait of Hormuz - through which roughly 20% of the world’s oil and gas supply flows - is a critical chokepoint linking regional conflict to global economic systems (see the geography of … the waterscapes of war, March 13, 2026). Threats to “destroy civilization” are not only rhetorical; they are spatial, implicating entire populations, infrastructures, and cultural landscapes.

The geography of Iran is layered with deep historical and cultural significance. The Persian Empire, originating in the 6th century BCE, contributed systems of governance, trade, and infrastructure that shaped regional and global connections. The Royal Road - an early transcontinental network, and precursor to the Silk Road - linked the Mediterranean to Persia, facilitating exchange across vast distances. Today, Iran’s 29 UNESCO World Heritage sites anchor these histories in place.

These sites are not just cultural artifacts; they are spatial expressions of human knowledge and creativity. The antiquity of Persia, the contributions to science and culture, and the manifestation of these contributions in specific places – UNESCO World Heritage sites provide another lens to marvel at human endeavor. Coordinates have been shared with military actors to prevent their destruction, reflecting international legal obligations to distinguish between civilian and military targets. Yet damage continues. The Golestan Palace in Tehran—an 18th-century architectural complex—has sustained impacts from airstrikes. The intersection of science and technology is demonstrated by these structures from the past – their architectural elegance and innovative artworks. Such losses are irreparable. They erase not only physical structures but also the cultural geographies they embody.

https://iranstravel.com/iran-unesco-world-heritage-sites/.

As the war continues, control over geospatial information is becoming increasingly contested. The company Planet Labs has reportedly been asked to withhold imagery of Middle East conflict zones. Satellite data—essential for journalists, researchers, and humanitarian organizations—are now entangled in geopolitical strategy. The ability to see, map, and analyze the Earth is no longer neutral. It is a terrain of power.

This brings us back to the juxtaposition at the heart of this moment.

The Artemis mission reflects the highest aspirations of science: exploration, discovery, and a shared human future. War reflects its darkest applications: precision targeting, surveillance, and destruction. Both rely on the same technological foundations. Both are products of human ingenuity. Yet they produce radically different geographies - one expansive and unifying, the other fragmented and violent.

From space, Earth remains unchanged in its appearance - a blue sphere suspended in darkness, as it was in 1972. But this view obscures the intensifying fractures on the ground. The persistence of global conflict, coupled with shifting political leadership and declining investment in scientific institutions such as NASA, signals a reorientation of priorities. A proposed 23% budget reduction to NASA contrasts sharply with increased defense spending, including a $1.5 trillion allocation aimed in part at advancing AI-driven targeting systems.

This is the geography of asymmetrical warfare: uneven power, blurred boundaries between civilian and military spaces, and technologies that compress distance while amplifying impact. War is no longer confined to defined battlefields. It permeates cities, infrastructures, and everyday life and a commitment to civilian lives and in particular children. “What is the formative sound of your childhood?” One defined by the acoustics of war – missiles, drones, and explosions. Against this, the silence of space - captured in the Artemis mission - offers a profound contrast. One geography is defined by awe and possibility: the other by fear and survival.

We can reach the Moon, navigate its far side, and return safely to Earth using the precise calculations of gravitational forces. Yet on Earth, we continue to produce landscapes of violence that disregard the most basic principles of humanity. The same scientific knowledge that allows us to explore the cosmos is used to refine the efficiency of destruction. Geography reveals how power operates across space, how technologies connect distant places, and how decisions made in one location reverberate globally. The Moon and war are not separate subjects. They are part of the same geographic condition: a world where the capacity for wonder and the capacity for destruction coexist, uneasily, on the same planet.

Artemis II’s trip evokes Pink Floyd’s album, “Dark Side of the Moon.” However, the phrase “dark side of the moon” is referenced in the song, Brain Damage, referring to the mental instability of one of the band members. “The lunatic is in the grass…” in this case might refer to the President of the U.S.

