Public Speaking

Speaking on geopolitical and environmental issues, Dr. de Blij has addressed business, governmental, and educational organizations in North America and around the world. His clients include:

Sample topics (established in consultation with the client) are:

Four Challenges for the Twenty-First Century

The United States today is the world's only superpower, a situation that is likely to be temporary. As the U.S.A. seeks to lead rather than dominate this world, it faces a host of challenges and demands. From a geographic perspective, four of these rank highly: (1) Environmental Change that has the potential to destabilize the planet; (2) the Rise of China on the eastern perimeter of Eurasia; (3) the Growing Challenge of Radical Islam; and (4) the Worsening Problems of Africa, which have the potential to affect the entire world.

Geographic Literacy and National Security

International competitions, tests, and polls prove that Americans are among the most geographically-illiterate citizens in the world. Indeed, the U.S.A. is the only country of consequence in which it is possible to go from kindergarten through graduate school without ever taking a course in geography. As a result, political leaders have embarrassed themselves and their country in foreign settings; members of the government have misled the country in disastrous foreign-policy campaigns, and an inadequately-educated public is in no position to make its views count. From business settings in the international arena to public relations with our neighbors, our geographic illiteracy constitutes a serious disadvantage --and worse.

Europe: Superpower in the Making?

Over the past six decades the political geography of Europe has been transformed. A European Union has emerged from lengthy international negotiations, and a dozen European countries have dropped their currencies in favor of the Euro. Some in Europe dream of a federal union forged by political as well as economic bonds, but others want to protect national rights and identities in certain key spheres. Now Europe faces several dilemmas: the consequences of further expansion into poorer and slower-growing Eastern Europe; the formation of a European armed force; and relations with Turkey (an applicant for membership) and Russia (not under current consideration). Meanwhile, devolutionary forces in the form of separatism and civil strife afflict the very states forming the core of the EU. Will Europe's unification create a global superpower?

Greenhouse or Icehouse? How Climate Will Change

Current (and legitimate) concerns over global warming notwithstanding, the Earth is in the grip of an ice age some 20 million years in duration, the most recent three million years of which have been especially frigid. The warming phase that began in the 1970s, undoubtedly augmented by human activity, should be seen in geographic context -- that is, long-range and world-wide. In that perspective, global climate change poses a very different challenge for humanity from the one being propagated in the popular press.

Geopolitical Prospects for East Asia: a Coming Cold War?

A case can be made for the proposition that the United States embarked on the Vietnam War because its political leaders were poorly informed about the physical and cultural geography of Southeast Asia generally and Indochina in particular. Now the U.S. is the key stabilizing force in a region rife with political and cultural tensions, and in which one of the world's potential superpowers, China, is on the rise. What is the likelihood of the world's first intercultural Cold War emerging in East Asia? How well informed are Americans today on the geography of China? How can the Cold-War risk be averted?

Promise and Peril on the Pacific Rim

Europe's political and economic organization empowered countries with frontages on the North and Mediterranean seas. The spread of industrialization transformed the shores of the North Atlantic Ocean. And now globalization ushers in the era of the Pacific -- with great economic promise and business opportunity, but also with looming political peril and environmental danger. The promise lies in huge markets and cheap labor, but the peril threatens in rising nationalisms, radical religions, and unsettled scores.

Geography as Destiny

For the vast majority of the Earth's inhabitants, place of birth remains the most powerful determinant of a lifetime's experiences. Even in the modern era of mass migration and global interaction, place of birth is crucial. Our world remains a jigsaw of countries, a patchwork of religions, a Babel of languages and a mosaic of innumerable customs and traditions. One's chances of surviving through infancy and childhood, and later one's opportunities for advancement in a competitive world, are strongly influenced by one's place of birth. And this means that geography -- environmental, cultural, economic, and political -- is destiny. To understand the geographic layout of our world is to comprehend the challenges of its diversity.

Comments from Clients include:

Dr. de Blij's speaking assignments are arranged by his agent: