Lightships (w/ thanks to Lesley Punton)

digital enclosure, transaction feedback, & the land enclosure movement

iSpy: Surveillance and Power in the Interactive Era (CultureAmerica)
by Mark Andrejevic (italics his - bold mine)

pg. 2
digital enclosure--the creation of an interactive realm wherein every action and transaction generates information about itself. Although the term implies a physical space, the same characteristics can apply to virtual spaces.
...
I use the term enclosure not just to invoke the notion of a space--virtual or otherwise--that is rendered interactive, but also to highlight the process of enclosure, whereby places and activities become encompassed by the monitoring embrace of an interactive (virtual) space. Accompanying this movement is a not-so-subtle shift in social relations: entry into the digital enclosure carries with it, in most cases, the condition of surveillance.
((re: Eyal Weisman: "the wall curls around itself"))
---
pg. 3
The use of the term digital enclosure is also meant to evoke the land enclosure movement associated with the transition from feudalism to capitalism, the process whereby over time communal land was subjected to private control, allowing private landowners to set the conditions for its use. Over time, the enclosure movement leads to the formation of distinct classes: those who own the means of production and those who must sell their labor for access to these means, whether arable lands or factories. A similar division of groups can be discerned in the emerging digital enclosure between those who control privatized interactive spaces (virtual or otherwise), and those who submit to particular forms of monitoring in order to gain access to goods, services, and conveniences.
...
...the use of interactive technologies--new media devices--lends itself to the generation of cybernetic information: feedback about the transactions themselves. This feedback becomes the property of private companies that can store, aggregate, sort, and in many cases, sell the information to others in the form of a database or a cybernetic commodity.

GARS O'Higgins/ANTARCTICA webcameras, +NeuMayer

Above: Penguin cam to the right and station cam 2 on the left. Both webcams are mounted on the outside of a container without any additional shelter in a standard fitting, just as you order them at the factory! These cams (made by MOBOTIX) are extraordinary robust, have lots of unique features and provide a fantastic picture quality! For example the new software enables each camera for IP Telephony. Each cam has a weatherproof microphone and loudspeaker. And the quality of the pictures speak for themselve! Our cam has two fixed lenses onboard. The best cams I can imagine for any outdoor surveillance, even in an extreme environment like the north antarctic (but they also have brands for indoor use).

If you want to see another MOBOTIX cam in the antarctic, then have a look on this stand-alone-solution on the Larsen shelf ice. As far as I know this is the most isolated webcam on the Antarctic continent at the moment! Energy supply comes from a combined windpower and photo-voltaic system, pics are sent via WLan over a distance of several kilometeres to the German Antarctic Base "NeuMayer"

website

Frontier (definition from Nationmaster)

http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Frontier

A frontier is a political and geographical term referring to areas near or beyond a boundary, or of a different nature. Politics is the process by which decisions are made within groups. ...

In the United States, the frontier was the term applied by scholars to the impact of the zone of unsettled land outside the region of existing settlements of Americans. That is, as pioneers moved into the frontier zone they were changed significantly by the encounter. That is what Frederick Jackson Turner called "the significance of the frontier." For example, Turner argued in 1893, one change was that unlimited free land in the zone was available and thus offered the psychological sense of unlimited opportunity, which in turn had many consequences, such as optimism, future orientation, shedding of restraints due to land scarcity, and wastefulness of natural resources.

Throughout American history, the expansion of settlement was largely from the east to the west, and thus the frontier is often identified with "the west." On the Pacific Coast, settlement moved eastward. In New England, it moved north.

'Frontier' was borrowed into English from French in the 15th century with the meaning "borderland," the region of a country that fronts on another country (see also marches). The use of frontier to mean "a region at the edge of a settled area" is a special North American development. (Compare the Australian "outback".) In the Turnerian sense, "frontier" was a technical term that was explicated by hundreds of scholars. Mark or march (or various plural forms of these words) are derived from the Frankish word marka (boundary) and refer to an area along a border, e. ... A tourism sign post Yalgoo, Western Australia The Dingo Fence near Coober Pedy Fitzgerald River National Park in Western Australia Outback refers to remote and arid areas of Australia, although the term colloquially can cover any lands outside of the main urban areas. ...

Colonial frontier

See also: Colonial America, British colonization of the Americas, French colonization of the Americas

In the earliest days of European settlement of the Atlantic coast, the frontier was essentially any part of the forested interior of the continent beyond the fringe of existing settlements along the coast and the great rivers, such as the St. Lawrence, Connecticut, Hudson, Delaware, Susquehanna River and James.

