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DOI: 10.1177/0309132507081492

2007 31: 592Prog Hum GeogrFraser MacDonaldouter space and the orbit of geography

AstropolitikAnti-

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Progress in Human Geography 31(5) (2007) pp. 592615

2007 SAGE Publications DOI: 10.1177/0309132507081492

Anti-Astropolitik outer space and

the orbit of geographyFraser MacDonald*

School of Anthropology, Geography and Environmental Studies,University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria 3010, Australia

Abstract: This paper aims to establish outer space as a mainstream concern of critical geography.

More than half a century after humans first cast their instruments into orbit, contemporary humangeography has been slow to explore the myriad connections that tie social life on Earth to the celestialrealm. My starting point is a return to an early-modern geographical imagination that acknowledgesthe reciprocity between heaven and earth. Although other disciplinary engagements are discussed,this project represents the first systematic attempt to explore how outer space both challenges andreanimates the geo of geography. The example of Global Satellite Navigation Systems is used toillustrate what is currently at stake in the military contest for geopolitical control of Earths orbit.Nigel Thrifts work on the technological refashioning of precognitive sociality is contextualizedwithin those systems of state geopower that sustain the everyday uplinking and downlinking to andfrom space hardware. Lastly, the paper offers a critique of the application of classical geopolitics toouter space in the form of astropolitics and its will-to-power variant ofAstropolitik.

Key words:Astropolitik, geography, geopolitics, orbit, outer space, surveillance.

*Email: [email protected]

Although the airplane opened up the sky, andthe radio tower filled the air with waves neither made the limits of the Earth entirelyvisible or transparent. Space technologyclosed the sky again, bounded it from aboveand sealed it whole. Only then could the skybecome fully modern in an active, techno-logical sense, and only then could what laybeyond it become meaningful as space, avast sea of darkness surrounding a blue and

green point of human place. At last the worldwas one. (Redfield,2000)

I IntroductionLet me acknowledge from the outset thatthis is a slightly odd paper. It deals with what

may seem like a superficial doubling of theword space: as both the primary analyticof contemporary human geography and asthe popular term for the expanse in whichsolar and stellar systems are located. To putit succinctly, this paper attempts to applythe insights of the former to pressing geo-political questions about the latter; it is myintention, in other words, to develop an agendafor a critical geography of outer space. Givenhow adept geographers have become inthinking philosophically about space, onemight expect this to be a relatively modestundertaking. We conceive of space as being

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Fraser MacDonald: Anti-Astropolitik outer space and the orbit of geography 593

produced through social action (Lefebvre,1991); space as relational (Massey, 2005);space as a site where justice can be addressed(Dike, 2005). Our analyses of space havebeen among the most significant advancesfor the discipline, attracting interest from

across the humanities and social sciences.But surely I am not the only geographer who,on trying to explain to the uninitiated thatour discipline is no longer about maps, hasresorted to space as my analytical trumpcard, only to be met with a quizzical look anda finger pointing upwards: what? you meanspace?. This, I have concluded, is not sucha bad question.

If this undertaking sounds esoteric, then Ihope to demonstrate that it is a lacuna in con-

temporary geographical scholarship thatshould be addressed with some urgency.Given that outer-Earth has been a sphere ofhuman endeavour for well over 50 years, acritical geography of space is long overdue.Our presence in, and reliance on, space hasbecome one of the enabling conditions forour current mode of everyday life in the west.Yet it lies, for the most part, outside the orbitof geography. I do not want to put at risk agreat deal of our abstract thinking about

space as an analytic (elegantly manifest, forinstance, in Doreen MasseysFor space) by set-ting up the cosmos as some great out there(Massey, 2005). It is precisely contemporaryhuman geographys relational understandingof space that makes it a good disciplinarylaunch pad for considering the meaning andpolitics of space exploration. Lest anyonethink that what follows are the musings ofa sci-fi fantasist, let me make clear that I amnot really a fan of the genre. My interests are

more down-to-earth: I write as a historicalgeographer who has come to think about outerspace through researching test sites for cold-war rocketry (see MacDonald, 2006a). Thefact that this paper is written from a modesttechnical and scientific understanding doesnot, I hope, constrain the discussion of outerspace as a sphere of the social. This essay isborne out of a conviction that what is at

stake politically and geopolitically in thecontemporary struggle over outer space istoo serious to pass without critical comment.As the future conquest of space representsa potentially unprecedented opportunityto enact politicomilitary control on Earth,

most plausibly by the worlds only super-power, such an awesome concentration ofstate power demands scrutiny.

What, then, is the status of outer spacein 2007? Stanley Kubricks classic film 2001:A Space Odyssey, made in 1968, may not haveentirely come to pass but neither was it verywide of the mark. Space has been inhabitedby humans, with relatively short absencesfor the last 20 years, and without interruptionsince 2 November 2000. Our species is now

represented in space by the crew of the Inter-national Space Station (ISS). At $100 billion,the ISS is the most expensive piece of tech-nology ever built (Jha, 2006). There arecurrently around 700 operational spacecraftin continuous orbit of the Earth, serving a var-iety of military, civilian and commercial uses(Johnson, 2004: 81). Over 60 new launchestake place every year, and at least 35 nationsnow have payloads in orbit. Despite the endof the Cold War, a thaw which is widely

thought to have restrained progress in thefield (Dolman, 2002), space explorationcontinues apace. For instance, both Americanand European unmanned vehicles haveexplored the surface of Mars, beaming backhigh-resolution pictures of the Martian sur-face, including its icefields. Forty years sincethe first Russian space probe landed onVenus, a new major European Space Agencyeffort was launched in November 2005 tostudy the surface and atmosphere of Earths

sister planet. Again, nearly 40 years after thefirst moon landings and despite numeroussetbacks for NASA (Vaughan, 1996; 2004),George W. Bush is planning a symbolic re-turn lunar mission in 2018 a renewed spiritof discovery as a means of mobilizing publicsupport for further American investment inspace dominance (see Stadd and Bingham,2004).

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594 Progress in Human Geography 31(5)

Among the technical and logistical ad-vances in space technology too numerousto detail here, there are two tendencies thatstand out. First, space and in particular theLower Earth Orbit (LEO) can no longerbe considered remote. The journey through

the Earths atmosphere is now made onan almost weekly basis. Such is the steadypassage of space vehicles that there is nowa growing literature on traffic management(Johnson, 2004; Lla, 2004). The costs ofentering space are now so low that studentsat Cambridge University have tested anamateur rocket that they hope can be readilylaunched to the edge of space (up to 32 kmaltitude) for under 1000 (Sample, 2006).Second, space is becoming ordinary. Space-

based technology is routinely reconfiguringour experience of home, work, educationand healthcare through applications in thetransport, telecommunications, agriculturaland energy sectors (Rumsfeld, 2001). Oureveryday lives already extend to the outer-Earth in ways that we entirely take for granted.Americas Global Positioning System (GPS),for instance, has become essential to theregular functioning of a variety of machinesfrom bank tellers to supertankers. The space-

based science of weather forecasting is nowintegrated into the day-to-day management ofdomestic and national affairs. Satellite-basedtelecommunications, particularly internationaland cellular telephony, are a mundane part ofeveryday life in the west (see Warf, 2006).More obvious, perhaps, are the technical ad-vances in space-enabled warfare that haveinspired recent American military operationsin the Balkans, Afghanistan and Iraq (Graham,2004; Gray, 2005). Following in the vapour

trails of the United States, Europe, Russia andChina are also trying to extend their sover-eignty into outer space. As I will go on to dis-cuss, terrestrial geopolitics are increasinglybeing determined by extraterrestrial strategicconsiderations. More abstractly, I want to arguethat through space exploration we are forgingnew subjectivities and new forms of socialityhere on earth (Stern, 2000; Shaw, 2004).

Space is a modality for hypermobile infor-mation which, in combination with advancedtechnologies of software-sorting (Graham,2005a), has enabled a wider automatic pro-duction of space (Thrift and French, 2002;see also Dodge and Kitchin, 2005). Above all,

I will make the case that outer space is thenext frontier for militaryneoliberal hegem-ony, as an earlier conception of space as com-mon property, enshrined in the 1967 UN OuterSpace Treaty (OST), becomes subject torenegotiation. In place of the OST is the prospectof a new space regime, as transformative in itsown way as the Bretton Woods consensus,that would oversee the privatization of spaceresources in the narrow interests of a globalelite. Moreover, it is this conquest of space,

I will argue, that underwrites much of thedynamic technological shaping and reshapingof Earthly environments recently discussed byNigel Thrift (2005a).

