Yves Lacoste facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Yves Lacoste
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Lacoste in 1972
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| Born | September 7, 1929 Fez, Morocco
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| Known for | Forensic analysis of the US bombing campaign of the Red River Delta |
| Scientific career | |
| Institutions | University of Paris 8 |
| Thesis | Transformational Analysis (1955) |
Yves Lacoste (born September 7, 1929) is a famous French geographer. He is known for his strong interest in politics and his work in a field called geopolitics. Geopolitics looks at how geography, like where countries are located, affects power and politics.
Yves Lacoste was born in Fez, Morocco. His father was a geologist, who studies rocks and the Earth, and his mother was a librarian. He grew up in Morocco. Later, he went to high school in France and then studied at a famous university called the Sorbonne.
After finishing his studies, Lacoste became a geography teacher. He taught in Algiers, a city in Algeria. At that time, he was involved in groups that wanted Algeria to be independent from France. He believed in fairness and freedom for people.
In 1955, he moved back to France. He kept studying geography, especially about how some countries were not as developed as others. He also wrote many important textbooks. In 1979, he earned his highest degree, a doctorate.
Later, in 1989, he started a research center. This center is now called the French Institute of Geopolitics. Lacoste is special because he combines natural geography with political ideas in his studies. He also started a geography magazine called Hérodote.
In 2000, he won a big award called the Vautrin-Lud prize. This award recognized his important work in geography. Yves Lacoste has continued to teach and talk about world issues in the media. He supports ideas of fairness and believes in keeping government separate from religion.
His Big Ideas
In 1976, Yves Lacoste started the French geopolitics magazine Hérodote. He also wrote a very important book called La Géographie ça sert d'abord à faire la guerre. This title means "Geography is first used to make war."
His main idea in the book was that geography is a key part of military plans. It is also important for how political power is used. Lacoste showed that knowing about places helps in planning wars and controlling areas.
Before this, in 1972, he became famous around the world. This was during the Vietnam War. He studied how the United States was bombing the Red River Delta in Vietnam. He looked at the maps and information carefully.
Lacoste agreed with the North Vietnamese government. They said the U.S. was purposely targeting the river's water systems. This could cause big floods and harm many people. He called this a very serious wrong act during a war.
Today, he is still a co-editor of the Hérodote magazine. He also leads the French Institute of Geopolitics. This institute is part of the University of Paris VIII.
Understanding Geopolitics
Yves Lacoste helped bring the word "geopolitics" back into use. For a while, this word was not popular. It was linked to the Nazi government and a German geographer named Karl Haushofer.
Lacoste focused on how space and location affect political matters. He defines geopolitics as studying power struggles over land. These struggles can happen at many levels. They can be global, between continents, within a country, or even in a small local area.
In an earlier book, La Géographie du sous-développement, Lacoste gave a geographic reason for why some places are "underdeveloped." He looked at how the land and location played a role in their economic situation.
His Books
- Les Pays sous-développés (1959)
- Géographie du sous-développement (1965)
- Ibn Khaldoun - Naissance de l'histoire du Tiers-Monde (1965)
- La Géographie ça sert d'abord à faire la guerre (1976) ISBN: 2-7071-0815-4
- Contre les anti-tiersmondistes et contre certains tiersmondistes (1985)
- Géopolitique des régions françaises (1986)
- vol 1: La France septentrionale
- vol 2: La Façade atlantique
- vol 3: La France du sud-est
- Dictionnaire de Géopolitique (1993) ISBN: 2-08-035101-X
- Dictionnaire géopolitique des États (1994) ISBN: 2-08-035104-4
- La Légende de la terre (1996) ISBN: 2-08-035446-9
- Vive la Nation - Destin d'une idée géopolitique (1998) ISBN: 2-213-59613-1
- L'Eau des hommes (2002) ISBN: 2-7022-0628-X
- De la Géopolitique aux Paysages. Dictionnaire de la Géographie (2003) ISBN: 2-200-26538-7
- Maghreb, peuple et civilisation (2004) ISBN: 2-7071-4432-0
- Géopolitique. La longue histoire d'aujourd'hui (2006) ISBN: 2-03-505421-4
- L'Eau dans le monde : les batailles pour la vie (2006) ISBN: 2-03-582578-4
- Géopolitique de la Méditerranée (2006) ISBN: 2-200-26840-8
See also
In Spanish: Yves Lacoste para niños