English, French, Spanish and Dutch patterns of expansion and settlement were quite different. Only a few thousand French migrated to Canada; these habitants settled in villages along the St. Lawrence river, building communities that remained stable for long stretches; they did not leapfrog west the way the Americans did. Although French fur traders ranged widely through the Great Lakes and Mississippi River watershed, as far as the Rocky Mountains, they did not usually settle down. Actual French settlement in these areas was limited to a few very small villages on the lower Mississippi and in the Illinois Country.^[1] Likewise, the Dutch set up fur trading posts in the Hudson river valley, followed by large grants of land to patroons who brought in tenant farmers who created compact, permanent villages. They did not push westward. ^[2]

In contrast, the English colonies generally pursued a more systematic policy of widespread settlement of the New World for cultivation and exploitation of the land, a practice that required the extension of European property rights to the new continent. The typical English settlements were quite compact and small--under a square mile. Conflict with the Native Americans arose out of political issues, viz. who would rule. Early frontier areas east of the Appalachian Mountains included the Connecticut river valley.^[3] The French and Indian Wars of the 1760s resulted in a complete victory for the British, who took over the French colonial territory west of the Appalachians to the Mississippi River. Americans began moving across the Appalachians into areas such the Ohio Country and the New River Valley.

Canadian frontier

A Canadian frontier thesis was developed by Canadian historians Harold Adams Innis and J. M. S. Careless. They emphasized the relationship between the center and periphery. Katerberg argues that "in Canada the imagined West must be understood in relation to the mythic power of the North." [Katerberg 2003] In Innis's 1930 work The Fur Trade in Canada, he expounded on what became known as the Laurentian thesis: that the most creative and major developments in Canadian history occurred in the metropolitan centers of central Canada and that the civilization of North America is the civilization of Europe. Innis considered place as critical in the development of the Canadian West and wrote of the importance of metropolitan areas, settlements, and indigenous people in the creation of markets. Turner and Innis continue to exert influence over the historiography of the American and Canadian Wests. The Quebec frontier showed little of the individualism or democracy that Turner ascribed to the American zone to the south. The Nova Scotia and Ontario frontiers were rather more democratic than the rest of Canada, but whether that was caused by the need to be self-reliant on the frontier itself or the presence of large numbers of American immigrants is debated. Harold Adams Innis (November 5, 1894-November 8, 1952) was a professor of political economy at the University of Toronto and the author of many seminal works on Canadian economic history and on media and communications.

The Canadian political thinker Charles Blattberg has argued that such events ought to be seen as part of a process in which Canadians advanced a "border"-- as distinct from a "frontier"--from east to west. According to Blattberg, a border assumes a significantly sharper contrast between the civilized and the uncivilized since, unlike with a frontier process, the civilizing force is not supposed to be shaped by that which it is civilizing. Blattberg criticizes both the frontier and border "civilizing" processes.

Canadian Prairies

The pattern of settlement of the Canadian prairies began in 1896, when the American prairie states had already achieved statehood. Pioneers then headed north to the "Last Best West." Before settlers began to arrive, the North West Mounted Police was dispatched to the region. When settlers began to arrive, a system of law and order was already in place and the Dakota lawlessness for which the American "Wild West" was famed did not occur in Canada. Before settlers arrived, the federal government also sent teams of negotiators to meet with the Native peoples of the region. In a series of treaties, the basis for peaceful relations was established and the long wars with the Natives that occurred in the United States largely did not spread to Canada. Like their American counterparts, the Prairie provinces supported populist and democratic movements in the early 20th century. ^[4] Pamphlet advertising the last best West Last best West was a phrase used to market the Canadian prairies to prospective immigrants.

Europe

In the European Union, the frontier is a term used to describe the region beyond the expanding borders of the European Union. The European Union has designated the countries surrounding it as part of the European Neighbourhood. This is a region of primarily less-developed countries, many of which aspire to become part of the European Union itself. Current applicants include Turkey and Croatia. Ukraine has also set itself the primary task of eventually joining the Union, as have many small countries in the Balkans and South Caucasus. Romania and Bulgaria, joined the European Union in 2007. Proposals to admit Turkey have been debated (and rejected), partly on the ground that Turkey is beyond Europe's historic frontier. If all or most East European states become members, the frontier may be the boundaries with Russia and Turkey. The European Neighbourhood is the region beyond the frontier of the European Union.

