What Term Is Applied To Drawing Political Boundaries

Political Boundaries

A. Paasi , in International Encyclopedia of Human Geography, 2009

Coda–Boundaries Are Everywhere

This article shows that human geographers have studied political boundaries intensively since the institutionalization of academic geography and that their interests have gradually moved from empirical studies of concrete cases and border landscapes to broader themes, for example, the mapping of divergent boundary-producing practices and the roles of boundaries as social symbols and institutions that are used to make social distinctions within societies. Political geographers understand boundaries nowadays in a much broader manner than as mere physical lines that separate social entities or power containers, especially states. More often than not boundaries are conceived as discursive formations and processes that have grown up to form parts of social and cultural practices that constitute and are constitutive of territories.

Such broader perspectives mean that notions such as territory, territoriality, sovereignty, nation and nationalism, nationality, and identity are crucial for understanding the meanings and functions of boundaries and the power relations associated with their formation and reproduction. Boundaries can therefore be understood as part of the process by which territories and their identities and meanings are formed and renewed. In the course of this process, which may be labeled as the institutionalization of territories, effective use is made of boundaries, symbols, and the institutions that maintain them in order to produce and reproduce a territory.

Despite the fact that concrete boundaries and physical border landscapes are often loaded with national symbolism, we can think that boundaries exist at the same time in the innumerable practices and discourses that constitute the sociospatial delimitations that place some individuals inside a certain boundary and others outside it. This broader perspective means that boundaries are manifested – either visibly or covertly – in politics, governance, economics, culture, the construction of ethnic relations, the media, educational practices, and other forms of national socialization. It is these practices that lay the foundation for our awareness of the sovereignty of states, of 'us' as an abstract, imagined community with a specific identity, and for our understanding of the relations between 'us' and 'them'. Such practices intersect and become fused across spatial scales. Some practices may be local, some national, and others international, which means that both the origins and manifestations of a boundary may exist simultaneously on several spatial scales.

This article also shows that political boundaries are not just neutral lines drawn on maps or through concrete border landscapes, but are actually spread all over state territories, and they can even manifest themselves at times outside states. One example of such an extension is the fact that the UK and French passport controls for the Eurostar trains are juxtaposed in Paris and London, respectively. This extension, like the increased monitoring and surveillance at national airports, in shopping precincts or in city streets, is part of the 'technical' landscapes of social control that have been created in the name of the often abstract discourse of security.

There is another way, too, in which boundaries exist more broadly within society. This is based on the fact that they are at the same time both symbols and institutions through which social groups generate distinctions and are themselves created through such distinctions. In this sense boundaries are a part of what can be called the 'discursive' landscape of social power, which is manifested in social practices. All states lean on such landscapes, drawing on both the past heritage, current symbolisms, and future societal expectations, when they try to produce and reproduce loyal citizens who will identify themselves with the nation, or at least with the political system.

Both the technical landscapes of social control and the discursive landscapes of social power makes it easier to understand the persistence of boundaries in the networking world and to comprehend why boundaries will not necessarily disappear even though certain social practices, for example, the economy, may produce alterations in the ways in which boundaries function. As Peter Taylor has shown, territoriality may have many shapes in the operation of nation-states. Instead of one territoriality we have numerous territorialities that may have divergent functions. This suggests that human geographers working with political boundaries will continue to face a number of interesting theoretical and empirical challenges in the future.

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Mediterranean-Climate Ecosystems

Philip W. Rundel , Richard M. Cowling , in Encyclopedia of Biodiversity (Second Edition), 2013

Introduction

The political boundaries of Chile provide relatively natural biogeographic boundaries because of the topography of desert, mountain, and ocean boundaries. To the north is the hyperarid Atacama Desert, which reaches its extreme of conditions in the Tacna-Arica region along the Peruvian border. Here, a virtual absence of rainfall separates the Peruvian floristic elements of the desert from the Chilean elements. To the east, the Mediterranean-climate region of central Chile is strongly delineated by the high Andean Cordillera. Many peaks in this range reach well above 6000 m and effectively shield Chile from weather fronts moving westward across Argentina. Although major uplift of the Andes began in the mid-Tertiary, at least 14 Ma, the range continues to be tectonically active today. The elevation of mountain passes along the Andes in northern and central Chile are too high to allow easy migration of either plants or animals, and thus have helped to isolate the flora and fauna of Chile. Only in southern Chile where the Andes are lower has there been easy migration across this range. However, the severe climatic conditions of cold that characterize Patagonia in southern Chile act to strongly reduce the biological diversity in this area.