Against this background, I intend toopen up the multiple questions of scale andaddress the diverse range of sociotechnicalphenomena that characterize our own spaceage. Although I will pay particular attentionto the role of geopolitics in space strategy, it isnot my intention to narrow this new agenda

to, say, the specific frame of critical geopolitics.Rather, my primary objective is to establishgeography as a whole as the obvious disciplineto carry a broad range of cultural, historical,political and economic inquiries into outerspace; inquiries that might freely draw, interalia, on Marxist, feminist, postcolonial, psy-choanalytic and deconstructive readingsof geopower (this list is not intended to beprogrammatic; it is only a starting point).One model for this work might be the recent

rediscovery of the sea in geographical re-search (see Lambert et al., 2006). The seais being reconceptualized in geography notas an undifferentiated emptiness betweenthe land, but as a culturally configured site ofknowledge and power where philosophical,scientific and aesthetic discourses intersectwith socio-economic, technological andpolitical forces (MacDonald, 2006b: 630).



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This comparison is relevant not least because,as I shall later discuss, the current architects oforbital supremacy take their inspiration fromthe naval geostrategies of Halford Mackinderand Alfred Thayer Mahan (Mahan, 1890;Mackinder, 1902; Gray, 1996; 2005; France,

2000; Fox, 2001; Dolman, 2002; Klein, 2004).Indeed, the classical geopolitical tradition even its fascist variant ofGeopolitik is suchan animating force for contemporary strategicthinking on space that it has been refashionedas astropolitics and, somewhat more worry-ingly, asAstropolitik (Dolman, 1999; 2002).

This paper sets out to critique the new bodyof astro-knowledge by engaging the diverseperspectives of critical human geography. Oneparadox of our current phase of space devel-

opment is that, unlike in the 1960s, popularimagination and interest has arguably not keptpace with technology. We are uncertain asto whether space exploration is a failed mod-ernist dream or a new window into a tran-scendent future (Benjamin, 2003). In this gaplies a profound ambivalence that may accountfor why geographers have neglected thecelestial realm. In advocating that geographyshould take outer space seriously, I do notpresent this as a new direction but rather, in

section II below, I frame this project as a re-turn to a much older early-modern tradition ofgeographical inquiry. In section III, I considerhow the spaces of Earth and Earths orbit arecoproduced through military strategy, satellitesurveillance and the everyday application ofspace technology. Finally, section IV turns tothe emerging field of astropolitics, particularlythe work of Everett Dolman, who has soughtinspiration from classical geopolitics in orderto strategize a future of monolithic American

hegemony in outer space (Dolman, 2002).

II The orbit of geographyThe first and most important point to makehere is that the project of this paper is not asearch for the new. It is not, I hope, a modishreinvention of geography that trades on thecommodious meaning of the word space.Rather, I want to frame the paper as boldly

going back to some of geographys earlierorigins. If outer space is a scale that for themost part feels unfamiliar, such limited dis-ciplinary horizons are, paradoxically, a late-modern tendency. Five centuries ago a moreexpansive geographical imagination was

at work. Tracing the intellectual buildingblocks of geographical knowledge in thesixteenth century, David Livingstone hasshown how astronomical inquiry and thestudy of cosmography aimed to connectthe workings of heaven and earth. In figureslike the scholar-mathematician John Dee(15271608), Livingstone sees an early effortto explore the intimate relationships be-tween human affairs and the celestialforces of the heavenly spheres (Livingstone,

1992: 77). Dees conception of the universe,informed by natural philosophy as well asreligion and magic, held to the principle asabove so below, thereby forging a chainof continuous causation between the ter-restrial and the celestial (Livingstone, 1992:78). Writings on astrology were clearly partof geographys early-modern heritage, themovements of the stars being afforded sig-nificance in the outcome of worldly affairs.The planetary scale formed the background

to much geographical teaching in this periodand mapping the heavens was a task of nolittle importance, an endeavour which hascontinued to the present day. If the astro-nomical legacy in geography has waned,the geographical legacy in astronomy hasremained strong; indeed, the term celestialmapping is still used in contemporary sci-entific parlance. Astronomical geography,it should be stressed, was not always a spe-cialist knowledge. Leafing through the pages

of an old geography book, I recently cameacross a loose insert (Figure 1) advertisinga nineteenth-century popular classic: ElijahBurritts Geography of the heavens withaccompanying Celestial atlas (Burritt, 1873).The fact that this book was designed for usenot only in schools but also in seminariesperhaps says something about the affectivequalities of outer space as a site of religious or



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cosmological significance. The night sky has,

of course, often been charged with a sense ofthe afterlife. While it would be unwise to gliblyconflate the terms space and heaven, thereis clearly some interesting work that could bedone here, remembering that heaven is noless a geographical imaginary than the Orientor the Occident. Indeed, access to heavenand other seemingly premodern eschatologicalquestions are becoming increasingly promin-ent geopolitical themes, from American evan-gelicalism to Wahibi Islam.1

My basic claim, then, is that a geographicalconcern with outer space is an old project, nota new one. A closely related argument is that ageography of outer space is a logical extensionof earlier geographies of imperial exploration(for instance, Smith and Godlewska, 1994;Driver, 2001). Space exploration has used ex-actly the same discourses, the same rationales,and even the same institutional frameworks

(such as the International Geophysical Year,

195758) as terrestrial exploration. Like itsterrestrial counterpart, the move into spacehas its origins in older imperial enterprises.Marina Benjamin, for instance, argues thatfor the United States outer space was alwaysa metaphorical extension of the AmericanWest (Benjamin, 2003: 46). Looking at theimbricated narratives of colonialism and theArianne space programme in French Guiana,the anthropologist Peter Redfield makes thecase that outer space reflects a practical

shadow of empire (Redfield, 2002: 795; seealso Redfield, 2000). The historian of scienceRichard Sorrenson, writing about the ship asgeographys scientific instrument in the ageof high empire, draws on the work of DavidDeVorkin to argue that the V-2 missile wasits natural successor (Sorrenson, 1996: 228;see also DeVorkin, 1992). A version of the V-2 the two-stage Bumper WAC Corporal

Figure 1 Advertisement for Burritts Geography of the heavens, found loose inanother bookSource:the author.



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became the first earthly object to penetrateouter space, reaching an altitude of 244 mileson 24 February 1949 (Army Ballistic MissileAgency, 1961). Moreover, out of this postwarallied V-2 programme came the means bywhich Britain attempted to reassert its geo-

political might in the context of its own ailingempire. In 1954, when America sold Britainits first nuclear missile a refined version ofthe WAC Corporal its possession was seenas a shortcut back to the international stageat a time when Britains colonial power waswaning fast (Clark, 1994; MacDonald, 2006a).Even if the political geography literature hasscarcely engaged with outer space, the adventof rocketry was basically Cold War (imperial)geopolitics under another name. Space ex-

ploration then, from its earliest origins to thepresent day, has been about familiar terrestrialand ideological struggles here on Earth.

1 Geographies from spaceIn this discussion so far, I have been drawingattention to geographys recent failure toengage outer space as a sphere of inquiryand it is important to clarify that this in-dictment applies more to human than tophysical geography. There are, of course,

many biophysical currents of geography thatdirectly draw on satellite technologies forremote sensing. The ability to view the Earthfrom space, particularly through the Landsatprogramme, was a singular step forward inunderstanding all manner of Earth surfaceprocesses and biogeographical patterns(see Mack, 1990). The fact that this newtranche of data came largely from militaryplatforms (often under the guise of dual use)was rarely considered an obstacle to science.

But, as the range of geographical applicationsof satellite imagery have increased to includesuch diverse activities as urban planning andice cap measurements, so too has a certain re-flexivity about the provenance of the images.It is not enough, some are realizing, to sayI just observe and explain desertificationand I have nothing to do with the military;rather, scientists need to acknowledge the

overall context that gives them access to thisdata in the first place (Cervino et al., 2003:236). One thinks here of the case of Peru,whose US grant funding for agricultural useof Landsat data increased dramatically in the1980s when the same images were found to

be useful in locating insurgent activities ofMaoist Shining Path guerrillas (Schwartz,1996). More recently, NASAs civilian Sea-Wide Field Studies (Sea-WiFS) programmewas used to identify Taliban forces during thewar in Afghanistan (Caracciolo, 2004). Thepractice of geography, in these cases as withso many others, is bound up with militarylogics (Smith, 1992); the development ofGeographical Information Systems (GIS)being a much-cited recent example (Pickles,

1995; 2004; Cloud, 2001; 2002; see Beck,2003, for a case study of GIS in the service ofthe war on terror).

