This post is about the birth of a new country… and the best job you can have! Explore!Many people are excited about it (the people who wanted the country and international business people for a start), others not too happy about it (one government was unhappy), others are nervous (the people who wanted the country!)…

But one group of people are probably thinking, “Wow! I really have a COOL job!”

Cartographers!

But let us start a little further back …

Sharing a space with others of the same culture is natural. Often, groups who do not share enough similarities get clubbed into a country because of complicated histories. This can lead to difficulties in the long run. If there is enough mutual dislike, it can lead to one group wanting to break away and form a separate country.

A few geography concepts can help us understand this.

Cultural differences can include

• one or more populations feeling that they have suffered injustice,
• one or more groups wanting a separate political area, etc.

Such feelings of difference can be very strong and can dis-unite a country. They are called ‘centrifugal forces’ – borrowing the concept from physics. The different units kind of “go away from the centre.”

Sometimes, these centrifugal forces are suppressed. Saddam Hussein (in Iraq) and Marshal Tito (in the former Yugoslavia) suppressed centrifugal forces in their countries. The former USSR consisted of many republics whose populations were very different from each other. They were held together by the communist party dictatorship. How? The different cultural groups were not allowed to express themselves politically.

Eventually, individual populations want to break away or ‘secede.’ The process is called ‘secession.’

In various ways, Yugoslavia and the USSR broke up into many pieces.

Closer home, in Sri Lanka, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fought unsuccessfully for secession for decades.  In Kashmir, there are populations who want to secede from India and either merge with Pakistan or become an independent country altogether.

The latest example of secession is Sudan (see map below — click on the map to open a larger image in a new window/tab). The people of the southern part of this African country recently voted overwhelmingly to secede.

Political boundaries of Africa, 2008.

The history of boundaries of countries in Africa is long and complicated. European powers that had colonized Africa drew up boundaries without any consideration for the traditional ethnic (tribal) boundaries that had evolved over centuries before. Very different tribes suddenly found they were part of one new country. These new boundaries are called ‘irrational’ and ‘superimposed.’

As a consequence, traditional tribal areas got cut up into different countries as new international boundaries were drawn. These tribes often were competitors for resources. Suddenly they found themselves in a new country, competing for limited resources. Their cultural differences became the basis for expressing their dissatisfaction with this situation. Centrifugal forces came into play.

Demands for secession increased.

Traditional and 'irrational boundaries' in Africa.

The northern part is predominantly Arab Muslim. The southern part is a mixture of over 200 different ethnic and religious groups with no one dominant group.

The northern part is desert except along the Nile river. The southern part has grasslands, savannas, and tropical forest – depending on rainfall patterns. More complicated is the distribution of the under-ground oil reserves – the new border will cut across them, making them international. Will this be a source of future conflict? Check out this interesting interactive on the BBC site (it will open in a new window/tab).

As of Tuesday, 08 February 2011, it is official.  A new country – South Sudan is its name for now – will come into being in July 2011.

The capital of South Sudan will be Juba.

Many decades of conflict between the northern and southern populations have led to this decision. Ninety-nine percent of southern Sudanese voted to separate from the north. Is this an end to conflict?  Hardly.

Many issues still need to be addressed. A LOT of work lies ahead. Here is a sampling of those issues:

1. Name – what will become the official name of the country?
2. Where will be the exact locations of the actual boundaries? One spokesperson for the South remarked, “… boundary is just a line on a piece of paper.” If only it were that simple! (here is a blog post on why a boundary is not just a line).
3. What will be the relationship between the new neighbors?
4. How will the resources be shared?
5. South Sudan will be land-locked; only the northern part will have access to the sea.  How will the new country cope with this?

As part of the effort to gather all the information necessary to set up the new country, The Southern Sudan Centre for Census, Statistics and Evaluation (SSCCSE) has been set up as the official statistical agency of the Government of Southern Sudan. Check out all the details they have posted on their site.

In this changing world, the best job you can have is perhaps that of cartographer – map-maker. You will never be out of a job!

New maps are always needed to know where things are and how to manage them!

After all, if you don’t know the geography, you have nothing to work with!

All right. Check out this interactive map of the world that is up-to-date (this link may take time to open, but it is well worth the wait). You can also download a large map in PDF format from here. [Note that under Indian law, the boundaries of India shown on these maps are illegal and considered wrong.]

Things you can do:

1. Prepare a poster for your classroom on the birth of this new country. You can use the links given here to help you. Always remember: you must fully credit your sources, or else it is cheating!
2. You could form teams that look at different aspects of the birth of the new country and have one poster per aspect. Examples: economy, natural resources (oil, forest, water), situation (connection to sea, connection to rivers), population characteristics, etc.
3. Brainstorm and raise questions with which a new country has to deal. You can begin by some that have been raised in this post and the links provided here. What other issues can you think of?
4. Finally, if you do these, prepare a brief write-up about what you did, what the results were, and add a few photographs and email it to us.  We will publish your work online.  If you include information that is even more recent than this blog, that will be even better.
5. Remember to identify
   • your school,
   • its location,
   • your class and section,
   • your team-mates’ names,
   • which syllabus you follow, and
   • your geography teacher’s name.