Which Countries Use the Euro in 2023? (Map of the Eurozone)

This map and explainer article, originally from 2016, have been updated to June 2023 to cover the recent addition of Croatia to the Eurozone. You can see previous versions of the map by viewing all Eurozone articles on PolGeoNow.

Map by Evan Centanni, from blank map by Ssolbergj. License: CC BY-SA

Article by Caleb Centanni and Staff Writer 

What is the Eurozone?

Officially called the "euro area", the Eurozone is a nickname for the group of countries in Europe that share a single currency, called the euro, as their official money. The euro currency is managed by the European Union (EU), but many countries in the EU don't use the euro, and some countries outside the EU do use it. The European Central Bank, headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, is in charge of regulating the currency and making euro coins and bills (bank notes).

Map: Which Countries are in the European Union in 2023, Which Aren't, and Which Want to Join?

This map and article have been revised and updated to April 2023. No new countries have joined the EU since our last update in 2020, but there are three new candidate countries and one new "potential candidate".

Map by Evan Centanni, from blank map by Ssolbergj. License: CC BY-SA

Somalia v. Kenya: 3 Maps Explaining the Maritime Dispute & Court Ruling

Scroll down for the full-size maps

The UN's main court for disputes between countries, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), ruled yesterday on a contentious case many years in the making: Kenya and Somalia's dispute over the rights to a large slice of the Indian Ocean off their coasts.

While other news outlets analyze the politics and economics of the dispute, it's PolGeoNow's job to give you a clearer, more detailed explanation of its geography. And as shown in the three all-new map infographics below, that geography is a bit more complex than most news articles let on.

Scroll down to see each map at full size, along with concise explanations expanding on the information within the graphics...

 

Schengen Border Controls in the Time of Coronavirus (March 27, 2020)

This is an older edition of our Schengen Area border controls map, preserved here with its accompanying timeline for the historical record. To read the full article and see the current map and country-by-country list of border controls, visit our updated Schengen border controls article.

Map by Evan Centanni, from blank map by Ssolbergj. License: CC BY-SA

Article by Evan Centanni

Coronavirus: Schengen Border Controls Timeline March 1-27, 2020

Border controls have proliferated within Europe's "Schengen Area", where there's normally no ID check required to travel from one country to another. For more details, and to see a current map and list country-by-country list of official controls, visit our updated Coronavirus Schengen Border Controls article. Continue reading this article for the timeline of changes to official border controls from the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak through March 27, as preserved from the previous edition of the article.

Map: What is the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA)?

There are newer versions of this map available. To see them, view all AfCFTA updates.

Map by Evan Centanni, from blank map by Eric Gaba. License: CC BY-SA

New Trade Bloc: What is the AfCFTA Agreement?

Despite being neighbors, most countries in Africa trade more with other continents than with each other - a peculiar leftover of colonialism that the African Union (AU) has long been looking to change. Last year, the organization's member countries finally came together and agreed on the creation of one of the world's most expansive "free trade areas". The new zone, called the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), officially came into being on May 30, 2019, after a minimum threshold of 22 countries confirmed that they had copied its 2018 founding treaty into their national laws (a process called "ratification").

"Macedonia": Why is a Name So Important?

Ancient definitions of Macedonia compared with modern borders.
Contact us for permission to use this map.

What's in a Name? The "Macedonia" Dispute

This Sunday, Southeastern Europe's Republic of Macedonia is voting on a deal with Greece that includes changing its name to "Republic of North Macedonia". Greece objects to its neighbor using the name "Macedonia", and has been locked in a bitter dispute over it ever since the smaller country declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991.

The spat is serious enough that the Republic of Macedonia has been forced to accept the temporary name "former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" (FYROM) in the UN and other international organizations for the past 25 years, and has been blocked entirely from joining the European Union and NATO, where Greece holds veto power on new member applications.

Map: Costa Rica & Nicaragua Settle Border Dispute in Court

Map by Evan Centanni, based on materials submitted to the court. Contact for usage permissions.

World Court Rules on Costa Rica vs. Nicaragua

What happens when two countries draw their border along a river, then the river changes course? The world got to find out yesterday, as the UN's International Court of Justice (ICJ) released its judgement on a border dispute between Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Though the court's ruling was dominated by a related request to define the two countries' borders at sea, it also involved a tiny sliver of land in a temperamental river delta.

Catalonia Referendum: Detailed Results in 5 Maps

This map report is part of our Referendum 2017 coverage, spotlighting controversial independence votes in two of the world's autonomous regions: Kurdistan voted for independence from Iraq last month, and Catalonia tried to vote on leaving Spain on Oct. 1. Now we've mapped out Catalonia's results in detail based on data from the regional government.
 

Controversial Independence Vote

On October 1, Spain's autonomous region of Catalonia tried to hold a referendum on independence from Spain. After Spanish courts ruled the vote illegal, Spanish national police attempted to prevent voting, and the result was that voting was disrupted in many areas and not organized properly in most others. Still, Catalan government data states that some 42% of the region's residents came out to vote anyway, and of those who did, about 90% voted in favor of secession. Though Catalonia's president had promised to declare independence within 48 hours of a YES victory, so far he's delayed doing so.

