The « Real » Map of Africa

The « Real » Map of Africa

We often think of a map as a realistic representation of the world, but it is actually quite the opposite: a neat and idealistic drawing of borders in what are often messy places with no visible demarcations on the ground. A map can depict state sovereignty over areas with little to no actual governance. Nowhere is the gap between reality and cartographic representation greater than in parts of Africa.

The new map provides some interesting insights into the state of affairs across the continent. For example, large parts of African land are beyond the reach of the states that ostensibly control them. On this “realist’s” map, some of the 54 official African states are contiguous to each other, but others are separated by large swaths of stateless regions, some more than a thousand miles long. By my count, of the 11.7 million total square miles of African continental land mass, roughly 4 million, or about 34 percent, are out of state control. In reality, a person can travel from Mauritania to Egypt (provided one survives the journey) without encountering any effective state authority.

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