Aside from military space applications,to which I will later return, one of the mostsignificant geographical engagements withouter space is in the sphere of planetarygeomorphology. There is a vast literature onsurface processes on the moon and on theother inner planets (Mars, Mercury and Venus)in journals such asIcarus andJournal of Geo-

physical Research (for an introduction, seeSummerfield, 1991). Terrestrial landscapesbecome analogues for interpreting remotelysensed images of planetary bodies, whichhas in turn heightened the importance ofsatellite imagery in understanding Earthsurface processes. One of the very few pointsof common reference in physical and humangeographical considerations of outer spaceis the imagery from the US Apollo space pro-gramme. While geomorphologists have

examined photographs of the lunar surface tocast light on, for example, cratering and massmovement, Denis Cosgrove has attended tothe cultural significance of the now iconicApollo photographs The Whole Earth,Earthrise and 22727 (Cosgrove, 1994;2001a). Cosgrove outlines the momentousimport of the western conception of theEarth as a globe, which culminated in photo-



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graphing the earth from space to provide anApollonian gaze that had been dreamedabout since the age of Cicero (Cosgrove,2001a).2 Despite his claim that geography isnot a lunar practice, Cosgrove is rare amongcontemporary human geographers in think-ing beyond the terrestrial (Cosgrove, 2001b;2004). But even the Apollos eye views, asJames Sidaway (2005: 71) has argued, embodytheir own particular geography. Sidaway pre-sents a critical visual exegesis of the cover ofHardt and Negris Empire, showing how aphotograph of the Earth innocently chosenby the publisher is itself predicated on a matrixof geo-political-ecologies the Cold War;the aeronautical agency of the pre-eminentcapitalist state; corporate copyright controls whose operations are purportedly the subjectof the book (Hardt and Negri, 2000). ForSidaway, the image signifies empire in waysunanticipated by the authors ofEmpire.Another exception to geographys prevailingworldliness, though not one that deals withouter spaceper se, is Rob Kitchin and JamesKneales collection of essays on geographiesof science fiction, Lost in space (Kitchin andKneale, 2002). In these essays, literary formquite rightly determines the genre rather thannecessarily requiring an outer space setting.The most explicit extraterrestrial treatmentsby geographers are by Jason Dittmer andMaria Lane who examine how a Martian geo-graphy has been produced through particulardiscourses of scientific advancement, placenaming and colonial exploration (Dittmer,2006; Lane 2005; 2006).

2 Geo-graphies of space

In all these geographical precedents, theenabling character and production ofspaceitselftends to be assumed. This much is alsotrue for some of the literature from Sociologyof Scientific Knowledge (SSK) and Science,Technology and Society (STS) concernedwith missile or space technology. Both ofthese fields have done much to expose thecontingency of technological outcomes and

to denaturalize the inevitability of technicalprogress (Mackenzie, 1990; Mack, 1990;Mort, 2002). However, the key monographson missile and satellite programmes by DonaldMackenzie, Pamela Mack and Maggie Mort,while taking a broadly SSK or STS approach,do not for the most part apply this perspectivespecifically to outer space. Only Peter Red-field, writing in Social Studies of Science,conceives space as a problematic which callsinto question some of the cherished tenets ofcontemporary social theory (Redfield, 2002).Where, for instance, does the study of outerspace leave political discourses of grounded-ness (Massey, 2005) or grass-roots? Or, forthat matter, the repeated mantra (especiallyprominent in sociologies of science and his-tories of geography) that all knowledge islocal (see Geertz, 1983: 4)? All knowledges,practices and objects may indeed be local,but are they equally local? asks Redfield(2002: 792). This point also has a bearingon the feminist argument, very familiarto geographers, about the situatedness ofknowledge and vision. There is a vast litera-ture in geography which critiques the notionof an Olympian view, arguing instead fora politics and an epistemology of location,positioning and (once again) groundedness.Informed by Donna Haraways work, itmakes the case that partiality rather thanuniversality is the basis from which we shouldmake rational knowledge claims (Haraway,1991). How will this argument fare in an erawhen there is no point on the Earths sur-face, nor in the Earths atmosphere (noreven, increasingly, below the Earths surface)that is not subject to the gaze of satellite

surveillance? This is not to question the pol-itical necessity of Haraways disclosure ofposition nor to suggest that a view fromspace is anything other than situated butto draw attention to the changing circum-stances in which this tactic might be deployed,remembering too that a satellite is a greatdeal more Olympian than Mount Olympus.It seems that, literally and figuratively, it



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is this god-trick so explicitly forbidden byHaraway that is now the primary goal ofastrostrategy (Haraway, 1991: 195).

Another problem: where does a geographyof or from outer space leave the question ofscale? Notwithstanding a recent move to

abolish scale altogether (Marstonet al., 2005),human geography has tended towards ahierarchy of (nested) scales with global al-ways on top: we have global capital, cities,flows, resistance, not forgetting hoary oldglobalization. The globe itself is a geograph-ical imaginary (Cosgrove, 2001a); as DerekGregory has argued, the global is not theuniversal but is itself a situated construction(Gregory, 1994: 204; original emphasis). Yetthe space from which the globe can be appre-

hended is not given much regard. Moreover,the language of the global seems somewhatill equipped to come to terms with the waysin which the outer-Earth and other extra-terrestrial spaces are already part of oureveryday lives. These then are just some ofthe many questions that a geographyofspacemight un-Earth.

It is worth pausing to consider some ofcharacteristics which enable or constrainhuman activity in outer space. In this discus-

sion I am primarily dealing with Earthsorbit rather than with the wider realm ofinner planetary space (that which containsMercury, Venus and Mars) or with the en-tire solar system. Earths orbit is where mosthuman activity is concentrated and conse-quently it is the most strategically valuable.So to some basics: in what sense does spacehave a geography? A helpful description ofthe astropolitical environment by EverettDolman suggests that space has a distinct

and definable geography and identifies a fewsalient features (Dolman, 2002: 60).3 Thedeterminant astropolitical characteristicsare: the Earths mass (which determines itsgravitational pull); its orbit; and its relationto other space phenomena. These produce acertain topography of gravitational mountainsand valleys. Without going into the detail ofcelestial mechanics, one can imagine the

Earth at the bottom of a gravity well orvalley which any space vehicle must escape,at enormous energy expenditure, to reach astable orbit or plateau. Most spacecraft aimto secure a stable orbit (an orbit being simplypath of a falling object caught in the grip

of gravity) which has a precise operationaltrajectory. Once in orbit, a spacecraft expendsno energy: it should be clear, therefore, thatthe potential for feasibly moving objectsthrough space is almost entirely dependenton harnessing the forces of celestial mech-anics. While space might seem like a vastundifferentiated expanse through which aspacecraft could move in any direction, thereality of gravitational pull and the cost ofcarrying fuel into space means that efficient

travel must make use of particular well-wornpaths. As with the terrestrial environment,there are natural lines of travel (HohmanTransfer Routes), strategically desirableareas of high ground (geostationary orbits;Lagrange Libration Points) and particularchoke points through which one must pass.

Different orbits have different astro-political purposes. The most crowded portionof space is the Lower Earth Orbit (LEO),between 150 and 800 km above the surface

of the Earth. This is the most accessible part ofspace (in terms of energy expenditure), andthe most useful for reconnaissance satellitesand manned flight missions.Medium-altitudeorbits (MEO) range from 800 to 35,000 kmand are often used for navigational satellites(like the American GPS network). High-altitude orbits exceed 35,000 km and providethe maximum coverage of the Earth with aminimum number of satellites. Of particularinterest here is Geostationary Orbit (GEO)

whereby the orbital period is identical toone full rotation of the earth such that a satel-lite at 0 inclination (ie, above the equator)will appear stationary from any fixed pointon Earth. This enables near-continuous con-tact with the Earth, so it is particularly usefulfor global communications and weathersatellites. These then are some of the environ-mental features which influence (rather than



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determine) the colonization of outer spaceand the extent to which any aspiring powercan maintain astropolitical dominance. I shallreturn to this when discussing the theory andpractice of astropolitics.