Comparisons of species diversity between Chilean organisms and those of other Mediterranean-climate regions deserve some caution in terms of the area included. As with California, the political boundaries of Chile include desert and wet forest ecosystems that are not comparable with core Mediterranean-climate habitats. Most figures for Chilean diversity in the literature are based on political boundaries. An additional issue of political boundaries comes in assessing levels of endemism for the Chilean flora or fauna. Levels of endemism for all groups are much lower if strict adherence to the political boundaries of Chile rather than the more natural boundaries of the Chilean/Patagonian biogeographic province is taken into account.

Much of central Chile, which covers an area of about 140×10³ km², shares a physiographic structure parallel to that of California. Moving inland from the Pacific Ocean, there is typically a coastal range of mountains, a broad central valley, and a high mountain range to the east. The geologically recent Cordillera de la Costa is relatively high west of Santiago at about 33° S latitude, with the major peaks Cerro Campana (1910 m), Campanita (1510 m), and El Roble (2220 m). These peaks are high enough to intercept moisture from humid southwestern winds, producing woodland areas with significant fog interception and thus improved water relations.

The dominant vegetation in central Chile is matorral, an evergreen shrubland similar in general form to chaparral (Rundel, 1981). Along the coast and to the north this community grades into a coastal matorral with a greater dominance by drought deciduous shrubs. At higher elevations and on sites with greater water availability, matorral grades into a sclerophyll woodland community, and to the south into hygrophilous woodlands with many species characteristic of the Valdivian forest region to the south. Much of the central valley of Chile today is dominated by a savanna community termed espinal, with Acacia caven as the sole dominant. This community is almost certainly the result of human intervention on landscape processes over the past four centuries. Sclerophyll woodland and matorral would once have covered much of this area.

Unlike California and the Mediterranean Basin, the high mountains of the Andean Cordillera in central Chile do not have a forest zone except in the southern margin of the central region. The young age of these mountains and lack of soil weathering has produced unstable geological conditions on the west-facing slope of the Andes. Matorral communities on the lower foothills of the Andes give way to a low and scrubby montane matorral community at about 2000 m elevation.

The biological diversity of Chile has an ancient origin that dates back to Gondwanaland. Southern Chile in particular exhibits many broad biogeographical linkages with New Zealand and Australia. Central Chile shows other biogeographical connections with southeastern Brazil, a linkage dating back to mid-Tertiary times before the uplift of the Andes. Since the Andean uplift, however, the biota of Chile has evolved largely in isolation from other biogeographic regions.

Biosystematic and biogeographic knowledge of the flora and fauna of Chile has increased greatly in recent decades, and thus the biodiversity of most groups of vascular plants and vertebrates is relatively well known (Simonetti et al., 1995). These syntheses have been applied more generally to the country as a whole, however, rather than to discrete regional areas. Thus, there is a strong need for more regional studies that evaluate patterns of alpha, beta, and gamma diversity in relation to environmental gradients.

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European Rivers*

K. Tockner , ... F.D. Peter , in Encyclopedia of Inland Waters, 2009

Introduction

Rivers recognize no political boundaries. This is particularly true for Europe, which has more than 150 transboundary rivers. For example, the Danube is the 29th longest river globally, yet it flows through 18 countries and 10 ecoregions. Further, 8 of the 10 largest catchments in Europe are in the eastern plains of Russia and information on their present status is highly limited. Europe also has a long history in river training with most rivers being severely fragmented, channelized, and polluted. Recently, the European Union launched an ambitious program called the Water Framework Directive (WFD) that requires a catchment management plan for all major European rivers for achieving 'good ecological status' by 2015. In this chapter we provide a comprehensive overview of all major European catchments ( Figure 1 ), starting with the biogeographic setting with an emphasis on physiography, hydrology, ecology/biodiversity, and human impacts.

