World of Agent 007

2006 - 2015



"Our enemies are no longer known to us. They do not exist on a map. They're not nations, they're individuals. And look around you. Who do you fear? Can you see a face, a uniform, a flag? No! Our world is not more transparent now, it's more opaque! It's in the shadows. That's where we must do battle."

--M, Skyfall 2012


"There are known knowns, things we know that we know; and there are known unknowns, things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns, things we do not know we don't know."

--Donald Rumsfeld, US Secretary of Defense 2001-2006


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Mapping Fiction and Real Life

The idea behind this map is to explore the geopolitical themes featured in the James Bond movie franchise. This project limits its scope to the most recent films produced between 2006 and 2015. Movie themes include; terrorism, corporatism, cyber warfare, and surveillance.

One of the challenges in assembling this map is that the countries featured in the movies, for the most part, only serve as scenic backdrops. There isn't any real engagement with political issues of the state. The movies' antagonists do not have political allegiances to any particular nation state. They are rogue individuals working in the shadows to push their own nefarious agendas.

For the purpose of this project, the countries featured in this project map are used as points of reference to explore geopolitics relating to terrorism, cyber warfare, and surveillance. Data used for this map are based on the following indexes:

  • Global Terrorism Index (2015), Institute for Economics and Peace
  • Global Cybersecurity Index (2015), International Telecommunications Union
  • Surveillance Industry Index (2016), Transparency Toolkit


Movie Trivia

Check out the countries featured in the 2006-2015 James Bond movie franchise and where each villain come from

Countries by Movie


Birthplace of a Villian







Geopolitics

Terrorism Impact

A snapshot of the degree of impact on countries affected by terrorism

LOW MEDIUM HIGH ALL CLEAR

Note: filters recategorize impact indexes based on which countries they are grouped with

Cyber Security

A snapshot of cyber security readiness - i.e - the existence of national structures in place to implement and promote cybersecurity

LOW MEDIUM HIGH ALL CLEAR

Note: filters recategorize security indexes based on which countries they are grouped with

Surveillance Technology

General geolocations of private surveillance/security firms and the national governments that purchase their technology



About>>

The aim of this project was to create a fun map based on a work of fiction. The character of James Bond was chosen, not only because of his many globetrotting adventures, but because the Bond movies also touch on geopolitical themes.
This project focuses mainly on the Bond films produced between 2006 and 2015 as their geopolitical themes would more likely reflect current events.
The themes for the more recent films revolved around; terrorism, corporatism, cyber warfare, and surveillance.

WEBPAGE AND MAP DESIGN: N. Ama A. Kusi
FOR: Advanced GIS, JJS Graduate Program in International Affairs, The New School


Data Sources>>


Methodology>>

Map:

  • Components are polygon features sourced from world countries boundary shapefile from Esri.org
  • Columns were added to the boundary map table to include movie and geopolitical data
  • The map contains six layers, one for each map filter, including a layer that contains no visualizations which serves as a preliminary clear filter
Webpage:
  • Template used: CARTODB Publishing template
  • A screenshot of the map legend was taken from CARTO and placed in an HTML div for the map web page (which works as long as visualizations remain static)
  • Structure, styling, and interactivity are based on HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and JQuery coding language
Issue(s):
  • Coding for pop-up info windows are included for the "villians" layer but do not appear when villian geolocations are clicked on