Globalizing Cartography? The International Map of the World, the International Geographical Union, and the United Nations

Few maps mirror the history of the twentieth century as closely as the International Map of the World (IMW). A proposal for a map of the entire globe on a scale of 1:1 million, using standard conventional signs, was presented at the Fifth International Geographical Congress in Berne in 1891 by the German geographer Albrecht Penck. More than two decades later, the final specification was finally published shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, a crisis that brought a halt to the international collaboration on which the project depended. The IMW's fortunes waxed and waned over the next three decades, necessitating a major review of its continuing value after the Second World War. A new IMW Executive under the chairmanship of John Kirtland Wright, Director of the American Geographical Society, was established at the 1949 Lisbon conference of the International Geographical Union. Drawing on Wright's correspondence in the AGS archives, this paper examines the debates between the national cartographic agencies and related societies involved in the future of the IMW, with particular reference to the transfer of the project's Central Bureau from the British Ordnance Survey in Southampton to the United Nations in New York in the early 1950s. This discussion, which focused mainly on the need to combine the IMW with an internationalized version of the US-dominated 1:1 million World Aeronautical Chart, reveals the on-going tensions between the ideals of scientific internationalism embodied in the IMW's original proposal and the harsh realities of national self-interest in the early years of the Cold War. Peu de cartes reflètent aussi fidèlement l'histoire du XXe siècle que la Carte Internationale du Monde (CIM). Une proposition pour une carte du monde entier, à l'échelle du millionième, utilisant des conventions et des symboles standardisés, fut présentée au cinquième congrès international de géographie de Berne, en 1891, par le géographe allemand Albrecht Penck. Plus de deux décennies plus tard, les caractéristiques finales furent publiées peu de temps avant le déclenchement de la Première Guerre Mondiale, une crise qui mit un terme à la collaboration internationale dont dépendait le projet. Le sort de la CIM connut des hauts et des bas au cours des trois décennies suivantes, nécessitant une révision majeure après la Deuxième Guerre Mondiale pour renforcer son utilité sur le long terme. Une nouvelle commission exécutive de la CIM, sous la direction de Jo