NOTES

https://www.statista.com/topics/13125/conflicts-worldwide-2025/?srsltid=AfmBOopZrakREkdhgcMMVXKJd0gftg8Ys2ytxhU99rzFWk2xXsjCbSLR#topicOverview

https://www.nature.com/articles/s43247-025-02183-7

https://www.fiercesensors.com/sensors/artemis-ii-image-sensors-digital-cameras-capture-stunning-moon-pics

https://www.euronews.com/video/2026/04/08/iranian-attacks-continue-in-the-gulf-raising-questions-about-ceasefire

https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/03/1167181

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2026/world/us-israel-iran-attack-maps#mapping-the-scale-of-the-conflict

In March 2025, the U.N. Emergency Relief Coordinator, Tom Fletcher, called for a humanitarian reset grounded in four principles: saving lives, delivering aid effectively and efficiently, devolving authority to local partners, and defending civilians and humanitarian workers from harm. This call reflects a broader recognition that humanitarian action must adapt to a rapidly changing world - one in which conflict, climate change, and disaster increasingly intersect (see the geography of … conflict and humanitarian aid, July 25, 2025).

From a geographic perspective, these intersecting crises do not produce uniform outcomes. They generate uneven landscapes of vulnerability shaped by place, scale, and access to resources. Institutional capacity to respond is under strain, reflected in reduced funding and the dismantling of key infrastructures such as United States Agency for International Development. Similarly, other countries have reduced their aid budgets; notably, the UK aims to cut their aid budget from 0.5% of Gross National Income to 0.3% by 2027. The result is a widening gap between humanitarian need and response.

https://ourworldindata.org/foreign-aid.

This context exhibits geographies of absence. Informal settlements, refugee camps, and rapidly expanding urban peripheries are often poorly mapped and lack reliable demographic data. In such spaces, populations may be highly visible in humanitarian narratives yet remain largely invisible in the datasets that guide decision-making. Geography, in this sense, is not only about where crises occur, but how information about those places is produced, structured, shared, and used (see the geography of … humanitarian aid, February 7, 2025).

Refugee Data Finder, UNHCR, 2025. Dots are country of asylum by refugees. Larger circles indicate larger numbers of refugees. https://www.unhcr.org/refugee-statistics/insights/annexes/forcibly-displaced-maps.html.

Geolocation technologies have emerged as a central tool in addressing this gap. Four developments have been particularly significant: the widespread availability of high-resolution satellite imagery; advances in precise location tracking; the integration of geographic coordinates across digital datasets; and the proliferation of mobile applications generating real-time geographic data. These developments have contributed to the rise of big geospatial data, characterized by high volume, rapid access, and diverse data sources, and increasingly analyzed within a GeoAI environment.

Lebanon designated shelters, 2024. https://www.unrwa.org/resources/reports/unrwa-situation-report-11-lebanon-emergency-response.

Humanitarian GIS - sometimes referred to as crisis mapping - applies geospatial technologies and digital data to shape the spatial and temporal dimensions of humanitarian response. They enable near real-time situational awareness, improve logistical coordination, and support decision-making across multiple scales. Many of these tools have geolocation capacity that allow individuals to contribute place-based information directly through mobile phones and social media platforms. Videos, photographs, and observations can be geotagged - linked to geographic coordinates such as latitude and longitude - allowing local populations to share information about unfolding crises. They allow previously unmapped regions to be visualized, vulnerable populations to be identified, and resources to be allocated more efficiently. Geolocation technologies directly support the goals of the humanitarian reset.

Table of data tools used for humanitarian aid and response. *Require data integration management with other humanitarian datasets (e.g., demographics, mobility, basic services requirements (water, electricity, shelter).

However, this relationship is not straightforward. The same data that make populations visible can also make them vulnerable. Geographic information is inherently revealing; it encodes not only location but relationships - patterns of movement, settlement structures, and connections between people and resources. When combined with other datasets, even aggregated information can expose sensitive details. In fragile or conflict-affected contexts, such information can be used for surveillance, targeting, or political control. The geography of data is a geography of power.

This tension is captured in the privacy-safety dilemma central to humanitarian GIS. Geographic coordinates identify place, and place is rarely neutral. In crisis situations, individuals have limited awareness of how their location data are collected, and informed consent is difficult to ensure. Mobile technologies continuously generate geographic data, without explicit user understanding, while cybersecurity protections may be uneven. Data collected for humanitarian purposes may be repurposed in ways that extend beyond their original intent.

The humanitarian principle of “do no harm” must be understood in spatial terms. Harm can result not only from action or inaction, but from the unintended consequences of making places and populations visible through data. A map can facilitate aid delivery - but it can also expose populations to harm.