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Introduction to European Rivers

Klement Tockner , ... Fabian D. Peter , in Rivers of Europe, 2009

Publisher Summary

Rivers recognize no political boundaries. This is particularly true for Europe, which has over 150 transboundary rivers. For example, the Danube is the 29th longest river globally and it drains parts of 19 countries and 10 ecoregions. Further, 8 of the 10 largest catchments in Europe are in the eastern plains of Russia and the Ukraine and information on their present status is highly limited. Europe also has a long history in river training with most rivers being severely fragmented, channelized, and polluted. The European Union launched an ambitious program called the Water Framework Directive (WFD), which requires a catchment management plan for all major European rivers for achieving "good ecological status" by 2015. This chapter provides a comprehensive overview of all major European catchments included in the book, starting with the bio-geographic setting, with an emphasis on physiography, hydrology, ecology/biodiversity, and human impacts.

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Breeding: Animals

G.L. Bennett , ... W.M. Snelling , in Encyclopedia of Agriculture and Food Systems, 2014

Breed and Line Formation

Geographical isolation, political boundaries, natural selection for adaptation to the environment, and selection by humans played roles in forming breeds. Breed formation by crossing existing breeds and interbreeding the crossbreds continues today as livestock breeders attempt to combine desirable and moderate undesirable aspects found in different breeds.

The process of forming and propagating breeds necessarily restricts the available number of potential parents that meet the specifications for inclusion in the breed. Typically, many livestock breeders want to maintain high relationships in an even smaller group of animals and ancestors that are influential and sought after in the breed. The genetic relationship between two animals probabilistically describes the shared DNA. Example relationships are 0.5 for parent and a progeny or for two progeny from the same parents, 0.25 for a grand-progeny and a grandparent, and 0.25 for any two progeny sharing a single parent.

Some livestock breeders intentionally mate related animals to maintain even higher relationship to influential ancestors through both sire and dam. Mating related animals results in inbred progeny. Inbreeding coefficients probabilistically describe the proportion of DNA nucleotide pairs with identical parental DNA origin. Inbreeding coefficients of progeny are one-half of the relationship between the parents. Examples of progeny inbreeding values are 0.25 for parent–progeny mating and 0.125 for mating any two progeny sharing a single parent.

Inbreeding also occurs unintentionally over time. Many generations of repeated emphasis on a few animals of every generation cause most animals to have some shared distant ancestry. This results in progeny with low levels of inbreeding that increase over time. Parents with many progeny contribute little more to a population's diversity than parents that produce a few progeny. A concept called effective population size describes the genetic size and diversity of a breed. Effective population size estimates the number of unrelated parents needed to create the same diversity as found in an actual population that has related parents, some who produce many progeny. Even in breeds with tens of thousands of animals, the effective size may be a few hundred or less. Smaller effective sizes result in larger increases in unintentional inbreeding. McParland et al. (2007) estimated an effective number of 75 for the more than 200 000 Holstein-Friesian dairy cattle born in Ireland in 2004. Most long-established breeds fluctuate in popularity and numbers throughout their history. The introduction of breeds into new areas and countries may consist of importing a few hundred animals or less. When numbers are low (called a bottleneck), effective numbers are reduced further and have a lasting effect on unintentional inbreeding in the breed.

Inbreeding increases the proportion of DNA that is identical in paired chromosomes (homozygous). Homozygous DNA increases the predictability of progeny. Some livestock breeders use inbreeding with the objective of producing more uniform and predictable animals. However, inbreeding increases the proportion of homozygous DNA with undesirable effects as well as desirable effects. Inbreeding itself cannot increase desirable homozygous DNA without increasing undesirable homozygous DNA. Inbreeding often reduces reproductive success of parents, vigor of offspring, and growth (inbreeding depression).

Following the early twentieth-century scientific and commercial successes of hybrid corn created by crossing inbred lines, livestock geneticists hypothesized that simultaneous inbreeding and selection might overcome the detrimental effects of inbreeding alone. An expected advantage of inbred lines is increased variation among the inbred lines compared to variation within the original, preinbred breed. Results of many experimental inbred lines developed into different livestock species demonstrated that selection usually could not overcome the undesirable effects of inbreeding on reproductive success and vigor. Inbred lines in low prolificacy species often failed to sustain the line due to low reproduction and survival. Still, a few mildly inbred lines survived and contributed toward improving some breeds (e.g., Line 1 Hereford; MacNeil, 2009). New genomics technologies may enable creating inbred lines with simultaneous selection of desirable homozygous DNA and elimination of undesirable homozygous DNA.

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Territorial disputes and cross-border resource management

Rongxing Guo , in Cross-Border Resource Management (Fourth Edition), 2021

14.1.1 Inappropriate terms and place names

Boundary and territorial disputes may evolve from historical claims, or they may be brought on by competition of resource exploitation. Ethnic clashes continue to be responsible for much of the territorial fragmentation around the world. Disputes over islands at sea or in rivers frequently form the source of territorial and boundary conflicts. Other sources of contention include access to water and mineral (especially petroleum) resources, fisheries and arable land. Issues pertaining to the territorial control of sea waters have long been the subject of international law.

Most topographic terms (such as 'crest', 'range', 'chain' and 'foothills' of mountains, and 'source', 'end', 'mouth', 'middle' and 'bank' of rivers) are vague; sometimes they may have varied locations due to geological or hydrological changes. In an ideal boundary demarcation document, the topographical terms used as boundaries should be specifically defined with detailed and, if possible, quantitative information. In addition, most existing names used for places have a long history; and they usually refer to areas rather than geographic coordinates. They are, therefore, not able to precisely define political boundaries.

Mountains have usually been served as political boundaries. Mountains, when serving as military borders, have the advantages of being easy to defend but difficult to attack. However, precipitous mountains, as political and administrative boundaries, do have the disadvantages for the relevant countries or regions to develop cross-border trade and economic cooperation. Detailed description of mountain-based boundaries is needed. In general, a water-parting (watershed in UK usage) is by no means always a barrier, or along a line of hills or mountains, or even visible. Its chief virtues as a political boundary are that it is precise, and that it separates drainage basins, which for many purposes are best treated as units under a single government. Water-parting a political boundary has the following shortcomings ( Jones, 1943, p. 105):

1.: They often lie well away from the zone of high peaks.
2.: Along the water-parting may be lakes and swamps with outlets in both directions.
3.: There may be streams and even large rivers which split and drain in two directions.
4.: The water-parting may be extremely crooked.
5.: Underground drainage may prevent ready determination of the water-parting.
6.: Basins without drainage to the sea (due to evaporation) may bifurcate the water-parting.
7.: In extreme flat regions the water-parting may be hard to locate.

In some circumstances, saying that a boundary follows 'the highest crests which may divide the waters' is to invite trouble. The phrase had once produced a threat of war between Argentina and Chile in the early 20th century. Laguna del Desierto is a quasirectangular area between Mt. Fitzroy and Lake San Martin. It is surrounded by three main mountain ranges from north–northeast (in Argentina) to south–southwest (in Chile). There was a general agreement on the placement of the extreme points of the boundary. However, differences existed in the demarcation of the connecting line on the ground. In the second (towards the east) mountain range, there are two headwaters: Rio Obstaculo, draining towards the Pacific; and a tributary of the Laguna Larga–Laguna del Desierto–Rio Las Vueltas (or Gatica)–lake Viedma system, on the Atlantic watershed.

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Territorial Disputes and Cross-Border Management

Rongxing Guo , in Cross-Border Resource Management (Third Edition), 2018

11.1.1 Inappropriate Terms and Place Names

Boundary and territorial disputes may evolve from historical claims, or they may be brought on by competition of resource exploitation. Ethnic clashes continue to be responsible for much of the territorial fragmentation around the world. Disputes over islands at sea or in rivers frequently form the source of territorial and boundary conflicts. Other sources of contention include access to water and mineral (especially petroleum) resources, fisheries and arable land. Issues pertaining to the territorial control of seawaters have long been the subject of international law.

Most topographic terms (such as 'crest', 'range', 'chain' and 'foothills' of mountains, and 'source', 'end', 'mouth', 'middle' and 'bank' of rivers) are vague; sometimes they may have varied locations due to geological or hydrological changes. In an ideal boundary demarcation document the topographical terms used as boundaries should be specifically defined with detailed and, if possible, quantitative information. In addition, most existing names used for places have a long history; and they usually refer to areas rather than geographic coordinates. They are therefore not able to precisely define political boundaries.

Mountains have usually been served as political boundaries. Mountains, when serving as military borders, have the advantages of being easy to defend but difficult to attack. However, precipitous mountains, as political and administrative boundaries, do have the disadvantages for the relevant countries or regions to develop cross-border trade and economic cooperation. Detailed description of mountain-based boundaries is needed. In general, a water-parting (watershed in UK usage) is by no means always a barrier, or along a line of hills or mountains, or even visible. Its chief virtues as a political boundary are that it is precise, and that it separates drainage basins, which for many purposes are best treated as units under a single government. Some peculiarities of water-parting are as follows:

•: They often lie well away from the zone of high peaks.
•: Along the water-parting may be lakes and swamps with outlets in both directions.
•: There may be streams and even large rivers which split and drain in two directions.
•: The water-parting may be extremely crooked.
•: Underground drainage may prevent ready determination of the water-parting.
•: Basins without drainage to the sea (due to evaporation) may bifurcate the water-parting.
•: In extreme flat regions the water-parting may be hard to locate (cited from Jones, 1943, p. 105).

