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have created a world in which there can be no
territory without a state. In this way, territory
has come to underpin bothnationalismand
representativedemocracy, both of which de-
pend critically on restricting political member-
ship byhomelandand address, respectively.
In political theory, control over a relatively
modest territory has long been seen as the pri-
mary solution to the ‘security dilemma’: to
offer protection to populations from the threats
of anarchy (disorder: cf.anarchism), on the
one hand, and hierarchy (distant rule and sub-
ordination), on the other. The problem has
been to define what is meant by ‘modest’ size.
To Montesquieu (1949 [1748], p. 122), the
enlightenmentphilosopher, different size ter-
ritories inevitably have different political forms:
‘It is, therefore, the natural property of small
states to be governed as a republic, of middling
ones to be subject to a monarch, and of large
empires to be swayed by a despotic prince.’
Early modern Europe offered propitious
circumstances for the emergence of a fragmen-
ted political system primarily because of its
topographical divisions. Montesquieu (1949
[1748], pp. 151–62) further notes, however,
that popular representation allows for the
territorial extension of republican government.
The founders of the USA added to this by
trying to balance between centralizing certain
securityfunctions, on one side, and retaining
local controls over many other functions, on
the other (Deudney, 2004). The recent history
of the European Union can be thought of in
similar terms (Milward, 2005).
Human activities in the world, however,
have never conformed entirely to spaces de-
fined by proximity as provided by territory.
Indeed, and increasingly, as physical distance
proves less of a barrier to movement, spatial
interaction between separated nodes across
networks is an important mechanism of geo-
graphical sorting and differentiation (Durand,
Le ́vy and Retaille ́, 1992). Sometimes posed
today in terms of a world offlowsversus a
world of territories, this is better thought of in
terms of territories and/or networks of flows
rather than one versus the other. Territories
and networks exist relationally rather than mu-
tually exclusively. If territorial regulation is all
about tying flows to places, territories have
never been zero-sum entities in which the
sharing of power or the existence of external
linkages totally undermines their capacity
to regulate. If at one time territorial states
did severely limit the local powers of trans-
territorial agencies, that this is no longer the
case does not signify that the states have lostall of their powers: ‘Territory still matters.
States remain the most effective governors of
populations.. .. The powers to exclude, to tax,
and to define political rights are those over
which states acquired a monopoly in the
seventeenth century. They remain the essen-
tials of state power and explain why state sov-
ereignty survives today and why it is
indispensable to the international order’
(Hirst, 2005, p. 45). jaaSuggested reading
Agnew (2005, ch. 3); Anderson (2002); Hirst
(2005); Paasi (1996).terrorism Organizedviolencethat deliber-
ately targets civilians and that is intended to
sow fear among a population for political pur-
poses. It is a deeply contested term, because
many writers restrict the term to non-state
actors and exclude thestatefrom the (direct)
use of such violence; they argue that since the
state lays claim to the legitimate use of phys-
ical force, then by definition it is incapable of
the deliberate targeting of a civilian popula-
tion, which is an offence under international
humanitarian law (seejust war). It then fol-
lows that all violent challenges to the authority
of the state, including armed resistance to
military occupation (seeoccupation, mili-
tary), risk being identified as terrorism.
Against this, others argue more persuasively
that states have often used violence to intimi-
date populations, either their own or those of
other countries, through a systematic assault
on ‘enemy, ‘alien’, ‘dissident’ or ‘subversive’
bodies and their associated places. Indeed, the
term originates in the Reign of Terror carried
out by the Committee of Public Safety in
1793–4 to purge the revolutionary French re-
public of its ‘internal enemies’. Modern state
terror includes both: (i) the exemplary vio-
lence of colonial wars and counter-insurgency,
Stalin’s campaign of terror against dissidents
in the 1930s, the German Blitz over London,
the holocaust, the saturation bombing
of German cities such as Hamburg and
Dresden, and the nuclear bombs dropped on
Nagasaki and Hiroshima during the Second
World War (Hewitt, 1987: see alsoethnic
cleansing;genocide); and also (ii) more in-
sidious forms of violence that work to extend
the envelope of fear within their target popu-
lations through arbitrary detention, disappear-
ance and torture (including the campaigns
perpetrated by authoritarian regimes in
Central and South America in the 1970s and
1980s, often with the support of the USA)Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_T Final Proof page 747 31.3.2009 9:40pm Compositor Name: ARajuTERRORISMTERRORISM