Critical Geopolitics and Geopolitical Imagination as a Research Methodology

Politics, as a form of human social activity, is strongly influenced by space. Space also significantly affects the social life of human communities and often becomes a major source of collective conflicts. From the perspective of research methodology, the fundamental weakness of classical geopolitics lies in its belief that geography and ‘objective geographical conditions’ predetermine how a nation’s leadership perceives its position in the world and formulates policies. However, the geopolitical character and foreign policy of a nation cannot be comprehensively understood without the consideration of national identity, national interests and foreign policy goals, and the ‘geopolitical imagination’ of various actors. The main problem with the historical ‘laws’ or ‘theories’ proposed by classical geopolitics is their disregard for the fact that the concepts of time and space are ultimately social constructs.Critical geopolitics refers to a specific research approach that emerged in the late 1980s and early 1990s, a group of studies that attempt to critically analyze traditional geopolitical attitudes. This paper aims to discuss the intellectual traditions that constitute critical geopolitics and its key characteristics in relation to research methods and geopolitical imagination. First, the intellectual traditions that have shaped critical geopolitics will be examined, followed by basic epistemological research hypotheses. Next, the paper investigates the most important factors that led to the emergence of critical geopolitics, namely its relationship to previous geopolitics, which will allow us to discuss its critique of the so-called ‘objectivity’ and ‘omniscient and comprehensive perspectives’ of the classical geopolitics, its critique of geopolitics as an instrumental form of knowledge, and the role of geopolitical theorists as intellectuals practicing the ‘art of governance’.The intellectual tradition of critical geopolitics has led to a renewed understanding of the role of space, particularly the function of geopolitical imagination, in political competition among human communities and in the conduct of political activities and decision-making processes. While the world and space may appear the same to everyone, the ways in which they are interpreted are far from uniform, and our thoughts or concepts about the spaces can vary greatly. Therefore, it will become increasingly important to study how imaginations of space and geography are formed, how ideas or notions of the world are represented, and the role of geopolitical imagination and its strategic implications in shaping international relations and the military and foreign policies. This, in turn, is expected to foster intellectual interaction with analyses of the changing nature of warfare in the 21st century, where intangible factors are becoming increasingly significant.