Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
programmes that may be implemented by
planners and managers in both the public and
private sectors, or by the residents of affected
communities. In performing these tasks, the
applied geographer will be confronted with a
variety of potential responses for any problem.
The selection of appropriate strategy is rarely
straightforward. The decision must be based on
not only technical criteria but also on a wide
range of conditioning factors, including the
views and preferences of those affected by the
problem and proposed solution, available
finance, and externality considerations or how
the strategy to resolve a particular problem
(such as construction of flood control levees)
may affect other problems (such as increased
flooding of downstream communities).
As indicated earlier, applied geographers, in
contrast to 'pure' geographers, may also be
involved in the implementation stage of the
research, normally in a supervisory or
consultancy capacity to ensure effective
application of a strategy. The nature of any
engagement is potentially wide-ranging, for
example from overseeing the setting-up of a
computer-based route-planning system for a
private transport company or public ambulance
service to making one's expertise available to
community groups seeking to establish a
housing cooperative or local economic
development initiative. Finally, as Figure 1.1
reveals, applied geographers may be involved in
monitoring the impacts of policies and
programmes implemented to tackle a problem,
and in relating these critically to predetermined
normative goals.
The earliest geographical research was, of
necessity, useful, concerned as it was with
describing the nature of the Earth as an aid to
exploration and human survival. The applied
tradition was central to the Earth measurement
and cartographic research of mathematical
geographers working under the direction of
Eratosthenes at Alexandria (Bunbury 1879).
Strabo in his account of the utility of geography
in Greek and Roman society identified a central
role for geographical knowledge in politics and
warfare. During the first millennium AD, the same
motives stimulated the development of
geographical knowledge and map making in
China. In Islamic lands, this was complemented
by the production of travel guides as an aid to
pilgrims making the
haj
.
These stimuli to applied geography were
boosted by the voyages of discovery of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries at a time when
the possession of accurate geographical knowledge
bestowed enormous advantage. During the
sixteenth century, geographical research was
undertaken with the principal purpose of enabling
European ships to navigate the world and return
with the produce of distant lands for commercial
profit (Taylor 1930).
Significantly, few of these early practitioners of
applied geography would have described
themselves as geographers—explorers,
adventurers, sailors, traders, astronomers,
cartographers, cosmographers, natural scientists,
mathematicians, historians, philosophers, surveyors
or topographers, but few outright geographers.
(What has in more recent times been referred to
as the cocktail party syndrome— 'Oh, you're a
geographer! What do you do?' —also has a long
history.)
A second point of note is that the early
acquisition of geographical knowledge was
designed to facilitate domination by merchants or
rulers, and the ways in which the knowledge was
applied often had negative consequences for those
peoples brought within the ambit of the emerging
capitalist economic system. While modern applied
geographers have been sensitised to the socially
regressive consequences of the misuse of
THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF
APPLIED GEOGRAPHY
Applied geography has a long history. As Martin
and James (1993) indicated, 'there has never been
a time when the search for knowledge about the
earth as the home of man has not been undertaken
for practical purposes as well as for the satisfaction
of intellectual curiosity'.