In response, humanitarian organizations are increasingly shifting toward safety-centered data governance. Rather than focusing solely on privacy, this approach emphasizes balancing the protection of individuals with the need to provide life-saving assistance. Operationalizing this shift involves several key practices: collecting only the data necessary for response, establishing aggregation thresholds to prevent identification, implementing tiered access controls, and defining clear data retention and deletion policies.

Equally important is the role of affected communities in shaping these practices. Geography is lived experience, and decisions about data cannot be separated from the people whose lives are being mapped. Participatory approaches align directly with the humanitarian reset’s emphasis on devolving authority to local partners. By involving communities in data collection and governance, humanitarian organizations can better reflect local priorities, cultural contexts, and knowledge systems.

Participatory mapping initiatives illustrate this potential. Mapping informal settlements, for example, has enabled communities to identify site-specific needs, advocate for services, and develop locally appropriate solutions. Collaborative efforts such as Missing Maps and Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team have mobilized volunteers to map previously unmapped regions, improving preparedness and response capacity. These initiatives demonstrate how geospatial technologies can support both immediate humanitarian action and longer-term resilience.

The Atlas of Informality has located 260 informal settlements around the world, 2020. https://www.atlasofinformality.com/.

These initiatives reinforce a critical geographic insight: data are not unbiased representations of space. They are produced through social processes that reflect existing power relations. Decisions about what is mapped, how it is mapped, and who has access to the resulting information shape the distribution of resources and risks. Without careful governance, geospatial technologies can reproduce - and even amplify - the inequalities they are intended to address.

Existing data protection frameworks, such as the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, provide important guidance but do not fully account for the distinctive characteristics of geospatial data. Various humanitarian organizations have also developed ethical codes for digital humanitarians. However, geographic information is difficult to anonymize, and spatial relationships can reveal identities even when individual data points are obscured. Geolocation technologies are transforming humanitarian response; they illuminate patterns of vulnerability, but can also obscure the structural conditions that produce those patterns. This creates a gap between policy frameworks and the realities of geospatial practice.

Addressing this gap requires new governance approaches that explicitly incorporate geographic thinking. One such approach is the development of a Geospatial Data Protection Impact Assessment (GDPIA) - a framework designed to evaluate the risks associated with geolocation technologies in humanitarian contexts. By accounting for spatial relationships, scale, and potential exposure, a GDPIA embeds geographic analysis directly into data protection practices. Common operational datasets and the annual report – The State of Open Humanitarian Data – are important steps towards assessing the datascape of humanitarian spatial information. OCHA’s Humanitarian Data Exchange is an example of how data exchange and consistency can support operations and decision making.

Severity of ongoing humanitarian crises, INFORM Severity Index, June 2024. https://data.europa.eu/en/publications/datastories/using-open-data-shape-humanitarian-action.

Building resilience requires integrating geospatial tools into broader social, environmental, and governance frameworks that address systemic inequities. Climate change, urbanization, and conflict operate across scales, and geospatial technologies must be used in ways that reflect complexity not oversimplification (see the geography of … rubble, October 11, 2025). A shift toward safety-centered data governance, responsible stewardship, and data sharing, supported by tools such as GDPIAs, can help ensure that geospatial technologies contribute to both immediate response and long-term resilience.

Geospatial technologies must be situated within broader frameworks of social and environmental justice. The humanitarian principle of “do no harm” and the global commitment to “leave no one behind” demand that digital innovation be guided not only by technological capability but by ethical responsibility. The use of these technologies must support the broader goals of humanitarian reform - particularly the commitment to local partnerships and accountability.

Humanitarian crises are spatially distributed, but so too are power, knowledge, and decision-making. The humanitarian reset provides a framework for rethinking these relationships, but its success depends on how these principles are operationalized across places and scales.

NOTES:

Read: Meier, P. 2015. Digital Humanitarians: How BID DATA is changing the face of humanitarian response. Boca Raton: CRC Press, Taylor & Francis Group.

The New Humanitarian newsletter: https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/about-us

United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management (UN-GGIM). 2020. Future Trends in geospatial information management: the five-to-ten-year vision – Third Edition. https://ggim.un.org/future-trends/.

https://ourworldindata.org/foreign-aid-domestic-overseas

ODA allocations for 2026 onwards show the grim reality of aid cuts | Bond