The Dictionary of Human Geography

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and occupied, and on the capacity to

mobilize troops to enforce public order.

In most cases,citiesfunction as the pivots

for all three, but during the US occupation

of Afghanistan, for example, it was (and

remains) far from clear how far the author-

ity of the USA and its proxies extended

into the countryside. The crucial import-

ance of cities also makes them centres of

rebellion and resistance to military occupa-

tion (Gregory, 2007).

 Contact zones. Many of the relations

imposed by occupying armies are intrinsic-

ally violent – including sexual violence,

arrest and imprisonment, forced labour

and evengenocide – but the occupied

also view interactions across the contact

zone in complex ways: Why are some con-

strued as collaboration, others as doing

business to survive and yet others as resist-

ance? During the US occupation of Iraq

from 2003 onwards, resistance increased

to the point at which it became increasingly

difficult to distinguish occupation from the

continuation of war (Gregory, 2004b).

It is not necessary to maintain a massive and

permanent military presence to continue an

occupation: Israel’s continued control over

Gaza and the West Bank rests on its capacity to

mobilize military force at will (‘incursions’) and

on the continuing development of colonies

(‘settlements’) as the eyes of what Segal and

Weizman (2003) call ‘a civilian occupation’.dg

Suggested reading

Benvenisti (2004); Weizman (2004).

oceans Even though the decline of sea travel

and diminishing dependence on self-supplied

foodsources has removed the maritime world

from the realm of landlubbers’ everyday

experience, the sea remains a crucial domain

for the essential wherewithal that sustains

humanity. Three perspectives have dominated

most studies of human–marine interactions:

the ocean as aresourceprovider, the ocean

as transport surface, and the ocean as a surface

for moving troops and projecting military

power. Embedded in each of these analytical

perspectives is a certain conception of ocean-

spaceand oceangovernance.

The value of the oceans to mankind has pol-

itical, social, economic, ecological and cultural

dimensions. Marine industries include fisher-

ies, mining, non-conventionalenergyindus-

tries, freshwaterproduction, coastal services,

environmental services, trade, tourism,

sub-marine telecommunications and fibre-

optic cable, safety and salvage, naval defence

and ocean-related education, training and

research. The economic importance of the

oceans is immense. According to the Inde-

pendent World Commission on the Oceans,

‘one recent study suggests that the sum total

of marine industries for which data are avail-

able, amounts to approximately US$ 1 trillion

out of a total global GDP of US$ 23 trillion’

(IWCO, 1998, p. 102).

Ecological services provided by various mar-

ine and coastalecosystemsof the Earth inc-

lude the regulation of gaseous exchange with

the atmosphere (e.g. the balance between car-

bon dioxide and oxygen, maintenance of

ozone for ultraviolet radiation protection), cli-

mate regulation, disturbance regulation (e.g.

storm protection, flood control), water supply,

cycling of nutrients, waste treatment, food

production and raw materials supply. The

value of these too is immense.

Climate change is also projected to have

effects such as global sea-level rise and inten-

sifyingglobal warming. According to a re-

cent Arctic Climate Impact Assessment report

(ACIA, 2004), the Arcticclimateis warming

rapidly, at almost twice the rate as the rest of

the world in the past two decades. At least half

the summer sea ice in the Arctic is projected to

melt by the end of this century, along with a

significant portion of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Climatic variations will have a large impact

on marine environments and marine-related

activities, including rising sea levels, changes

in ocean salinity (which could strongly affect

regional climate), the decline or extinction of

marine species due to habitat loss, expanding

marine shipping and the enhancement of some

major Arctic fisheries together with the decline

of others.

On 26 December 2004, the Indian Ocean

tsunami devastated coastal communities. In

its reports on the environmental impact of

the Tsunami in Sri Lanka and Maldives, the

United Nations Environmental Programme

(UNEP, 2006) has noted that coastal areas

where coral reefs, mangrove forests and nat-

ural vegetation had been removed suffered the

greatest damage. Fishing communities were

the worst hit. The challenges include not

only the restoration of the livelihood of fisher-

men and raising the income of coastal com-

munities above pre-tsunami levels, but also

capacity building to improve skills of boat

builders, enforcement of standards to reduce

potential risks to fishermen, and the revival

of the tsunami-hit aquaculture industry. sch

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