ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts covered in the preceding chapters of this book. The book develops Realist Geopolitics' as a materialist approach to international relations therein analysing how location and the naturally existing and man-made environment shape South Africa's economic and political relations with its neighbouring countries. With regard to energy policy, this means that the book analyses should rest on naturally existing conditions such as the volumes of oil and gas that the Sub-Saharan African countries possess or those states' varying climatic and geomorphological suitability for hydropower generation. Yet it is apparent that geographical conditions, both naturally existing and man-made, cannot provide a complete explanation of economic and political phenomena. Referring only to natural causes often leads as sadly exemplified by many publications that stand in the tradition of Classical Geopolitics to crude forms of geodeterminism.
