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Natural border
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== Criticism == In Chapter IV of his 1916 [[book]] ''The New Europe: Essays in Reconstruction'', British [[historian]] [[Arnold J. Toynbee]] criticized the concept of natural borders.<ref name = "toynbee">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AIHTAAAAMAAJ&dq=The+New+Europe:+Some+Essays+in+Reconstruction&pg=PA9|title=The New Europe: Some Essays in Reconstruction|year=1916}}</ref> Specifically, Toynbee criticized this concept as providing a justification for launching additional wars so that countries can attain their natural borders.<ref name = "toynbee"/> Toynbee also pointed out how once a country attained one set of natural borders, it could subsequently aim to attain another, further set of natural borders; for instance, the [[German Empire]] set its western natural border at the [[Vosges Mountains]] in 1871 but during [[World War I]], some Germans began to advocate for even more western natural borders—specifically ones that extend all of the way up to [[Calais]] and the [[English Channel]]—conveniently justifying the permanent German retention of those Belgian and French territories that Germany had just conquered during World War I.<ref name = "toynbee"/> As an alternative to the idea of natural borders, Toynbee proposes making free trade, partnership, and cooperation between various countries with interconnected economies considerably easier so that there would be less need for countries to expand even further—whether to their natural borders or otherwise.<ref name = "toynbee"/> In addition, Toynbee advocated making national borders based more on the principle of [[national self-determination]]—as in, based on which country the people in a particular area or territory actually wanted to live in.<ref name = "toynbee"/>
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