See also

American Old West
Cabin Rights
Frontier Thesis

The cowboy, the quintessential symbol of the American Old West, circa 1887. ... At an early period in the settlement of the Frontier, pioneers asserted their claims to parts of wild lands by blazing trees around the desired boundary, and later comers customarily recognized the claims: tomahawk rights, they were called. ... Frederick Jackson Turner, author of the Frontier Thesis The Frontier Thesis or Turner Thesis is the conclusion of Frederick Jackson Turner that the wellsprings of American exceptionalism and vitality have always been the American frontier, the region between urbanized, civilized society and the untamed wilderness.

References

US history

• The Frontier In American History by Frederick Jackson Turner
• Billington, Ray Allen. America's Frontier Heritage (1984), an analysis of the frontier experience from perspective of social sciences and historiography
• Billington, Ray Allen. Westward Expansion: A History of the American Frontier (1952 and later editions), the most detailed textbook, with highly detailed annotated bibliographies
• Billington, Ray Allen. Land of Savagery / Land of Promise: The European Image of the American Frontier in the Nineteenth Century (1981)
• Blattberg, Charles Shall We Dance? A Patriotic Politics for Canada (2003), ch. 3, a comparison of the Canadian 'border' with the American 'frontier'
• Hine, Robert V. and John Mack Faragher. The American West: A New Interpretive History (2000), recent textbook
• Lamar, Howard R. ed. The New Encyclopedia of the American West (1998), 1000+ pages of articles by scholars
• Milner, Clyde A., II ed. Major Problems in the History of the American West 2nd ed (1997), primary sources and essays by scholars
• Nichols, Roger L. ed. American Frontier and Western Issues: An Historiographical Review (1986) essays by 14 scholars
• Paxson, Frederic, History of the American Frontier, 1763-1893 (1924)
• Slotkin, Richard, Regeneration Through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier, 1600-1860 (2000), University of Oklahoma Press

Canada

• Blattberg, Charles Shall We Dance? A Patriotic Politics for Canada (2003), ch. 3, a comparison of the Canadian 'border' with the American 'frontier'
• Cavell, Janice. "The Second Frontier: the North in English-canadian Historical Writing." Canadian Historical Review 2002 83(3): 364-389. ISSN 0008-3755 Fulltext in Ebsco
• Clarke, John. Land, Power, and Economics on the Frontier of Upper Canada. McGill-Queen's U. Press, 2001. 747 pp.
• Colpitts, George. Game in the Garden: A Human History of Wildlife in Western Canada to 1940 U. of British Columbia Press, 2002. 216 pp.
• Forkey, Neil S. Shaping the Upper Canadian Frontier: Environment, Society and Culture in the Trent Valley. U. of Calgary Press 2003. 164 pp.
• Katerberg, William H. "A Northern Vision: Frontiers and the West in the Canadian and American Imagination." American Review of Canadian Studies 2003 33(4): 543-563. ISSN 0272-2011 Fulltext online at Ebsco
• Mulvihill, Peter R.; Baker, Douglas C.; and Morrison, William R. "A Conceptual Framework for Environmental History in Canada's North." Environmental History 2001 6(4): 611-626. ISSN 1084-5453. Proposes a five-part conceptual framework for the study of environmental history in the Canadian North. The first element of the framework analyzes approaches to environmental history that are applicable to the Canadian North. The second element reviews historical forces, myths, and defining characteristics that pertain to the region. A third element of the framework tests the validity of Turner's Frontier Thesis and Creighton's Metropolitan Thesis when applied to northern Canada. The fourth element consists of an overview of major northern environmental trends. The final element consists of four interrelated themes that identify the environmental relationships between northern and southern Canada.

External links

• Turner Thesis text
• Transhumanist.com: Opening Space as a Frontier

---

1. ^ Clarence Walworth Alvord, The Illinois Country 1673-1818 (1918)
2. ^ Arthur G. Adams, The Hudson Through the Years (1996); Sung Bok Kim, Landlord and Tenant in Colonial New York: Manorial Society, 1664-1775 (1987)
3. ^ Allan Kulikoff, From British Peasants to Colonial American Farmers (2000)
4. ^ Laycock, David. Populism and Democratic Thought in the Canadian Prairies, 1910 to 1945. 1990; Seymour Martin Lipset, Agrarian Socialism (1950).

