While the boundaries of consequence - nation, state, locality are clearly mapped in atlases and widely known, the boundaries of convenience - those of multi-county, multi-state and multi-local government regions are not. Where could one find such an atlas of regions?
It is a goal of the Regions Work Initiative, launched in 1998 to have such an atlas. It is likely to be established first on-line. The objective is for residents of a locality to see and understand the regional relationships which affect them so they may be more proactive in the work.
One challenge is the alphabetical nature of filing and information processing systems. These systems work so that one may quickly find Tanzania, Texas or Tarrant County in a data list, but it does not present information in a way that shows data in relation to neighboring jurisdictions or the regional alignments they may participate. Geographic relationship is only by chance, not design.
As a citizen, I know my locality, my county, state and nation. I may know voting districts generally - at least the official position I'm selecting. Beyond that, regional entities are unknown. Whatever they might be, I expect the officials to be cooperating on behalf of the efficient investment and expenditure of my tax resources.
An online source of local government regional council information on the United Kingdom, Eire, Europe, USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa is the oultwood local government web site index. Here local government entities are listed alphabetically. Links may lead to maps which demonstrate geographic relationships.
Subdivisions of countries are managed by the national governments - named and mapped. The International Organization for Standardization cooperatively manages the protocols for codes and abbreviations. Mr. Gwillim Law published "Administrative Subdivision of Countries" in 1999 and maintains information on line at his Statoids page.
Academics focus on the concept of "regionalism" which, as an "-ism" is a top down governmental efficiency often viewed with suspicion by those being "regionalized." I advocate building regional community as a more natural way to respond to modern dynamics of a more crowded planet.
My experience has been confined to the U.S. where regional approaches promoted by the national and state governments were met with skepticism. The U.S. Federal Information Processing Codes are alphabetic filing codes, not geo-codes. Coding which places data in tables relating neighbor boundaries are more useful for analysis, but it requires users to know the geographic relationships. The alphabet isn't helpful. I've experimented with a North-South-East-West-South-North flow for the U.S. state names. Because the computer protocol is to sort folders alphabetically - number codes are required.
I have begun development of del.icio.us tags using "re:" as a tage to indicate region, regions, regional topics and, with number geo-codes, build a virtual Atlas of Regions of Earth - I.See.Regions.Work. Use the link below.
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