Our history

The  International Geographical Union (IGU)  is an international, non-governmental, professional organization devoted to the development of the discipline of Geography. The IGU was formally established in Brussels in 1922. Its instruments are its National Committees (101, in 2016), Commissions (38, in 2016) and Task Forces (3, in 2016). 

In 1984, the International Geographical Union established a Study Group under the title 'Geography and Public Administration', which was then used as the preliminary status before a Commission could be launched. It was replaced in 1988 by a Commission on 'Geography and Public Administration'. Since then, the Commission was renamed twice to reflect new issues and perspectives on the relation between   territory and public administration. In 2000 became 'Commission on Geography and Public Policy' and in 2008 adopted its current title 'Commission on Geography of Governance'. 

An important aspect of the initial period (1984-1988) was participation of Commission members in early debates about restructuring of local and regional government in the central European countries then dominated by the Soviet bloc. Two of the main meetings held in this period dealt with specific aspects of Poland and Hungary, and the wider debates in other Central European countries. Catalan regionalism and separatism also became a very live issue, with the Commission holding a meeting in Barcelona specifically to engage in the debate. A feature of the Commission’s activities was collaboration with other organisations, such as the Academy of Sciences in Budapest and in Warsaw, and with the Institute of Catalan Studies in Barcelona. An important partnership was a collaboration with the sister organisation of IGU, the International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS). Robert Bennett represented the IGU Group at an IIAS meeting in Berlin in 1984 just prior to the launch of the IGU Commission (Study Group). This founded collaboration with a Study Group of IIAS on L’Amenagement du Territoire (The management of territory), formed mainly of lawyers and administrative scientists, who were also centred on Central European reforms. As well as its own IGU Commission publications, collaboration with the IIAS produced a key publication in 1988: L’Amenagement du Territoire et les Pouvoiurs Locaux et Regionaux face aux Mutations Economiques (Regional Planning and Local Government confronted with Economic Change), ed. Gerard Marcou (University of Lille).  This was interdisciplinary with members of the IIAS, with 5 of the 11 chapters written by IGU members. In February 1988, at the end of the Commission’s first four years, a path-breaking meeting was held in Washington D.C. jointly with the US Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations, and taking place in the Indian Treaty Room of the White House. 

The Study Group formally became a Commission at the IGU Congress in 1988 in Sydney. A key feature of the period 1988-1992 continue to be restructuring of local and regional governmental in the central European countries. In the build-up to the removal of the Berlin Wall in 1990, and its aftermath, the Commission took an active role in many activities to implement new laws and reforms in countries now freed from limitations on open debate.  One of its members, Jerzy Regulski became the minister for Local Government reform in Poland; other members in Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary and Russia became politicians, or were active as advisors and consultants. It was a dramatic period of change throughout central Europe in which the Commission played a small but important role. The Commission meeting in Moscow in September 1991 was uncertain, but did begin just as the siege of the Russian Parliament and Boris Yeltsin came to an end, with the parliament building surrounded by tanks. Collaboration continued with the International Institute of Administrative Sciences (IIAS), and new collaborations developed. A major meeting sponsored by the United Nations University (and others) took place in Spain in 1991 that widened the IGU Commission’s brief to developing countries, and also focused on the other key themes of the period of decentralisation geographically, and to markets, often focused on privatisation.  The Commission over this period also diversified through many bilateral collaborations focused on developing expertise in the new regimes of Central Europe. Key exchanges occurred with Amsterdam (through Petr Dostál) and the London School of Economics (through Robert Bennett) to help colleagues in Prague, Bratislava, Budapest, Warsaw and other centres to access library resources and advice to develop new curricula for students, and to re-equip their teaching and library resources. 

The third four-year period (1992-1996) of the Commission maintained a close focus on Central European developments, but also now added routine sessions at the major annual conferences of Geographical bodies in many countries, especially the USA. There was also diversification of the Commission’s interests into wider concepts of governance taking debates further into understanding how partner bodies operated with formal government administration in different contexts. 

Commission members meet now regularly at its annual conference, held in different parts of the world, and during the sessions or panels organized within the program of the major IGU Congresses and Conferences. Field trips to study and discuss local issues has also been held as part of some of its annual conferences. 

The Commission has been highly active during its first four decades of existence (1984-2024), holding numerous sessions in all IGU major congresses and conferences, in addition to its own annual thematic conferences. The Commission facilitates the exchange of research outcomes, experiences and perspectives on local and regional governance issues in different contexts around the world. One of the outcomes of this joint work is the publication of several books and edited collections of selected papers in peer-reviewed international journals, namely in 'Environment & Planning C: Government and Policy', 'GeoJournal', Acta Universitatis Carolinae / Geographica, Bulletin de la Société Languedocienne de Géographie, and in the 'International Journal of E-Planning Research'.