Categories: Canadian-American relations | History of United States expansionism

Frontier - Wiki In the United States, the frontier was the term applied to the zone of unsettled land outside the region of existing settlements of Americans.

Storming the Gates of Paradise: Landscapes for Politics by Rebecca Solnit

page 2-bold and italics mine

I realized that in order to describe the rich tangle of experience there [at the antinuclear actions at the Nevada Test Site in the late 1980s] I needed to describe, to analyze, to connect, to critique, and to report on both international politics and personal experience. That is, I needed to write as a memoirist or diarist, and as a journalist, and as a critic--and these three voices were one voice in everything except the conventions that sort our experience out and censor what doesn't belong. [...]

Since then, I have been fascinated by trying to map the ways that we think and talk, the unsorted experience wherein one can start by complaining about politics and end by confessing about passions, the ease with which we can get to any point from any other point. Such conversation is sometimes described as being "all over the place," which is another way to say that it connects everything back up. The straight line of conventional narrative is too often an elevated freeway permitting no unplanned encounters or necessary detours. It is not how our thoughts travel, nor does it allow us to map the whole world rather than one streamlined trajectory across it. I wanted more, more scope, more nuance, more inclusion of the crucial details and associations that are conventionally excluded. The convergence of multiple kinds of stories shaped my writing on one way; this traveling by association shaped it in others. Early in my history of walking, I wrote that "if fields of expertise can be imagined as real fields, fenced off and carefully tilled, then the history of walking is a path that trespasses through dozens of fields." So are most unfenced lines of inquiry. I learned two kinds of trespassing at the test site, geographical and intellectual.

"I'm trying to help you, to keep you."

Friday 1 April 2005 Guardian

Strangeways here we come

On April 1 1990 a riot in Manchester triggered a wave of protests in prisons across Britain.

Strangeways prison rooftop protest, 1990. Photograph: Denis Thorpe

On April Fools' Day, 15 years ago, 300 prisoners filed into the chapel at Strangeways prison, Manchester, to attend the Church of England service. They heard a sermon from a visiting Church Army preacher, and at 11am, the prison's chaplain, Noel Proctor, rose to continue the service.

What happened next was tape recorded, along with the sermon. The transcript of the tape reads thus:

Noel Proctor: "After that remarkable message that has ..."

A prisoner (later identified as Paul Taylor): "I would just like to say, right, that this man has just talked about the blessing of the heart and how a hardened heart can be delivered. No it cannot, not with resentment, anger and bitterness and hatred being instilled in people."

(noise, over which) A prisoner: "Fuck your system, fuck your rules."

Proctor: "Right lads, sit down."

(More noise)

Proctor: "Right lads, down. Down. Come on, this is no way to carry on in God's house."

(More noise)

A prisoner: "Fuck your system."

Proctor: "Right lads, sit down. This is completely out of order. Sit down."

A prisoner: "Why is it [out of order]? It's been waiting to happen forever. It will never change."

Proctor: "Come on. This is terrible."

(More noise; banging, shouting, cheering)

Proctor: "All of you who want to go back to your cells, go to the back of the church please."

A prisoner: "What? You're a fucking hypocrite, you."

Proctor: "I'm trying to help you, to keep you."

A prisoner: "Leave it, mate."

(More noise until microphone goes dead)

rest of article

neither fish nor fowl

http://www.answers.com/topic/neither-fish-nor-fowl

Also, neither fish nor flesh; neither fish, flesh, nor fowl. Not one or the other, not something fitting any category under discussion. For example, They felt he was neither fish nor fowl--not qualified to lead the department, yet not appropriate to work as a staff member either. This expression appeared in slightly different form in John Heywood's 1546 proverb collection ("Neither fish, nor flesh, nor good red herring") and is thought to allude to food for monks ( fish, because they abstained from meat), for the people (flesh, or meat), and for the poor (red herring, a very cheap fish).

full text of proverb (confusing layout)

David Antin - self definition as Euglena (neither plant nor animal)

from Q&A at UPenn accessed at
http://writing.upenn.edu/pennsound/x/Antin.php

UPenn student:
"Are you a poet, do you intend to be a poet, um, do you think about your own categorization, or how do you categorize yourself?"

David Antin:
"When i think of myself, which is not as much as all that, and not as necessarily so frequently, what comes to mind is something i learned in biology that there is a microorganism called a euglena. And a euglena has chloroplasts which allows it to absorb solar energy and turn it into metabolic energy and material, so that it ingests like a plant.

