POLITICAL GEOGRA.PIIY.
The migrations of man over the earth's surface, his present location, and the stage of civilization which he has reached, are, in the last analysis, the results of geographical environment, whatever the immediate cause may be. Great Britain has become, because of her insular position, and her limited farming area, a great commercial nation. New England, by reason of the destructive com petition of Western farms, has changed her in dustries from agriculture to manufactures. Thus the climate, soil, and surface determine in great measure the products and leading industries of a region, subject, of course, to the degree of civil ization of the inhabitants.
The leading industries of mankind—pastoral pursuits, mining, fishing, agriculture, manufac tures, and commerce—require different forms of distribution of the inhabitants. Pastoral pur suits imply a very sparse population scantily distributed, since cattle and sheep require large areas for their sustenance. In agriculture, a much smaller area to a family suffices, implying a much denser population, while manufacturing and commerce require that people be closely grouped in towns and cities. Hence in the his tory of the settlement of a region, we may often trace a direct connection between the principal avocations of the people and the average density of population. In early stages of settlement, when the people are few in number and widely separated, pastoral pursuits are the principal ones. As population increases, the herders are crowded out by the farmers, and still later cities spring up and grow, and manufactures and com merce become the dominant industries.
Cities have been located from a great variety of considerations. Anciently a common cause of their location was protection from enemies, and hence they were placed in easily defensible posi tions. As wars have become less frequent, and as private property has become more exempt from danger, they have been placed in industrial ly strategical positions, commercial cities on har bors, manufacturing cities at sites of water power, etc. Often, however, through changes in industrial methods, such locations cease to be advantageous, yet, through sheer inertia, the cities remain and grow.
The form of land-holdings is significant of the degree of civilization, and often, on the other hand, may hasten or retard its progress. Among savage and barbarous peoples, and even those possessing some degree of civilization, such as the Russian peasantry, land is held in common by communities. Among most highly civilized peoples individual ownership is well-nigh uni versal, and such a form of ownership undoubtedly conduces to a high development of the race, as it carries with it a sense of proprietorship and re sponsibility.
The people of the earth are organized into com munities, various in form, size, and character. for governmental purposes. Savages are grouped in clans and tribes, civilized man into empires, kingdoms, and republics. With primitive man the functions of government are few, and are mainly confined to war, offensive and defensive, and the organization is feeble and often short lived. With advance in civilization comes an increase in the strength of the government, and an extension of its functions. From being only an offensive and defensive league, the govern ment of a civilized nation defends the rights of its citizens against one another, protects them in person and property, in many cases educates them, and maintains public utilities, such as surveys, means of communication, water-supply, lighting, etc. Indeed, there is a perceptible ten dency to go much further in the direction of socialism, so as to endanger the self-dependence of the individual, as is shown in recent develop ments in Germany and the experiments in New Zealand.
The form of government, whether known as empire, monarchy, kingdom, or republic, differs widely in the degree of power centralized in the hands of the chief executive and that retained by the representatives of the people. As a rule, the more highly civilized the people, the greater the share which they have in the government, and the lower the degree of civilization, the more absolute is the sovereign. The names by which governments are known are in many cases not descriptive. Most of the countries of Western Europe which possess a high degree of civiliza tion are of the type which may be called con stitutional monarchies. The executive power is in the hands of hereditary monarchs, and minis ters of their choosing, while the laws are made by legislative bodies elected, in the main at least, by the people. Thus are governed the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Austria-Hungary, Norway and Sweden, Denmark, Rumania, Servia, and Bulgaria. France and Switzerland, as well as the United States, are republics, in which the executive head of the Government and the legislative bodies are elected by the people. The other independent governments of America are nominally republics. Japan has recently been transformed into a constitutional monarchy. Rus sia, Turkey, Morocco, Persia, and Korea are absolute monarchies, in which the people have little or no voice. In the Chinese Empire the central authority is limited by the great measure of independence enjoyed by the individual prov inces.