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Steven Spiegel's (2000) "Traditional Space vs. Cyberspace" exemplifies the divide between political science & political geography. In trying to incorporate geographic factors into his consideration of post-Cold War geopolitics, Spiegel equates his view with distance & less explicitly with territory. The attempt to position geography as central to international politics has failed once again because of the equation of spatial analysis with the field of geography. Ignorance & neglect of the place tradition, prominent in contemporary geography, is the most important factor in the continued failure of communication between Geography & International Relations. Adapted from the source document.

In the aftermath of the Cold War, no consensus has emerged in American political circles on a replacement for the containment geopolitical code of the 1945-1990 era. Various geopolitical paradigms are on offer, each emanating from a worldview that is heavily colored by domestic political ideologies. Seven of these paradigms are described & considered in light of the momentous geopolitical decision in 1998 to expand NATO into Eastern Europe. Eastern Europe has been considered a "crush zone" by political geographers for over a century & the region has been intimately involved in the geopolitical reorderings of this century. Strenuous avoidance of geopolitical issues, including long-term relations with Russia, was notable during the NATO expansion debates. The stark contrast of "chaos" (Russia & its neighbors in the former Soviet Union) to "cosmos" (the EU & three new members of NATO) dominated the NATO enlargement debate. The end-consequence of recent NATO & US foreign policy decisions will be a redrawing of the geopolitical divide across Europe from the eastern Baltic to the Black Sea. Fear of being placed on the eastern side of this new "iron curtain" has caused many East European states to rediscover their "European" credentials & claim entry to the West. 1 Table. Adapted from the source document.