Resource geography II: What makes resources political?/

What makes resources political? We often imagine that politics is something done to resources (i.e. larger contestations over access to and control over resources). In this second “progress report”, I question whether resource politics is simply about fighting over stuff. How does the materiality of resources themselves shape broader conceptions of “the political” in general? I highlight the role of resources in shaping three central meanings of the political or politics. First, the commonsense ideology of politics as electoral contests over political power. Second, the state – as the sphere of “the political” – is constructed as a geographical entity based on a specific form of territoriality. Third, the nation-state reflects a complex political duality: both an institutional state apparatus and a cultural imaginary of shared nationhood. I conclude with some thoughts on the need to expand the terrain of the political in resource geography.