The historic relationship between know-

ing a space and exerting political and stra-tegic dominion over it is entirely familiar togeographers. Just as the geographicalknowledge of Empire enabled its militarysubjugation, colonization, and ultimately itsecological despoliation, this same pattern isbeing repeated in the twenty-first-centuryfrontier.4 It is also worth remembering thatthe geographies of imperialism are made notgiven. In what follows, I want to examinehow the geographies of outer space are being

produced in and through contemporary sociallife on Earth. Such an account inevitablythrows up some concerns about the politicsand socialities of the new space age. Againstthis background, I set my argument on atrajectory which is intermittently guided bytwo key writers on technology with verydifferent sensibilities. It is my intention tohold a line between the dark anticipations ofPaul Virilio and the resplendent optimism ofNigel Thrift. This discursive flight may well

veer off course; such are the contingencies ofnavigating space.

III Militarization, surveillance and thepolitics of a-wherenessThe most striking aspect of the sociality ofouter space is the extent to which it is, andalways has been, thoroughly militarized. The1967 UN Outer Space Treaty banned nuclearweapons in space, on the moon or on othercelestial bodies, and contained a directive to

use outer space for peaceful purposes. Butits attempt to prohibit the weaponizing ofspace was always interpreted in the loosestpossible manner. The signatories to the OSTin Washington, London and Moscow were inno doubt that space exploration was primarilyabout military strategy; that the ability to senda rocket into space was conspicuous evidenceof the ability to dispatch a nuclear device to

the other side of the world. This associationremains strong, as the concern over Iransspace programme (with its Shahab family ofmedium range missiles and satellite launchvehicles) makes clear. Several commentatorsin strategic affairs have noted the expanding

geography of war from the two dimensions ofland and sea to the air warfare of the twen-tieth century and more recently to the newstrategic challenges of outer space and cyber-space (see, for instance, Gray, 2005: 154).These latter dimensions are not separatefrom the battle-field but rather they fullysupport the traditional military objectives ofkilling people and destroying infrastructure.Space itself may hold few human targets butthe capture or disruption of satellites could

have far-reaching consequences for life onthe ground. Strictly speaking, we have not yetseen warfare in space, or even from space,but the advent of such a conflict does appearcloser.

In post-Cold-War unipolar times the stra-tegic rationale for the United States to main-tain the prohibition against weaponizingspace is diminishing (Lambakis, 2003), evenif the rest of the world wishes it otherwise.In 2000, a UN General Assembly resolution

on the Prevention of an Arms Race in OuterSpace was adopted by a majority of 1630with 3 abstentions: the United States, Israeland the Federated States of Micronesia(United Nations, 2000). Less than two monthslater, a US Government committee chairedby Donald Rumsfeld5 issued a report warningthat the relative dependence of the US onspace makes its space systems potentiallyattractive targets; the United States thusfaced the danger, it argued, of a Space Pearl

Harbor (Rumsfeld, 2001: viii). As spacewarfare was, according to the report, a virtualcertainty, the United States must ensure con-tinuing superiority (Rumsfeld, 2001: viii). Thisargument was qualified by obligatory gesturestowards the peaceful use of outer space butthe report left little doubt about the directionof American space policy. Any difficult ques-tions about the further militarization (and



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even weaponization) of space could beeasily avoided under the guise of developingdual-use (military/civilian) technology andemphasizing the role of military applicationsin peacekeeping operations. Through suchrhetoric, NATOs satellite-guided bombing

of a Serbian TV station on 23 April 1999 couldhave been readily accommodated underthe OST injunction to use outer space forpeaceful purposes (Cervino et al., 2003).Since that time new theatres of operationhave been opened up in Afghanistan andIraq, for further trials of space-enabled war-fare that aimed to provide aerial omnisciencefor the precision delivery of shock and awe.What Benjamin Lambeth has called theaccomplishment of air and space power has

since been called into question by the all tooapparent limitations of satellite intelligencein the tasks of identifying Iraqi Weapons ofMass Destruction or in stemming the growingnumber of Allied dead and wounded frommodestly armed urban insurgents (Lambeth,1999; Graham, 2004; Gregory, 2004: 205).For all its limitations, even this imagery hasbeen shielded from independent scrutiny bythe military monopolization of commercialsatellite outputs (Livingstone and Robinson,

2003). Yet, far from undermining Allied con-fidence in satellite imagery or in a cosmic viewof war (Kaplan, 2006), it is precisely theseabstract photocartographies of violence detached from their visceral and bloodiedaccomplishments that have licensed, say,the destruction of Fallujah (Gregory, 2004: 162;Graham, 2005b). There remains, of course,a great deal more that can be said about thepolitics of these aerial perspectives than canbe discussed here (see, for instance, Gregory,

2004; Kaplan, 2006).The geopolitical effects of reconnaissancefrom space platforms are by no means con-fined to particular episodes of military conflict.Like the high-altitude spy plane, its Cold Warprecursor, satellite surveillance also givesstrategic and diplomatic powers. Unlike aerialphotography, however, satellite imagery isubiquitous and high-resolution, and offers

the potential for real-time surveillance.The emerging field of surveillance studies,strongly informed by critical geographicalthought, has opened to scrutiny the politicsand spaces of electronic observation (see,for instance, the new journal Surveillance andSociety). The writings of Foucault, particularlythose on panopticism, are an obvious influ-ence on this new work (Foucault, 1977; Wood,2003), but they have seldom been applied tothe realm of outer space. As Foucault pointedout, the power of Jeremy Benthams pan-opticon prison design is enacted throughthe prisonersubjects internalizing the dis-ciplinary gaze: the presence of the gaolerwas immaterial, as the burden of watchingwas left to the watched. Similarly, the power

of panoptic orbital surveillance lies in itsnormalizing geopolitical effects.

If the geopolitics of surveillance is par-ticularly evident at the level of the state, itapplies also to the organization of the dailyactivities of its citizens (Molz, 2006). GPS tech-nology is perhaps the most evident incursionof space-enabled military surveillance systemsinto everyday life, becoming an indispensablemeans of monitoring the location of peopleand things. For instance, the manufacturer

Pro Tech, riding the wave of public concernabout paedophilia in Britain, has developedsystems currently being trialled by the UKHome Office to track the movements of regi-stered sex offenders (see also Monmonier,2002: 134). Somewhat predictably, given theapparent crisis in the spatialities of childhood(Joneset al., 2003), children are to be the nextsubjects of satellite surveillance. In December2005, the company mTrack launched i-Kids,a mobile phone/GPS unit that allows parents

to track their offspring by PC or on a WAP-enabled mobile phone. Those with petsrather than children might consider the $460RoamEO GPS system that attaches to yourdogs collar, should walkies ever get out ofhand. It will surprise no one that the same tech-nology gets used for less savoury purposes: aLos Angeles stalker was jailed for 16 monthsfor attaching a GPS device to his ex-girlfriends



