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Peters' Map Projection

© 2001 Akademische Verlagsanstalt. Source.

Technical details of this map projection

PROP) Peters' book
the equations Peters' used to create it:

From The New Cartography by Arno Peters (Friendship Press, NY, 1983)


the developable surface it is based on: a cylinder
what it preserves from the spherical earth: areas
and what it distorts: shape

But we can also look at the map projection as a human created object

• while it is based on equations and the science of map projection

• it was created for specific, political and ideological purposes

• and it was criticized by cartographers for having a political agenda

The controversy reveals that maps are ideological as well as technical representations

• ideological: infused with political or social or cultural belief

• Monmonier: propaganda maps

• ... or just maps as arguments?

The Peters' incident reveals how something as seemingly objective as a map projection can become embroiled in ideological debates

• It also raises the question as to what is an accurate map

Arno Peters and the Peters Map Projection Controversy

Background: Who is Arno Peters?

© 1993, ODT, Inc.. Source.

1950s: German textbook controversy: While writing his controversial textbook, Peters apparently came to believe that the world maps available in text books were highly problematic

• argued that the Mercator map projection was usually the default

• by the mid 1970s Peters had devised his world map as an alternative

• and he began to make statements about why it was better than the Mercator

The Peters' map projection is now one of the three most widely distributed world maps

• along with the Mercator and whichever map projection National Geographic is using
  

Mercator and Peters Projections with Equator

At the news conference introducing his map projection to the world Peters claimed that the Mercator projection had the tendency to center the world on Europe: it did!



It distorted the relative sizes of land masses, inflating the northern areas at the expense of the equatorial regions: it did this too!

Peters: "the Mercator projection overvalues the white man and distorts the picture of the world to the advantage of the colonial masters of the time"

Ward Kaiser: "the Mercator portrays a colonialist and racist mentality"

The bottom line:

• the Peters map is for anyone with a true devotion to a progressive and liberal understanding of global social issues

• It empowers the 3rd world by showing its actual landmass size in relation to the first world

• It makes a profound political statement favoring the 3rd world and its social issues, reversing what Peters sees as the profound political statement of the Mercator, which favors the 1st world

Christianity Today Clipping: the Peters Projection

adopted by many different organizations as their official map projection
United Nations: distributed over 60 million copies
Christian Aid organization: sold over 15,000 copies
Lutheran Church: distributed 6,000 copies
promoted by National Council of Churches, other Methodist groups
promoted by Willy Brandt, former chancellor of West Germany and Nobel Peace Prize winner
promoted by former Pope John Paul

Proponents of the Peters' Map Projection have created teaching materials:

Teaching a New World Vision: Ward Kaiser



© 1993, ODT, Inc. Source.

"The transformation of the world begins in the transforming of our minds, and the renewal of our minds begins with the transforming of the images we entertain: images we hang on our walls and images we carry with us in our heads."

Tempest in a Teapot: Cartographers Freak

• Loxton: the Peters map projection is a "plague" on cartography

• Porter and Voxland: the Peters map projection is a "provocative" and "mischievous" product of "a thoroughly confused cartographer" whose work is "perverse and wrong headed."

• German Cartographic Society: the Peters map is "misleading" "manipulative," and "falsifying"

• Robinson: the Peters map is a "cleverly contrived, cunningly deceptive attack" against cartography. "The land masses are somewhat reminiscent of wet, ragged, long winter underwear hung out to dry on the Arctic Circle."

• ACSM Bulletin: "American Cartographers Vehemently Denounce German Historian's Map"

• Snyder: "From its initial announcement, the Peters world map has been surrounded by controversy: in over 40 articles on the subject, cartographers have vigorously denounced a number of Peters' claims for the map, while he and his supporters have argued that his is the only world map that meets the concerns of people interested in social issues"

So why the outcry?

In part because Peters' made claims that his map was the best way to map the entire globe

• and cartographers rushed to point out the maps technical inadequacies

Maling: the Peters' projection is not quite equal area because of some minor problems with the equations used to create the projection

The projection is not "new": the Peters' projection is nearly identical to an obscure map projection devised in the mid 1800s by the Scottish Reverend James Gall

Gall Map Projection

1991: World Atlas based on Peters' Projection was published by HarperCollins

• cartographers lobbied the publisher to not publish the atlas

Cartographers have addressed technical issues in criticizing the projection

• is it actually exactingly equal area

• was it truly "invented" by Arno Peters

• are the equations Peters' uses accurate

They have not addressed the political issues Peters' raises: its social agenda

Claim by Peters that his map overcomes the Euro-centric mentality of the Mercator

• not criticized by cartographers as seen as outside the realm of cartography

Alas one of the most important critics of Peters is Arthur Robinson

• National Geographic map

Internal and External Contexts and Mapping

The internal context: much of what we have been discussing

• issues of geographic and mappable data, how it was collected, and its accuracy

• issues of map generalization, scale, classification, symbolization

• issues of coordinate systems and map projections

But there is also an external context as revealed by the Peters' map controversy

• what culture produced the map and why?

• what social forces shaped the creation of the map and why?

• what political and ideological beliefs shape the map?

Peters' world map is clearly more understandable from the latter perspective

• map projections have a "subliminal geometry"

The question is: do "neutral" things like the map projection and where it is centered and what it distorts affect our world view or not?

Thomas Saarinen: gathered over 3,800 sketch maps of the world by children from 49 countries in a National Geographic sponsored research project

Children's Mental Maps of World: Looks like the Mercator Projection, which greatly exaggerates areas in the North. From: T. Saarinen. "The Euro-centric Nature of Mental Maps of the World." Research in Geographic Education 1:2, 1999.
most, even those in the 3rd world, centered the world on Europe