Updated! Catalonia Referendum Results Maps: How Did Each Region Vote?

Updated! This article's maps and text have been updated with final results released by the Catalan government. See below for more details. We also now have an article with detailed results maps broken down by municipality.

This map report is part of our Referendum 2017 coverage, spotlighting controversial independence votes in two of the world's autonomous regions: Kurdistan voted for independence from Iraq last week, and Catalonia voted to leave Spain this weekend. Now detailed results are available, and we're working on getting them mapped out.

Maps by Evan Centanni, starting from blank map by Vinals and Rwxrwxrwx. License: CC BY-SA

Catalonia Independence Vote (Updated)

Detailed, final results are now available for Catalonia's controversial referendum on independence from Spain. The vote was widely disrupted by the Spanish police after courts ruled it illegal, resulting in massive irregularities that will make it hard for outsiders to accept as a proper democratic referendum. Still, some 43% of eligible Catalan voters reportedly made it out to cast ballots, meaning there's plenty of reported data to look at.

Referendum 2017: Iraqi Kurdistan Map

Two of the world's autonomous regions are about to vote in controversial independence referendums. Iraqi Kurdistan decides on independence from Iraq this Monday, and on October 1 Catalonia plans to vote on leaving Spain. PolGeoNow will be covering these events with a series of articles, but in the meantime we couldn't wait to share our new Iraqi Kurdistan map with you!

Graphic by Evan Centanni and Djordje Djukic, incorporating base map by Koen Adams of onestopmap.com. All rights reserved.

Iraqi Kurdistan Independence Referendum

The Kurdistan Region of Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan for short) is just part of the traditional homeland of the Kurds, the Middle East's fourth-largest ethnic group after Arabs, Persians, and Turks.

Many Kurds also live in Turkey, Syria, and Iran. But Iraqi Kurdistan is where they have the most legal rights, governing themselves in what's internationally recognized as an autonomous region within Iraq.

But all's not well in Kurdistan-Iraq relations. Iraqi Kurds suffered through horrific violence and persecution in the 1980s and 90s, and now the region's top politician has staked his reputation on separating Kurdistan from Iraq permanently.

Map of Temporary Border Controls in the Schengen Area, March 2016

There are newer versions of this map available. To see them, view all Schengen Area articles.

In the companion to this article, we explain in plain English what the Schengen Area is, and which countries are part of it. Here, we present a map of the area's current crisis, showing where border checks have been reintroduced. Details and explanation in the article below.

Map by Evan Centanni, from blank map by Ssolbergj. License: CC BY-SA

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Article by Evan Centanni

Borders Re-emerging Inside the Schengen Area

Over the past months, concern has been rising that Europe's border-free travel zone, known as the Schengen Area, is falling apart. As unprecedented numbers of refugees and other migrants enter the Schengen Area, individual member countries have begun to re-start border checks in the places where they abolished them decades ago. Read on to learn the why, how, and where of the Schengen Area's new border controls!

Maps of How Scotland's Regions Really Voted

Good geographers know that maps can lie to you. Every map emphasizes some aspects of a place at the expense of others, giving it a lot of power to lead careless readers astray. Maps of Scotland's recent independence referendum are misleading us about the reality, even if not intentionally.

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Map by Evan Centanni, based on blank map by TUBS and NordNordWest (CC BY-SA)

By Evan Centanni

Misleading Maps
By now you've probably heard the results of Scotland's independence referendum: voters chose "no" by a solid margin of 55% to 45%. Check out our previous article to learn more about what would have happened if Scotland had voted "yes".

Maps like this one from the BBC and this one from Wikipedia have popped up since the results came out, showing how each of Scotland's council areas voted. Most of the country is in red for "no", with a few "yes" areas in green.

But if one area went 51% for "yes", and another 51% for "no", those two areas actually voted almost identically - yet contrasting red/green maps make us feel like they're polar opposites (not to mention that one-in-thirty readers has trouble seeing the difference between red and green).

How the Councils Really Voted
Whether each area's people voted just over or just under 50% in favor isn't actually that important. What matters is how far the balance was tipped in each region. This is not the U.S. presidential election, where the final vote is actually made by delegates obligated to go by the majority in each state. All the votes across Scotland were pooled together to determine the result, so which side of the 50-yard line each area came out on has no effect .

How Sharply Divided is Ukraine, Really? Honest Maps of Language and Elections

There's no question that Ukraine's current crisis arose from major political divisions in the country, and it's true that language is an issue. But some online news websites have sensationalized and exaggerated these divisions through misleading maps. PolGeoNow offers a pair of maps that better communicate the blurriness of the supposed lines between western and eastern Ukraine. 

(For a map of current events from January up to this week, including protester control, government occupations, and the Russian invasion, purchase our premium map of the Ukraine crisis or become a member.)

A more honest map of Ukraine's 2010 presidential election. By Evan Centanni.

