Geography Personal Statement Example

The relationship between geopolitics and human rights particularly interests me. It presents the dynamic nature of our world and shows the interconnectedness between geography and human rights. Through my studies, I have come to realise the strategic interests of states within the UN seem to prevail over human rights. Exploring this led me to an article by Falk who believed that human rights are used by states to validate the use of force. This is expressed through his analysis of the US’s geopolitical agenda. My research into the Ukraine-Russian conflict uncovered the role Ukraine plays in the trade as a leading exporter of wheat. This falling under Russian control could have damaging socioeconomic impacts on the US. During this research, I also uncovered Falk’s anti-Israel agenda stemming from the 2008 Gaza attack where the US refused to intervene. This led me to question his view as it may have been influenced by his own opinion on the US’s actions, making it subjective. This research has allowed me to understand the topic in a real-world context.

My interest in geopolitics was cemented by Marshall's book ‘Prisoners of Geography' which showed that individuals often physical geography and politics as uncorrelated. In fact, the physical geography of a country plays a role in the actions of its politicians. Though this link is explored well, he presents geopolitics as a static, rather than a dynamic process. I explored his limited view in my essay for the Fitzwilliam competition. In this, I found that since deindustrialization the influence of physical geography on politics has decreased as we moved away from the dependency on our environment. I explored this by looking at inequality in coastal areas which I found to be higher compared to inland areas. This was partly due to the decrease in the number of ports as transport methods evolved. This influences government funding in these areas causing more inequality, hence showing the dynamic nature of geopolitics.

When visiting the Natural History Museum, I was intrigued by an exhibit containing falcon eggs collected during the use of the pesticide DDT. My research into these eggs led me to Carson’s book ‘Silent String’ which claims that pesticides have negative impacts on our environment. I found that DDT impacted the falcon populations as chemicals in DDT acted to thin the eggshell making them less likely to hatch. While reading Carson’s work further I found that little is known about the effects of pesticides we currently use on the environment. I wish to continue researching this in the future to understand how we have impacted our planet and how we can address this issue. This research inspired me to create my school’s first sustainability club, in which we aimed to reduce our carbon footprint by planting vegetables which could be used in our canteen.

Through the Sutton trust law programme, I attended work experience at the Government legal department. During this, I was able to debate the ways in which governments could cooperate in order to reduce carbon emissions. While debating this, an issue of development arose, centring around the impacts of colonialism. Some previously colonised countries still rely on the secondary sector as they were unable to develop earlier. This restricts their access to the technology needed for a fair universal emissions cap leading us to believe a cap based on individual country development should be implemented instead. The issue of development was also present in the Girton College lecture on extreme volcanos. From this, I learned that well-known volcanos tend to be located in higher-income countries as they have the technology to monitor volcanic activity. Leaving those in lower-income countries vulnerable to the effects of an eruption as they don’t possess the means to mitigate the hazard.

Geography is key to understanding our evolving planet which drives my passion for this subject that I look forward to exploring further at university.