The ‘Mediterranean World’

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The ‘Mediterranean World’: European Power Politics and the Geographical Mind, 1571–1973 (English: De Gruyter, 2026)

Open Access: link (from October 2026)

The expression “Mediterranean World” refers to a geographical division supposedly distinguished from all others by its unique characteristics. By taking a long-term perspective, the book traces the gradual emergence, from the late sixteenth century onward, of ideas that imbued the Mediterranean Sea with meanings that referred to something other than just a sea. These ideas crystallised into a distinct concept of Mediterranean-ness during and after the Napoleonic era, when it was harnessed in the service of European power politics. The book explores how its subsequent iterations served colonial and neo-colonial interests, right up to the Cold War, when Western hegemony in the region passed from Europe to the United States. Although grounded in the history of ideas and concepts, the text weaves its analysis into a comprehensive narrative, making it accessible to non-specialist readers and suitable for use as a history textbook in International Relations and related fields.


Contents 

Introduction

 Part 1

The Mediterranean Sea, 1571–1797

Navigating the Middle Sea

  • Shifting Spheres of Influence: The Late Sixteenth and the Seventeenth Centuries
  • Trade Lanes and Power Politics: The Eighteenth Century

Imagining the Middle Sea

  • Segmented Imaginative Geographies
  • Overlapping Imaginative Geographies

Europeanizing the Middle Sea

  • When History Started to Matter
  • Rocking the Cradle of Civilization

Part 2

A “Mediterranean World,” 1798–1973

The Making of a “Mediterranean World,” 1798–1876

  • Napoleon in Egypt, 1798–99
  • Engineers, Philosophers, and the Geographical Mind

Projecting the Nation onto the Mediterranean

  • British and French Colonialism
  • Other Nations’ Mediterranean Fantasies

Projecting the West onto the Mediterranean, 1877–1973

  • Geopolitics and Geohistory: From Ratzel to Braudel
  •  “Middle East,” “Eurafrica,” and the Cold War

Epilogue







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