It also has a whip-like attachment that is called the flagella. And this flagella allows it to whip around and capture prey.

My question is about the euglena is it a plant or is it an animal and i don't know which it is, and neither do the biologists know what it is, and i have always regarded this as my identity."

David Antin - "talk-pieces"

From Wiki

David Antin (born in New York City, February 1, 1932) is a United States poet and critic. In the late 1960s, Antin began performing extemporaneously, improvising "talk poems" at readings and exhibitions. In the late 1960s Antin moved with his wife, the writer and performance artist Eleanor Antin, to Southern California to take up a post at the University of California, San Diego, in the newly formed and experimental Visual Arts Department. He served for a time as gallery director and much longer as a professor there. In the early 1970s, his influence on a nascent group of conceptual photographers among the graduate students there was powerful. He has a fellowship in the Guggenheim Foundation and the NEH. He also received the PEN Los Angeles Award for Poetry in 1984. Antin lives in San Diego with his wife.

Works

David Antin has said that as a child he wanted to invent things, and that to him this meant he must either become a scientist or an artist. His early published poetry, collected in "Selected Poems: 1963-1973," was experimental, using found or "readymade" texts to address issues of language. In "Definitions for Mendy," a poem from this book, he uses definitions of "loss" from both a dictionary and an insurance handbook to fuel a meditation on the death of a friend. In his "Novel Poems" from the same book, he pages through popular novels, choosing a line or a phrase from each page to assemble poems.

After gathering some experience reading his poems, he began to find the convention of reading his own previously-written poetry stultifying. He turned instead to improvising poems that are a kind of thinking out loud about the act of creating meaning. The themes of these "talk-pieces" are often inspired by their location and audience. The talk pieces can be viewed alternately as poetry that seeks to re-connect with oral and performative aspects of the poetic tradition, as philosophy in the tradition of Plato's dialogues or Wittgenstein's lectures, or as a "site-specific" artwork like Robert Smithson's earthworks. He tape-records each performance and often composes subsequent written versions, which are collected in books like "talking at the boundaries," "tuning" and "what it means to be avant garde."

In his talk pieces Antin blends personal narrative with philosophical reflection to address issues of meaning. In "tuning," for example, he critiques the concept of "understanding" and offers an alternative model. In "what it means to be avant garde" he suggests that the avant garde attempts to address not the future but the present. In "the fringe" he tells a story about resistance to the Vietnam War that offers as a central figure a bucket containing the urine of several Guggenheim poets.

more:

interview

audio from UPenn

general backround/more links

Constructive ambiguity

from wiki
Constructive ambiguity is a term generally credited to Henry Kissinger, said to be the foremost exponent of the negotiating tactic it designates. It refers to the deliberate use of ambiguous language on a sensitive issue in order to advance some political purpose. Constructive ambiguity is often disparaged as fudging. It might be employed in a negotiation, both to disguise an inability to resolve a contentious issue on which the parties remain far apart, and to do so in a manner that enables each to claim obtaining some concession on it. It warrants further hopes that the ensuing postponement of resolution on this particular point, in a way that causes neither side excessive discomfort, will enable them to make real progress on other matters. If this progress takes place, the unresolved question might be revisited at a later date, if not voided altogether by the passage of time. On the other hand, since ambiguity in agreements can generate subsequent controversy, the likelihood of its employment proving constructive in comparison to further attempts to negotiate the point in question in clear terms, is a question best left for historians.

-------------------

A DICTIONARY OF DIPLOMACY by G. R. Berridge & Alan James 2004

constructive ambiguity. [elaborated] A term widely attributed to Henry Kissinger and also known as 'fudging', the deliberate use of ambiguous language on a sensitive issue in order to advance some political purpose. In a negotiation, for example, constructive ambiguity might be employed not only to disguise an inability to resolve a question on which the parties remain far apart but to do so in a manner that enables each to claim that some concession on it has actually been obtained. (The UN Security Council's Resolution 242 of November 1967 regarding the withdrawal of Israel from territory she had occupied in the recent *Six Day War was such a case.) It may also be hoped that, having thereby shelved this particular point in a way that causes neither side excessive discomfort, they will be able to make real progress on other matters. If this should prove to be the case, the ground might be prepared for a return to the unresolved question at a later date; time might even see it dissolve altogether. Of course, such hopes often prove ill-founded, and ambiguity in *agreements can also generate subsequent controversy. Whether on balance, therefore, its employment proves 'constructive' in relation to any further attempts to negotiate the point in question is for historians to determine. See also step-by-step diplomacy.

