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National maps, digitalisation and neoliberal cartographies: transforming nation‐state practices and symbols in postcolonial Ecuador
Author(s) -
Radcliffe Sarah A
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
transactions of the institute of british geographers
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.196
H-Index - 107
eISSN - 1475-5661
pISSN - 0020-2754
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-5661.2009.00359.x
Subject(s) - state (computer science) , relation (database) , jigsaw , corporate governance , land titling , political science , neoliberalism (international relations) , geography , economy , sociology , political economy , land tenure , management , archaeology , pedagogy , algorithm , database , computer science , economics , agriculture
The paper explores the connection between computerised techniques of mapping and the role of maps in modern nationhood, interrogating the ways that maps are naturalised and deployed in postcolonial neoliberal statecraft. A case study of Ecuador demonstrates how the relationship between cartography and the nation‐state is being both altered and reaffirmed by new mapping practices and institutional processes. Despite neoliberalising moves to decentre state cartographers and the technological advances supporting the proliferation of national maps and map‐makers, Ecuadorian cartographies are still authorised by the nation‐state, as explored in relation to spatial information about the country, and in relation to the processes of land‐titling. Under neoliberal governance and with advanced mapping techniques, land‐titling produces small territories that replicate – in miniature – the jigsaw‐like and modular quality of national territories. As such, mappings of individual private properties produce the reality of neoliberal statecraft.