Introduction

This chapter introduces the new edition of the Companion to Political Geography with a synopsis of the crisis in Kobani, the Kurdish city in Northern Syria near the Turkish border that came under siege from Islamic State in 2014. It situates the crisis in Kobani at the heart of political geographical thought and demonstrate how many of the most pressing issues of our times and their historical conditions are encapsulated in this crisis. The authors acknowledge that political geography is no silver bullet, unraveling the complex and often deadly conflagrations of the contemporary world, but do suggest that it stages some important questions and provides some powerful tools for understanding. The chapter situates this claim within the field of political geography and its historical development. It then indicates how this volume builds on the previous edition, the areas in which it departs, and how it contributes anew to the making of political geography today.