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car (Teather, 2004). What is more startling,perhaps, is that one does not need to be a GPS-user to be subject to the surveillant possibilitiesof this technology. Anyone who leaves theirmobile phone unattended for five minutescan be tracked, not just by the security services,

but by any individual who has momentary ac-cess to enable the phone as a tracking device.For the purposes of a newspaper story, theGuardian journalist Ben Goldacre stalkedhis girlfriend by registering her phone on oneof many websites for the commercial trackingof employees and stock (Goldacre, 2006).The exercise revealed how easily everydaytechnologies like the mobile phone can bereconfigured for very different purposes.Even this modest labour in tracking a mobile

phone will become a thing of the past. Phoneswill be more specifically configured as a track-ing device: Nokia is due to release a GPS phonein 2007, while the Finnish company Benefonhas already launched its Twig Discovery, aphone that has a finder capability that locatesand tracks other contacts in your address book.Should the user come within range of anothercontact, the phone will send a message askingwhether you are willing to reveal your locationto this contact. If both parties are agreeable,

the phones will guide their users to eachother.In this way, the gadgetry of space-enabled

espionage is being woven into interpersonal aswell as interstate and citizenstate relations.If the movements of a car can be tracked bya jealous boyfriend, they can also be trackedby the state for the purposes of taxation: thisis surely the future of road tolls in the UK. ABritish insurance company is already usingsatellite technology to cut the premiums

for young drivers if they stay off the roadsbetween 11pm and 6am, when most accidentsoccur. Information about the time, durationand route of every single journey made bythe driver is recorded and sent back to thecompany (Bachelor, 2006). The success ofgeotechnologies will lie in these ordinary re-configurations of life such as tracking parcels,locating stolen cars, transport guidance or

assisting the navigation of the visually im-paired. Some might argue, however, thattheir impact will be more subtle still. Forinstance, Nigel Thrift locates the power ofnew forms of positioning in precognitivesociality and prereflexive practice, that is to

say in various kinds of culturally inculcatedcorporeal automatisms (Thrift, 2004b: 175).In other words, these sociotechnical changesmay become so incorporated into our uncon-scious that we simply cease to think about ourposition. Getting lost may become difficult(Thrift, 2004b: 188). Perhaps we are not atthat stage yet. But one can easily envisageGPS technologies enhancing existing in-equalities in the very near future, such asthe device that will warn the cautious urban

walker that they are entering a bad neigh-bourhood. In keeping with the logic of thepanopticon, this is less Big Brother than anarmy of little brothers: the social life of the newspace age is already beginning to look quitedifferent. And it is to this incipient militariza-tion of everyday life that the emerging litera-ture on military geographies (Woodward,2004; 2005) must surely turn its attention.

Mention must also be made of geofencingtechnologies. This is not merely a matter of

tracking dogs, children or friends, but an evenmore active expression of geographic power.Take, for example, the case of networkedcows.6 Zack Butler, an academic computerscientist at the Rochester Institute of Tech-nology, has pioneered a form of satelliteherding technology which would allow afarmer to move livestock by means of virtualfences controlled by a laptop computer:basically we downloaded the fences to thecows Butler told the New Scientist (2004).

Each cow wears a collar with a GPS cowbellthat activates a particular electric or soundstimulation which discourages the animalfrom proceeding in a given direction wheneverit arrives at the virtual fence. It is of passinginterest to learn that Butler also compares thisnew era of satellite-guided farming to playinga computer game. This may be a relativelyminor example, but it gives some indication of



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the potentially wide array of applications thatawait geofencing technologies.

Many of these space-enabled develop-ments have, unaccountably, been neglectedby the mainstream of geography. For instance,Barney Warf makes the comment that to date,

satellites remain a black hole in the geographicalliterature on communications (Warf, 2006: 2).Yet these technologies underwrite an array ofpotentially new subjectivities, modes of thinkingand ways of being whose amorphous shapehas recently been given outline by Thrift in aseries of original and perceptive essays (Thrift,2004a; 2004b; 2005a). He draws our attentionto assemblages of software, hardware, newforms of address and locatability, new kindsof background calculation and processing, that

constitute more active and recursive every-day environments. The background hum ofcomputation that makes western life possible,he argues, has been for the most part inaudibleto social researchers. Of particular interest toThrift is the tendency towards making differentparts of the world locatable and transposablewithin a global architecture of address (Thrift,2004a: 588), which is, of course, the ultimateachievement of Global Navigation SatelliteSystems (GNSS), of which GPS is the current

market leader. On the back of the absolutespace of GPS and its ancillary cartographicachievements (Pickles, 2004) have emergedother (relational) spatial imaginaries and newperceptual capacities, whereby the abilityto determine ones location and that of otherpeople and things is increasingly a matter ofhuman precognition (Thrift, 2005a: 472). Dis-solving any neat distinction between natureand technology, this new faculty of techno-intelligence can support quite different modes

of sensory experience. Thrift offers the terma-whereness to describe these new spatialmodalities that are formed when what used tobe called technology has moved so decisivelyinto the interstices of the active percipienceof everyday life (Thrift, 2005a: 472; see alsoMassey and Thrift, 2003: 291).

For all its clunky punnage, a-wherenessnevertheless gives a name to a set of highly

contingent forms of subjectivity that are worthanticipating, even if, by Thrifts own admission,they remain necessarily speculative. Readingthis body of work can induce a certain vertigo,confronting potentially precipitous shifts inhuman sociality. The same sensation is also in-

duced by engagement with Paul Virilio (2005).But, unlike Virilio, Thrift casts off any senseof foreboding (Thrift, 2005b) and insteadembraces the construction of new qualities(conventions, techniques, forms, genres, con-cepts and even senses), which in turn openup new ethicopolitical possibilities (Thrift,2004a: 583). It is important not to jettison thisopenness lightly. Even so, I remain circumspectabout the social relations that underwritethese emergent qualities, and I am puzzled

by Thrifts disregard of the (geo)political con-texts within which these new technologieshave come to prominence. A critical geographyshould, I think, be alert to the ways in which stateand corporate power are immanent withinthese technologies, actively strategizing newpossibilities for capital accumulation and mili-tary neoliberalism. To the extent that we cansensibly talk about a-whereness it is surelya function of a new turn in capitalism, whichhas arguably expanded beyond the frame (but

not the reach) of Marx and Engels when theywrote that:

the need for a constantly expanding marketfor its products chases the bourgeoisie overthe whole surface of the globe. It must nestleeverywhere, settle everywhere, establishconnections everywhere. (Marx and Engels,1998: 39)

The current struggle for orbital supremacy, asthe next section will make clear, is an exten-sion of these relations into space in order toconsolidate them back on Earth. Indeed, outerspace may become, to use David Harveysterm, a spatio-temporal fix that can respondto crises of over-accumulation (Harvey, 2003:43). While this might seem like shorthand forthe sort of Marxist critique that Thrift rejects(Amin and Thrift, 2005), it is an analysis thatis also shared by the advocates of American



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Astropolitik, who describe space as themeans by which capitalism will never reachwealth saturation (Dolman, 2002: 175). Theproduction of (outer) space should, I think, beunderstood in this wider context.

To illustrate this discussion, it is worth

returning to the example of GNSS (GPS andits new European competitor, Galileo), giventhe centrality of positioning technologiesto the tendencies that Thrift describes. Let usnot neglect the significance of these changes(which, to his great credit, Thrift is among theearliest in the social sciences to recognize).We are potentially talking about an end tothe ordinary meaning of the question Wheream I?. In a development comparable to thenineteenth-century standardization of clock

time for the measurement of labour, GNSStechnology has conquered space; it is becom-ing part of the computational backgroundto everyday life an epistemic wallpaper aform which, like clock time, structures sociallife but is relatively invisible because of itsutter familiarity (Thrift, 2004a). GNSS repre-sents a standardization of space in terms of aEuclidean topology or system of coordinates the most absolute of absolute spaces (Thrift,2004a: 600) which, while not new in its con-

ception, has only been fully realized with theadvent of satellites and atomic clocks. Fromnow on, every corner of the globe can be givenan address to an accuracy of 4 m, allowing, aswe have already seen, for an unprecedentedability to track people and things.

But such technology did not just emerge.Rather, the example of the American GPSshows how military systems for missile guid-ance were gradually refined for civilian use asthe commercial possibilities for innumerable

user applications have become more evident.The current global standard for position,velocity and timing information, GPS wasforged in the Cold War, originating in the sci-ence of monitoring the Russian Sputnik. Anearly version quickly found its principal usedetermining the exact locations of Americansubmarines in order to accurately deploy thePolaris nuclear missile (Beidleman, 2005: 121).

The potential civilian utility of the technologywas not widely publicized until 1983 when aKorean passenger aircraft (KAL 007), boundfor Seoul, accidentally strayed over Soviet air-space and was shot down by jet interceptors.Outraged by the episode, President Ronald

Reagan announced that when the full GPSconstellation was operational the data could beused for civil aviation. However, as GPS wasa military support system tailored for missileguidance, the USA was unwilling to make anaccurate signal widely and freely available; todo so, it was thought, could assist an enemy intargeting the USA. The civilian GPS signal wastherefore deliberately degraded to 100 m orso, until President Clinton eventually author-ized access to the 1020 m signal in 2000.

Since then, GPS has become so hard-wiredinto social and economic life on Earth that itscommercial and military rationales are moreevenly weighted. The value of the market atstake is considerable. In 2002, commercialservices based on free access to GPS hadestimated revenues of $12 billion; the globalmarket for services and receivers was expectedto reach40 billion by 2005 (Beidleman, 2005:134). Further, GPS has become crucial to somany of the routine infrastructural operations

of nation states, a dependence entirely basedon a continuing trust in the American provision.Should issues of (American) national securitybe at stake, however, the USA has made noguarantee of GPS signal quality. It is in thiscontext that the European Union has pursuedits own GNSS, Galileo, whose first satellite(GIOVE-A) started transmission in January2006 (Figure 2). The pan-European supportfor Galileo revealed a widespread concernamong member states that having such basic

infrastructure ultimately subject to the controlof a foreign power was a breach of Europeansovereignty. Indeed French President Chiracwent so far as to warn that failing to supportGalileo would inevitably lead to [Europe]becoming vassals of the United States(quoted in Beidleman, 2005: 129). The initialAmerican response to Galileo was outrightdiplomatic opposition coupled with a certain



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doubt that the European Space Agency couldmanage the political and technical coordinationnecessary to complete the project. The likeli-hood that Galileo will be successful has, how-ever, brought about a major challenge toAmerican orbital supremacy. An agreementto standardize signal protocol means thatGalileo will not disrupt GPS signals, but theEuropean system makes it much more difficultfor the USA to deny positioning data to userswith potentially hostile intent. The fact thatother non-European states, including China,Israel, Ukraine, India, Morocco, Saudi Arabiaand South Korea, have also invested in the pro-ject has been disconcerting for the USA. Evenmore worrying is the anticipated portion ofmarket share that Galileo may acquire beforea planned accuracy upgrade to GPS can becompleted. The enhanced precision of Galileolooks set to generate new applications as well

as attract new users; a market penetration of13% in 2010 is expected to rise to 52% in 2020(Beidleman, 2005: 135).

Although Galileo has been presented as aninfrastructural and commercial asset designedspecifically for civilian purposes, anotherlargely unspoken rationale is undoubtedlyEU defence (Wilson, 2002: 5). Galileo willsurely underpin a future common Europeandefence policy, even if such a developmentcan be currently subsumed under the guiseof dual use. The European Advisory Groupon Aerospace notes that the well being ofthe [European space] industry depends ontwin pillars, namely civil and defence. Theseare both complementary and mutually de-pendent (quoted in Cervinoet al., 2003: 233).The notion of dual use is convenient for gov-ernments because it mitigates against de-clining public defence research budgets. But

Figure 2 An artists impression of European Space Agencys GIOVE-A, being thefirst satellite of the European Galileo constellationSource: European Space Agency.



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there are, I think, grounds for concern aboutit in this case. Investment in what seems to becivilian infrastructure can easily become, at thesame time, an extension of the militarizationand, potentially, the weaponization of space,particularly in an era when warfare is increas-

ingly being couched in humanitarian terms.A team of Italian atmospheric scientists haverightly expressed misgivings that the com-mercial competition in space technology isbecoming a de facto arms race that furtherundermines confidence in UN OST spacegovernance (Cervinoet al., 2003).

I should emphasize that I am not advancingsome technologically determinist argumentto the effect that if something is military inorigin it is somehow tainted or forever in

the service of militarism. Walter Benjaminreminds us that the meaning of technologyhas no umbilical link to its origins: he notedthat the Eiffel Tower found its purpose asa military radio transmitter long after it hadbeen built simply as a monument to industrialconfidence in iron (Benjamin, 1999: 568).But we should be concerned when the needsof basic civilian infrastructure come to beregarded as coterminous with those of militarystrategy, particularly in circumstances when

technologies of the state are so readily adapt-able to monitoring the lives of its citizenry.Another consequence of this conflation isthat dual-use systems underpinning normallife have become a ready target of militaryefforts, being exempt from the usual civilianprotections of international law (Graham,2005c). To use Stephen Grahams phrase,US air and space power is increasingly aimedat switching cities off (Graham, 2005c).This may very easily develop from targeting

electricity networks (Belgrade, Baghdad,Beirut) to the destruction of satellite provisionon which so much of our civilian infrastructuredepends. As Tim Luke observed:

many more human beings live highly cyber-organized lives, totally dependent upon theDenature of machinic ensembles with theirelaborate extra-terrestrial ecologies of mega-technical economics. This is true for the

Rwandans in the refugee camps of Zaire [sic]as it is for the Manhattanites in the luxurycoops of New York City. (Luke, quoted inGraham, 2005c: 171)

I am reluctant to reiterate Paul Virilios pre-occupation with the crash and the accidentas defining features of modernity (Virilio,2000; Leslie, 2000), but one cannot avoid thefact that systems that have become vital forsustaining our current mode of existence arenow obvious and accessible targets. Concernshave even been raised that constellationsof satellites are vulnerable to hackers withdestructive intent (Kent, 2006). The point ofall this gloomy talk is to qualify rather than tooverturn the emphases of Nigel Thrifts recentwork. Moreover, I hope to contextualize some

of the tendencies Thrift describes within thesystems of geopower from which they havematerialized. In the final section I want toshow something of the strategic struggle forspace; a struggle that is by no means distantfrom the discipline of geography.

IV Critical astropoliticsTwo things should now be clear. First, outerspace is no longer remote from our everydaylives; it is already profoundly implicated in the

ordinary workings of economy and society.Second, the import of space to civilian, com-mercial and, in particular, military objectives,means there is a great deal at stake in terms ofthe access to and control over Earths orbit.One cannot overstate this last point. Thenext few years may prove decisive in termsof establishing a regime of space control thatwill have profound implications for terrestrialgeopolitics. It is in this context that I wantto briefly introduce the emerging field of

astropolitics, defined as the study of therelationship between outer space terrain andtechnology and the development of politicaland military policy and strategy (Dolman,2002: 15). It is, in both theory and practice,a geopolitics of outer space. Everett Dolmanis one of the pioneers of the field. An ex-CIAintelligence analyst who teaches at the USAir Forces School of Advanced Airpower



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Studies, he publishes in journals that areperhaps unfamiliar to critical geographers,like the modestly titled Small Wars and In-surgencies. As what follows is uniformlycritical of Dolmans work, I should say thathis Astropolitik: classical geopolitics in thespace age (Dolman, 2002) is unquestionably asignificant book: it has defined a now vibrantfield of research and debate. Astropolitikdraws together a vast literature on spaceexploration and space policy, and presents alucid and accessible introduction to thinkingstrategically about space. (In the previoussection I drew heavily on Dolmans descrip-tion of the astropolitical environment.) Mycritique is not founded on scientific or tech-nical grounds but on Dolmans construction

of a formal geopolitics designed to advanceand legitimate the unilateral military conquestof space by the United States. While Dolmanhas many admirers among neoconservativecolleagues in Washington think-tanks, criticalengagements (eg, Moore, 2003; Caracciolo,2004) have been relatively thin on the ground.

Dolmans work is interesting for our pur-poses here precisely because he draws on geo-graphys back catalogue of strategic thinkers,most prominently Halford Mackinder, whose

ideas gained particular prominence in Americain the wake of the Russian Sputnik (Hooson,2004: 377). But Dolman is not just refashioningclassical geopolitics in the new garb ofastropolitics; he goes further and proposesan Astropolitik a simple but effectiveblueprint for space control (p. 9) modelledon Karl Hausofers Geopolitik as much asRealpolitik. Showing some discomfort withthe impeccably fascist pedigree of this theory,Dolman cautions against the misuse ofAstro-

politik and argues that the term is chosen as aconstant reminder of that past, and as a grimwarning for the future (Dolman, 2002: 3). Atthe same time, however, his book is basicallya manual for achieving space dominance.Projecting Mackinders famous thesis on thegeographical pivot of history (Mackinder,1904) onto outer space, Dolman argues that:who controls the Lower Earth Orbit controls

near-Earth space. Who controls near-Earthspace dominates Terra [Earth]. Who dominatesTerra determines the destiny of humankind.Dolman sees the quest for space as alreadyhaving followed classically Mackinderianprinciples (Dolman, 2002: 87). Like Mackinder

before him, Dolman is writing in the serviceof his empire. Astropolitik likeRealpolitik hewrites, is hardnosed and pragmatic, it is notpretty or uplifting or a joyous sermon for themasses. But neither is it evil. Its benevolenceor malevolence become apparent only as itis applied, and by whom (Dolman, 2002: 4).Further inspiration is drawn from Alfred ThayerMahan, whose classic volume The influence ofseapower upon history, has been widely citedby space strategists (Mahan, 1890; Gray, 1996;

see also Russell, 2006). Mahans discussionof the strategic value of coasts, harbours,well-worn sea paths and chokepoints has itsparallel in outer space (see France, 2000).The implication of Mahans work, Dolmanconcludes, is that the United States must beready and prepared, in Mahanian scrutiny, tocommit to the defense and maintenance ofthese assets, or relinquish them to a state will-ing and able to do so (Dolman, 2002: 37).

