Political Geography Terms

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nation

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A group with a shared culture inside a land area (example: Cherokee Nation)

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state

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Sovereign territory with distinct borders (Example: Canada, Mexico)

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sovereignty

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Supreme power or authority; the right for a state to govern itself (example: United States)

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Political Sovereignty

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Absolute control of a state by a government, everything within the boundary is under state control (Example: Russia)

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nation-state

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Land where a nation and state are within the same sovereign territory (example: Japan)

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Ethnic Sovereignty

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Control for an ethnic group inside a functioning sovereign state; a group's right to self-govern based on their shared culture (Example: Kurdistan)

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compact state

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A state in which the distance from the center to any boundary does not vary significantly (example: Kenya, Switzerland)

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elongated state

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A state with a long narrow shape (example: Chile, Malawi)

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fragmented state

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A state that includes several discontinuous pieces of territory (example: Indonesia, Turkey, Philippines)

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microstate

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State that encompasses a very small land area (example: Andorra, Liechtenstein, Fiji)