ABSTRACT
The previous chapter ends with a paradox: it would appear that the modern world is simultaneously less and more territorial than what came before. One mode of territorial rule disappears, but the dissolving of this earlier assemblage of allegiances, institutions and sign systems allows for the emergence of a more uniform assemblage of geo-political territories. 1 Theories of modernity tend to pay more attention to the former half of this process than to the latter. 2 The modern world is defined in terms of what it has transcended, breaking the fetters of a traditional social system. There is another side to modernity, however, that is bound up with the process of creating and securing territories. This chapter explores some of this history, providing several insights into the transformations that paved the way for the territorial racism of the present era.