The primary problem for those advanc-

ing Astropolitik is that space is not a lawlessfrontier. In fact the legal character of spacehas long been enshrined in the principles ofthe OST and this has, to some extent, pre-vented it from being subject to unbridledinterstate competition. While it is morallydesirable to explore space in common with allpeoples, writes Dolman without conviction,even the thought of doing so makes wearythose who have the means (Dolman, 2002:135). Thus, the veneer of transcendent human-

ism with regard to space gives way to brazenself-interest. Accordingly, Dolman describesthe res communis consensus7 of the OST asa tragedy that has removed any legal in-centive for the exploitation of space (p. 137).Only ares nullius8 legal order could constructspace as proper objects for which statesmay compete (p. 138). Under the paradigmof res nullius andAstropolitik, the moon and



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other celestial bodies would become potentialnew territory for states. Here Dolman againparallels Karl Hausofers Geopolitik. Just asHausofer desired a break from the VersaillesTreaty ( Tuathail, 1996: 45), Dolman wantsto see the USA withdraw from the OST,

making full speed ahead for the moon (seealso Hickman and Dolman, 2002). Non-space-faring developing countries need not worryabout losing out, says Dolman, as they wouldown no less of the Moon than they do now(2002: 140).

To his credit, Dolman does give someattention to the divisive social consequencesof this concentrated power. Drawing on earliercurrents of environmental determinism and onthe terrestrial model of Antarctic exploration,

he ponders the characteristics of those whowill be first to colonize space. They will behighly educated, rigorously trained and psy-chologically screened for mental toughnessand decision-making skills, and very phy-sically fit; the best and brightest of our pilots,technicians and scientists; rational, givento scientific analysis and explanation, andobsessed with their professions (p. 26). Inother words, they are a superior subset of thelarger group from which they spring (p. 27).

As if this picture is not vivid enough, Dolmangoes on to say that colonizers of space willbe the most capably endowed (or at least themost ruthlessly suitable, as the populating ofAmerica and Australia so aptly illustrate[s])(p. 27; my emphasis). Duty and sacrifice willbe the highest moral ideals (p. 27). Society,he continues, must be prepared to makeheroes of those who undertake the risk ofexploration (p. 146). At the same time, theastropolitical society must be prepared to

forego expenditures on social programs tochannel funds into the national space program.It must be embued with the national spirit(p. 146).

Dolman slips from presenting what wouldbe merely a logical outworking ofAstropolitikto advocating that the United States adopt itas their space strategy. Along the way, he ac-knowledges the full anti-democratic potential

of such concentrated power, detaching thestate from its citizenry:

the United States can adopt any policy itwishes and the attitudes and reactions ofthe domestic public and of other states cando little to challenge it. So powerful is theUnited States that should it accept the harshRealpolitik doctrine in space that the militaryservices appear to be proposing, and givena proper explanation for employing it, theremay in fact be little if any opposition to a faitaccompli of total US domination in space.(Dolman, 2002: 156)

Although Dolman claims that no attemptwill be made to create a convincing argumentthat the United States has a right to domin-ation in space, in almost the next sentence

he goes on to argue that, in this case, mightdoes make right, the persuasiveness of thecase being based on the self-interest of thestate and stability of the system (2002: 156;my emphasis). Truly, this is Astropolitik: aveneration of the ineluctable logic of powerand the permanent rightness of those whowield it. If it sounds chillingly familiar, Dolmanhopes to reassure us with his belief that theUS form of liberal democracy is admirableand socially encompassing (p. 156) and it

is the most benign state that has ever at-tempted hegemony over the greater part ofthe world (p. 158). His sunny view that theUnited States is willing to extend legal andpolitical equality to all sits awkwardly withthe current suspension of the rule of law inGuantanamo Bay as well as in various otherspaces of exception (see Gregory, 2004;Agamben, 2005).

Dolmans astropolitical project is by nomeans exceptional. The journalAstropolitics,

of which he is a founding editor, containsnumerous papers expressing similar views. Itis easy, I think, for critical geographers to feel sosecure in the intellectual and political purchaseof Tuathailian critiques ( Tuathail, 1996),that we become oblivious to the undeadnature of classical geopolitics. It is comfortingto think that most geography undergraduatesencountering geopolitics, in the UK at least,



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will in all likelihood do so through the portalof critical perspectives, perhaps through theexcellent work of Joanne Sharp or Klaus Dodds(Dodds, 2005; Sharp, 2005). But the legaciesof Mackinder and Mahan live on, and radicalcritique is as urgent as ever. While this is not

the place for a thoroughgoing reappraisalof astropolitics in the manner of Gearid Tuathail, a few salient points from his critiquecan be brought out.

(1) Astrography and astropolitics, like geo-graphy and geopolitics, constitute a pol-itical domination and cultural imagining ofspace ( Tuathail, 1996: 28). While com-mentators like Colin Gray have posited aninescapable geography (eg, of course,physical geography is politically neutral),a critical agenda conceives of geographynot as a fixed substratum but as a highlysocial form of knowledge (Gray, 1999: 173; Tuathail, 1999: 109). For geography, readastrography. We must be alert to thedeclarative (this is how the Outer Earthis) and imperative (this is what we mustdo) modes of narration that astropoliticshas borrowed from its terrestrial ante-cedent ( Tuathail, 1999: 107). Themodels of Mackinder and Mahan thatare so often applied to the space environ-ment are not unchanging laws; on the con-trary they are themselves highly politicalattempts to create and sustain particularstrategic outcomes in specific historicalcircumstances.

(2) Rather than actively supporting thedominant structures and mechanisms ofpower, a critical astropolitics must placethe primacy of such forces always alreadyin question. Critical astropolitics aims toscrutinize the power politics of the expert/think-tank/tactician as part of a widerproject of deepening public debate andstrengthening democratic accountability( Tuathail, 1999: 108).

(3) Mackinders end of geography thesisheld that the era of terrestrial exploration

and discovery was over, leaving only thetask of consolidating the world order to fitBritish interests ( Tuathail, 1996: 27).Dolmans vision of space strategy bearsstriking similarities. Like Tuathailscritique of Mackinders imperial hubris,Astropolitik could be reasonably describedas triumphalism blind to its own precarious-ness ( Tuathail, 1996: 28). Dolman, forinstance, makes little effort to concealhis tumescent patriotism, observing thatthe United States is awash with powerafter its impressive victories in the 1991Gulf War and 1999 Kosovo campaign,and stands at the forefront of history cap-able of presiding over the birth of a boldNew World Order. One might argue,however, that Mackinder as the theoristof imperial decline may in this respectbe an appropriate mentor ( Tuathail,1999: 112). It is important, I think, todemystifyAstropolitik: there is nothinginevitable about US dominance in space,even if the USA were to pursue this im-perial logic.

(4) Again like Mackinder,Astropolitikmobilizesan unquestioned ethnocentrism. Implicit inthis ideology is the notion that Americamust beat China into space because theyare not like us. The most ruthlesslysuitable candidates for space dominance,we are told the most capably endowed are like those who populated America andAustralia (Dolman, 2002: 27).

(5) A critical astropolitics must challenge themythic properties ofAstropolitik anddisrupt its reverie for the timeless insightsof the so-called geopolitical masters. For Tuathail, geopolitics is mythic becauseit promises uncanny clarity in a complexworld and is fetishistically concernedwith . prophecy ( Tuathail, 1999:113). Tuathails critical project, by con-trast, seeks to recover the political andhistorical contexts through which theknowledge of Mackinder and Mahan hasbecome formalized.