In some circumstances, saying that a boundary follows 'the highest crests which may divide the waters' is to invite trouble. The phrase had once produced a threat of war between Argentina and Chile in the early 20th century. Laguna del Desierto is a quasi-rectangular area between Mt Fitzroy and Lake San Martin. It is surrounded by three main mountain ranges from north–northeast (in Argentina) to south–southwest (in Chile). There was a general agreement on the placement of the extreme points of the boundary. However, differences existed in the demarcation of the connecting line on the ground. In the second (towards the east) mountain range there are two headwaters: Rio Obstaculo, draining towards the Pacific; and a tributary of the Laguna Larga–Laguna del Desierto–Rio Las Vueltas (or Gatica)–lake Viedma system, on the Atlantic watershed.

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Exploiting natural resources in cross-border areas

Rongxing Guo , in Cross-Border Resource Management (Fourth Edition), 2021

7.2.2 Making use of flowing rivers

Since many rivers have been used as political boundaries for various reasons (see Section 2.3.2), there are complexities in making use of these flowing rivers. In addition, since almost all rivers flow across one or more political or administrative boundaries, there is a crying need of coordinated management of these flowing rivers. Without good reason, people living at the lower reaches of a river have always disadvantages over their counterparts living at the upper reaches of the river. Numerous cases of cross-border disputes and even wars between upper and lower reaches have been found in geopolitically stressed areas.

In order to reduce the negative impact of waters from upper reaches on lower reaches, humans have learnt to construct dams to hold water back. Dam building is an ancient concept. The ancient West Asians may have been the first humans to build dams. The oldest known dam is the Jawa Dam, the remains of which are located in Wadi Rajil at the town of Jawa in Mafraq Governorate, 58 km north of Azraq, Jordan. It was built in the 4th century BCE. Early dams were only to provide farmers with a steady source of water to irrigate crops. This allowed ancient farmers to feed a growing population. Later dams were built to serve more functions like supplying water for irrigation, flood control and generations of hydroelectricity.

Dams can be used to store water, control flooding and generate electricity. However, constructing dams can lead to many ecological problems. Environmentalists have warned that it interferes with the natural flow of river water in the environment and causes soil erosion. It also affects the flow of water in the upstream area leading to flooding. In addition, there is an increased risk of earthquakes in the surrounding area, since building the dam in a large area will depress the earth's surface. See Section 12.3.3 for a more detailed description of some of the worst disasters resulting from dam failures in the last two centuries.

The region spanning the US–Mexico border is heavily dependent on cross-border natural resources available to open access by the two nations. The Colorado River flows over a distance of 2330 km and forms a drainage basin of 637,000 sq. km. For a about 27-km long section, the river serves as the border between the state of Arizona in the United States and Mexico; it then flows 129 km through Mexico to the Gulf of California. Issues, particularly those concerning groundwater quantity and quality, take on even more complex dimensions along the US–Mexico border. Waters in underground basins located partly in the United States and partly in Mexico have never been apportioned between the two countries.

At least 12 US border municipalities are completely dependent on groundwater, and another four partially so. Agricultural production in Arizona and New Mexico and along the upper Rio Grande in Texas is also heavily dependent on groundwater. With the exception of the lower Rio Grande valley, Mexican agriculture relies just as much on this resource. The Mexican cities of Nogales, San Luis Rio Colorado, Agua Prieta, Ciudad Juarez, Presido and Ciudad Acuna are nearly totally dependent on groundwater, while Mexicali, Tijuana, Reynosa and Matamoros are variously dependent on it for their water supplies. Along the entire border area, there are many other locations where groundwater is at present or may become a source of bilateral conflict.