Examples from wiki:
UN Security Council's Resolution 242

The UN Security Council agreed on the text of the Resolution 242 after the crushing defeat that Israel inflicted on joint Arab forces during the Six Day War in 1967. As a result of bargaining between the powers sitting in the Security Council, the resolution reflected the deeply polarized political opinion. The provision of the resolution which prompted different and incompatible interpretations was the one immediately following the preamble of the text, reading: “establishment of just and lasting peace in the Middle East should include the application of both the following principles:

• withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in recent conflict;
• termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for…territorial integrity…of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries.”

The use of an unnatural English construction “territories occupied in recent conflict”, omitting the expected definite article “the”, made it possible to question whether Israel was asked to withdraw from all the territories occupied in the recent conflict, or to withdraw from some, but not all, such territories. Notably, the French translation of the document, unlike the English original, used the definite article, demanding the “retrait des forces armées israéliennes des territoires occupés lors du récent conflit”. Thus the French version, which together with the English version was an official UN version of the document, suggested that Israel must withdraw from all territories that it occupied during the Six Day War. Naturally, the French interpretation suited the interests of Arab countries, who made numerous attempts to prove its validity. By contrast, Israel opposed such an interpretation, and the sponsor of the resolution, Lord Caradon, appears to have had no intention of inserting the definite article into its text. Caradon additionally emphasized the additional and clarifying light that the second part of the first provision shed on its first part, and insisted that it must be given uppermost consideration. According to him, the boundary that existed before the Six Day War did not satisfy the right of Israel to live within secure and recognised boundaries. Consequently, under this interpretation, Israel did not have to withdraw to its pre-Six Day War borders.

quotes from Hollow Land, Israel's Architecture of Occupation by Eyal Weizman-2

pg 6

The following chapters form an 'archival probe', investigating the history and modus operandi of the various spatial mechanisms that have sustained - and continue to sustain - the occupation's regime and practices of control.

(see footnote re: use of this term in Mutations published 2001))

pg 6-7

Elastic geography

...the frontiers of the Occupied Territories are not rigid and fixed at all; rather, they are elastic, and in constant transformation. The linear border, a cartographic imaginary inherited from the military and political spatiality oft eh nation state has splintered into a multitude of temporary, transportable, deployable and removable border-synonyms - 'separation walls', 'barriers', 'blockades', 'closures', 'road blocks', checkpoints', 'sterile areas', special security zones', 'closed military areas', and 'killing zones' - that shrink and expand the territory at will. These borders are dynamic, constantly shifting, ebbing and flowing, they creep along, stealthily surrounding Palestinian villages and roads.... The anarchic geography of the frontier is an evolving image of transformation, which is remade and rearranged with every political development or decision.
...
The Separation Wall, merely one of a multiple barriers, is constantly rerouted, its path registering like a seismograph the political and legal battles surrounding it. Where territories appear to be hermetically sealed in by Israeli walls and fences, Pal. tunnels are dug underneath them. Elastic territories could thus not e understood as benign environments: highly elastic political space is often more dangerous and deadly than a static, rigid one.

quotes from Hollow Land, Israel's Architecture of Occupation by Eyal Weizman

pg 4

Against the geography of stable, static places, and the balance across linear & fixed sovereign borders, frontiers are deep, shifting, fragmented and elastic territories. Temporary lines of engagement, marked by makeshift boundaries, are not limited to the edges of political space but exist throughout its depth. distinctions between the 'inside' and 'outside' cannot be clearly marked. In fact, the straighter, more geometrical and more abstract official colonial borders across the 'New Worlds' tended to be, the more the territories of effective control were fragmented and dynamic and thus unchartable by an conventional mapping technique.

pg. 5

the spatial organization of the occupied territories is a reflection on only of an ordered process of planning and implementation, but, an increasingly so, of 'structured chaos', in which the -often deliberate- selective absence of govt intervention promotes an unregulated process of violent dispossession.
...
b/c elastic geographies respond to a multiple and diffused rater than i single source of power, their arch cannot be understood as the material embodiment of a unified political will or as the product of a single ideology. Rather the organization of the Occupied Territories should be seen as a kind of 'political plastic', or as a map of the relation between all the forces that shaped it.