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V ConclusionStephen Graham, following Eyal Weizmann,has argued that geopolitics is a flat discourse(Weizmann, 2002; Graham, 2004: 12). Itattends to the cartographic horizontalityof terrain rather than a verticality that cuts

through the urban landscape from the ad-vantage of orbital supremacy. Just as, forGraham, a critical geopolitics must urgentlyconsider this new axis in order to challengethe practices and assumptions of urbicide,so too I would argue it must lift its gazeto the politics of the overhead. Our interestin the vertical plane must extend beyondterrestrial perspectives; we must come toterms with the everyday realities of spaceexploration and domination as urgent sub-

jects of critical geographical inquiry. A pre-requisite for this agenda is to overcome oursense of the absurdity and oddity of space,an ambivalence that has not served humangeography well. The most obvious entrypoint is to think systematically about someof the more concrete expressions of outerspace in the making of Earthly geographies.For instance, many of the high-profile crit-ical commentaries on the recent war in Iraq,even those written from geographical per-

spectives, have been slow to address theorbital aspects of military supremacy (see,for instance, Harvey, 2003; Gregory, 2004;Retort, 2005). Suffice to say that, in war as inpeace, space matters on the ground, if indeedthe terrestrial and the celestial can be sensiblyindividuated in this way.

There is also, I think, scope for a wideragenda on the translation of particular Earthlyhistorical geographies into space, just asthere was a translation of early occidental

geographies onto imperial spaces. WhenDonald Rumsfeld talks of a Space PearlHarbor, there is plainly a particular set ofhistoricogeographical imaginaries at workthat give precedence, in this case, to Americanexperience. Rumsfeld has not been slow toinvoke Pearl Harbor, most famously in theaftermath of 11 September 2001; notably, inall these examples Hawaii in 1941; New York

in 2001; and the contemporary space race there lurks the suggestion of a threat fromthe East.9 All of this is a reminder that thecolonization of space, rather than being adecisive and transcendent break from thepast, is merely an extension of long-standing

regimes of power. As Peter Redfield suc-cinctly observed, to move into space is a formof return: it represents a passage forwardthrough the very pasts we might think weare leaving behind (Redfield, 2002: 814).This line of argument supports the idea thatspace is part and parcel of the Earths geo-graphy (Cosgrove, 2004: 222). We canconceive of the human geography of space asbeing, in the words of Doreen Massey, thesum of relations, connections, embodiments

and practices (Massey, 2005: 8). She goes onto say that these things are utterly everydayand grounded, at the same time as they may,when linked together, go around the world.To this we might add that they go aroundand beyond the world. The space of spaceis both terrestrial and extraterrestrial: it isthe relation of the Earth to its firmament.Lisa Parks and Ursula Biemann have de-scribed our relationship with orbits as beingabout uplinking and downlinking, [the]

translation [of] signals, making exchangeswith others and positioning the self (Parksand Biemann, 2003). It is precisely this rela-tional conception of space that might help-fully animate a revised geographical under-standing of the Outer Earth.

As has already been made clear, this sortof project is by no means new. Just as astro-politics situates itself within a Mackinderiangeographical tradition, so a critical geographyof outer space can draw on geographys early-

modern cosmographical origins, as well as onmore recent emancipatory perspectives thatmight interrogate the workings of race, class,gender and imperialism. Space is already beingproduced in and through Earthly regimes ofpower in ways that undoubtedly threatensocial justice and democracy. A critical geo-graphy of space, then, is not some far-fetchedor indulgent distraction from the real world;



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rather, as critical geographers we need tothink about the contest for outer space asbeing constitutive of numerous familiar oper-ations, not only in respect of internationalrelations and the conduct of war, but also tothe basic infrastructural maintenance of the

state and to the lives of its citizenry.Geography is already well placed to think

about these things; there are many well-worn lines of geographical critique that havetheir parallel in space. For instance, there arepressing environmental questions aboutthe pollution of Earths orbit with space junk,a development which is seriously comprom-ising the sustainable use of Lower EarthOrbit. This high-speed midden, already ofinterest to archaeologists (see Gorman, 2005),

is coming up for its 50th anniversary in 2007,after the launch of the Russian satellite Sputnikon 4 October 1957. Since then, the sheervariety and number of discarded objects is re-markable. From lens caps to astronaut faeces,the number of orbiting articles greater than10 cm in diameter currently being tracked isover 9000 (Brearley, 2005: 9). The ability tothink critically about nature conservationand heritage policy another aspect of thegeographers remit may also have an extra-

terrestrial transference, as wilderness andfirst contact paradigms look set to be mob-ilized in space (Cockell and Horneck, 2004;Rogers, 2004; Spennemann, 2004). Onemight further speculate that the economicgeography of outer space would be a rich, if asyet undeveloped, avenue of inquiry. A culturaland historical geography of space also offersnumerous flights of fancy, from questions ofastronautical embodiment to the politics ofplanetary representation. All of this is to say

that a geography of outer space should be abroad undertaking, aside from the obviousproject of a critical geo/astropolitics.

Lastly, a critical geography must not beoverly pessimistic, nor must it relinquish anengagement with space technology on thegrounds that this has, to date, been drivenlargely by military agendas. The means ofour critique may require us to adopt such

technologies, or at least to ask what opportu-nities they present for praxis. One thinks hereof various forms of playful and subversiveactivism, experiment and art-event thathave knowingly toyed with space hardware(Triscott and la Frenais, 2005; Spacearts,

2006). GPS receivers can help us think re-flexively about position (Parks, 2001); remotesensing can be used to explore politicalconditions in the world (Parks and Biemann,2003); amateur radio-telescopy can help usreconceptualize space by attuning us tothe sonorous qualities of its scientific data(Radioqualia, 2003); even rocket science canstill carry utopian freight (Chalcraft, 2006).Through such means, can space be given atruly human geography.

Acknowledgements

My thanks to Charlie Withers and DavidLivingstone who pointed me in some early-modern cosmographical directions; to KlausDodds for some helpful comments; to twoanonymous referees; to Angus McCoatupfor his inspiration; to Hayden Lorimer andNick Spedding for their wise counsel andperceptive remarks; and to Eleanor Collinsfor her peerless editing. I am also grateful

for the stimulating discussion of this paperwhen it was presented at seminars at theuniversities of Melborne, Edinburgh, Glasgowand Nottingham.

Notes1. One thinks here of the extraordinary popularity

in the USA of theLeft behind Christian dispensation-alist novels of Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins,which detail end time geopolitical catastrophesprior to the tribulation that will bring about theend of the world and the reign of heaven (see

Frykholm, 2004).2. Apollo was an Olympian deity considered to be the

god of all wisdom whose figure has been carefullycharted by Denis Cosgrove from classical Greeceto the US space programme. Cosgrove notes thatApollo embodies a desire for wholeness and a will topower, a dream of transcendence and an appeal toradiance (Cosgrove, 2001a: 2). The figure of Apollocontinues to work as a metonym for much of whatis discussed in this paper.



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3. What follows is taken from Everett Dolmans helpfuldiscussion of the space environment. Other writerslike Colin S. Gray (2005) also draw substantially onthis aspect of Dolmans work.

4. See Brearley (2005) on the pollution of outerspace.

5. As well as the chair of this committee, Donald

Rumsfeld was better known as the United StatesSecretary of Defense until his resignation inNovember 2006. The committee also includedLTG Jay Garner, an arms contractor who becamethe first US-appointed Director of Reconstruc-tion and Humanitarian Assistance in Iraq in 2003before he was replaced by Paul Bremer.

6. I am grateful to Melanie Thomson for drawing thisexample to my attention.

7. Res communis could be translated as a thing foreveryone. It is also conceived as res communishumanitatis (common property of all) and rescommunis omnium (space as the heritage of all

mankind). The res communis legal conception wasarrived at as a compromise in negotiations prior tothe OST (see Laver, 1986; Johnston, 1992; Hickmanand Dolman, 2002).

8. Res nullius translates as a thing for no one, andis this subject to the ancient legal principle resnullius naturaliter fit primi occupantis perhaps moreuniversally recognized in the playground phrasefinders, keepers!.

9. I am grateful to Klaus Dodds for this observation.

PostscriptSince submitting this paper, two key developments

have taken place that amplify the significance of myargument. Most notably, President Bush announceda bellicose new National Space Strategy in October2006 which, while more or less in line with the RumsfeldCommission report, is also a move in the direction ofAstropolitik. By way of response, on 11 January 2007the Peoples Republic of China confirmed that they hadsuccessfully tested an Anti-Satellite Weapon on oneof their own ageing weather satellites 500 miles intospace.

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