For more than a century, leaders from both the United States and Mexico have recognised the importance of the cross-border cooperation on water and environmental issues. The Treaty of 1848 that established the river as a US–Mexico boundary was modified in 1853, which, taking into account the changing course of the river, sets today's boundary. In 1889 a treaty signed by representatives of both nations created the International Boundary Commission (IBC). A commissioner appointed by each country was entrusted with enforcing rules established in an 1884 agreement to fix the location of the boundary as the river meandered. In 1944 another treaty – the Treaty on Utilisation of Waters of the Colorado and Tijuana Rivers and of the Rio Grande, otherwise known as the Water Treaty – converted the IBC to the International Boundary Water Commission. The treaty increased the commission's authority to include issues affecting the quality, conservation and use of water on the border (EPA, 2001, p. A1.1).

Different political systems, when they meet at the border, will make cooperation on mutual problems much more complex and difficult. Even with these institutional progresses, many problems still exist. With regard to the division of the surface waters of rivers that run cross the boundary between Mexico and the United States, there is no definition of quality of water delivered to Mexico, nor is there any requirement as to when water has to be delivered. For more than a century, leaders from both the United States and Mexico have recognised the importance of the cross-border cooperation on water and environmental issues. Even with these institutional progresses, many problems still exist. Traditionally, Mexican municipalities have had no secure and adequate source of funding so they have relied on state and federal governments. This made continuity in programs difficult and works against continuity in cross-border cooperation. In most circumstances, legislative and policy differences may hinder the effective management of cross-border economic activities. In addition, since each side (the United States and Mexico) has its own standards to protect public health with an adequate margin of safety, there are difficulties in the adoption of common production standards, as well as the coordination of cross-border trade and investment.

In addition to other international issues associated with the US–Mexico border, there remain locally significant surface issues along Colorado and Rio Grande Rivers. For example, the waters of a number of international streams have yet to be apportioned. These include the Tijuana River in the Tijuana–San Diego area; and the Santa Cruz River, San Pedro River and Whitewater Creek, which all cross the Arizona–Sonora border. The San Pedro River carries contaminants from the large copper works at Cananer, Sonoran into Arizona and the New River, which rises south of Mexicali and flows northward to the Salton Sea in California, perhaps the most polluted stream in the United States (Hansen, 1989). In addition to water pollution in those cross-border rivers, principal solid waste and air pollution resulting from fast industrialisation and population growth in both sides next to the border have also posed challenges to the governments of the United States and Mexico.

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Role and Trends of Protected Areas in Conservation

Timothy M. Boucher , ... Carmen Revenga , in Encyclopedia of Biodiversity (Second Edition), 2013

International Approaches

The patterns and processes of nature rarely follow political boundaries; there are numerous cases where habitats, species, or populations cannot be adequately conserved in one country alone. Such efforts include bilateral funding, comanagement agreements such as transboundary protected areas (TBPAs), and the development and implementation of international agreements intended to improve global patterns and trends in conservation and protection. Three important global mechanisms provide for the identification and designation of protected areas directly:

•: The 563 Biosphere Reserves in 110 countries are sites recognized under UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere Programme. They are nominated by nations for international recognition on a voluntary basis. The original intention was to develop a systematic approach to conservation by developing a biogeographically representative network of protected areas, although this aspect has received relatively little direct attention in recent years. One unique defining feature has been an effort to support complementary human use. Many sites are categorized into core, buffer, and transitional zones with differing levels of human use and access.
•: Ramsar sites are protected areas recognized under the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance. Following a number of guidelines and criteria, member nations identify and protect important wetlands. In 2011 there were nearly 2000 designated sites covering 1.9 million km².
•: World Heritage Sites are places of 'outstanding universal value' nominated by the 187 nations that have ratified the 1972 World Heritage Convention. Chosen to protect natural or cultural attributes or both, the sites are selected in a review process that determines if the importance of a given site 'transcends national boundaries.' The 923 sites selected as of 2011 (183 selected for natural attributes and 28 for natural and cultural attributes) are then protected by the member nations.

Finally, the influence of the 1993 CBD is considerable. The original text of this convention called generally for greater efforts to protect biodiversity; a subsequent agreement set tangible targets for effective conservation of 10% of each of the world's terrestrial ecological regions by 2010 and of marine regions by 2012. In 2011 these targets were reset:

Target 11: By 2020, at least 17 per cent of terrestrial and inland water areas, and 10 per cent of coastal and marine areas, especially areas of particular importance for biodiversity and ecosystem services, are conserved through effectively and equitably managed, ecologically representative and well connected systems of protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures, and integrated into the wider landscapes and seascapes. (Convention on Biological Diversity, 2010)

Although many of these international agreements and conventions have some legal framework, effective enforcement mechanisms are typically weak and cases are very rarely brought before the multinational or international courts. Even so, a number of NGOs and site managers have used the high profile of international recognition as a tool to support protection. For many countries, national pride in international recognition can also lead to associated benefits from tourism, particularly for World Heritage Sites. In some cases there are also financial and other supporting mechanisms for international sites.

A TBPA straddles one or more national or provincial boundaries. Though the area is managed cooperatively and human-made barriers are removed, each country retains sovereignty over the area within its borders. According to the most recent official inventory (2007), there are 227 TBPAs incorporating 3043 individual protected areas and more than 4.6 million km² (Table 1).

Table 1. Total area of TBPA by region (TBPA, 2007)

Region	TBPA area (km²)
North America	1,511,627.08
Central and South America	1,424,697.66
Europe	188,153.30
Africa	931,617.95
Asia	570,505.86

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Marine Spatial Planning

Catarina Frazão Santos , ... Larry B. Crowder , in World Seas: an Environmental Evaluation (Second Edition), 2019

30.4.6 Transboundary Issues

Since the "behavior" of the biophysical ocean does not follow political boundaries, transboundary effects are a major issue in marine planning and management, and it has increasingly been recognized that MSP should take account of cross-border considerations (Hassan et al., 2015; Jay, Alves, et al., 2016). Several types of boundaries, or frontiers, should be accounted for in MSP, namely, the sea-land interface, cross-border effects with neighboring nations, cross-border effects with areas beyond national jurisdiction (ABNJ), and connections among different EEZ "fractions" of the same nation. The latter occurs in situations where national marine waters are not continuous (e.g., in Australia, Portugal, Norway, the United States, Mexico, and many others) but where MSP objectives and goals, management approaches, monitoring and revision procedures, etc., must be common to ensure consistency within the planning process. Issues related to the sea-land interface are among the most referred ones in the scientific literature (e.g., Álvarez-Romero et al., 2011; Kerr et al., 2014). Several challenges arise not only from the biophysical differences between terrestrial and marine environments, but also from the traditionally distinct planning and governance frameworks. Cross-border effects with adjacent countries refer directly to potential impacts from national maritime activities in neighboring marine waters (e.g., decisions on shipping routes in the Portuguese EEZ may affect the risk of pollution in Spanish waters; and species depletion in Spain may limit recruitment to Portuguese stocks). Cross-border effects with ABNJ follow the same reasoning, although considering effects in (or from) ABNJ, instead of neighboring countries. Entities involved in MSP must bear in mind that marine ecosystems "move," although sometimes at imperceptible speeds, and that their boundaries are more difficult to perceive and establish than terrestrial ones (Norse et al., 2005). Hence, planning authorities should consult neighboring authorities on MSP-related matters (Jay, Alves, et al., 2016; Jay, Klenke, & Janßen, 2016) and national MSP initiatives should be further developed into regional and international contexts to be truly sustainable (Katsanevakis et al., 2011).

The ABNJ are of special importance as most of the open ocean lies in international waters and there is a growing concern on the protection, conservation, and recovery of their ecosystems (Norse et al., 2005). Even though MSP initiatives are in general confined within national boundaries (Table 30.1), the need for transboundary MSP in international waters has long been advocated (Agardy et al., 2012). Almost a decade ago, MSP was pointed out as "practical way forward" regarding marine management in the high seas (Ardron et al., 2008). Since then, the need for MSP in the Arctic, one of the most pristine but vulnerable ecosystems in the world, has been supported by different authors (Aspen Institute, 2011; Hoel, 2009). Recognizing the importance of moving beyond national MSP initiatives, a pan-Arctic approach for MSP has been identified as essential to guide the future of the Arctic, especially in the context of external economic factors and effects of a changing climate (Ehler, 2014b). In the Southern Ocean, the Commission on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) has also committed to a transboundary spatial planning initiative—although not formally identified as a MSP process—where MPAs, fishing zones, and research zones were designated through a consensus decision-making process (Brooks et al., 2016). Spatial planning in ABNJ is also occurring in the context of the exploitation of deep seabed mineral resources, where the International Seabed Authority has the responsibility to both allocate leases for exploratory mining and establish networks of no-mining areas to protect seabed ecosystems (Wedding et al., 2015).

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