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Article by Evan Centanni 

Misleading Ukraine Maps
In January, the Washington Post's Max Fisher wrote a popular map-illustrated blog post about the political and linguistic divisions fueling Ukraine's crisis, then at the height of its pro-Europe protest phase. Later, CNN followed the Post's lead and published a similar set of maps. However, the maps in both articles are designed in a way that makes the divisions look much sharper and more black-and-white than they really are. There's not, as Fisher preposterously claims, "an actual, physical line" splitting Ukraine in half. Instead, there's a gradual shading of mixed populations whose ethnic identities and voting history don't always correlate to the country's current political divisions.

Map: Peru & Chile's Sea Dispute Settled in Court

Two weeks ago, the International Court of Justice released a long-awaited ruling on Peru and Chile's disputed maritime boundary. Many headlines claimed that Peru "won" the case, but in fact it was not a full victory for either country. Below is our detailed map of Peru and Chile's seas and of the dispute, followed by an easy-to-understand summary of the case. 

Map by Evan Centanni (country coastlines and land borders from Natural Earth)

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Article by Evan Centanni

Disputed Territory
Chile and Peru have just settled a decades-long dispute over the location of their maritime boundary (the border between their sea zones). A large wedge of sea off the countries' coast was claimed by both sides, in part because of its high value for the fishing industry. In 2008, Peru took Chile to court over the dispute. Their disagreements would be resolved by the International Court of Justice (ICJ), a United Nations body in the Hague founded for the purpose of settling differences between U.N. member countries.

Disputed Territory: The Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands

You may have heard the news about China and Japan's ongoing territorial dispute over a group of islands in the East China Sea. But what are the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, and why are they so fiercely contested? Read on for all these answers and more!

Map of the disputed Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands (by Evan Centanni).

Article by Omar Alkhalili

About the Islands
The Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands are a collection of five small islets and three rocks in the East China Sea, all of which are uninhabited. The largest of the islands has an area of 4.32 km² and the smallest is only 0.45 km². They are located about 140 km from the nearest inhabited Japanese islands, 300 km from mainland China and 170 km from Taiwan. They are administered by Japan but claimed by both the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Taiwan, whose government is known officially as the Republic of China (ROC).

Niger and Burkina Faso Resolve Territorial Dispute

Update: In May 2015, Niger and Burkina Faso formally agreed to implement this ICJ ruling, with the practical aspects of exchanging territories to be completed by the end of the following year.

Map by Evan Centanni. Sources: ICJ, Natural Earth. Africa inset based on this map by TUBS/Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA).

By Evan Centanni
 
Border Dispute Settled
Last week, a territorial dispute between the West African countries of Niger and Burkina Faso was resolved peacefully with a ruling from the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Both countries' governments agreed to respect the court's ruling on where their border should lie, a question which had persisted ever since they both achieved independence in 1960.

In the ruling, the court drew an official border based on a careful analysis of a 1927 document establishing the pre-independence boundary between the two former French colonies, also turning to a 1960 French map which both countries had agreed to use as a secondary reference. The new border splits the disputed area between Burkina Faso and Niger, and will help put an end to confusion regarding policing and tax collection in the border area.

Map: The Falkland Islands' Disputed Seas

The Falkland Islands, a South Atlantic territory disputed between the U.K. and Argentina, held a status referendum this week in which 99.8% of voters defied Argentina by choosing to remain British. But it's not just about the islands - also at stake are legal rights to the sea for hundreds of miles around.

Zones of maritime jurisdiction around the Falkland Islands, highlighting area disputed between the U.K and Argentina. Map by Evan Centanni (country coastlines from the Natural Earth dataset). All rights reserved.

The Disputed Seas of the Falkland Islands
The Falkland Islands are administered by the U.K. as an overseas territory, but are also claimed based on historical arguments by Argentina, which calls them "las Islas Malvinas". Both countries have signed and ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which defines ownership and legal rights for the waters surrounding coastal countries. According to the UNCLOS, each country is entitled to three basic zones of control in its surrounding seas:

Partner Project: Range of Taiwan's Missiles

Click to see at full size on Taiwan in Perspective blog.
Map by Evan Centanni (all rights reserved).

Michal Thim from Taiwan in Perspective recently asked Political Geography Now to help him make a map depicting Taiwan's current and future missile capabilities in its standoff with China. For anyone who's interested, here's the finished product (click on the map to see it at full size on Michal's site). The main sources for the missile information was this article from Defense News, and the locations of China's military assets come from the U.S. Department of Defense's 2012 annual report on China.

If you want to learn more about the complex political situation in Taiwan, Wikipedia has a decent outline of the basics. Political Geography Now also hopes to publish maps and articles covering Taiwan in the future.

Map: Sudan & South Sudan's Disputed Territories

Countries: South Sudan, Sudan
Official Names: Republic of South Sudan, Republic of Sudan
Summary: After South Sudan declared independence from Sudan last year, much of the border between the neighbors is still hotly disputed, with recent violent clashes around the Heglig oil field and other areas. Read on for a full list of Sudan and South Sudan's eight major border flashpoints.

Border map of Sudan and South Sudan, showing disputed areas and fighting since the beginning of 2012. Aerial bombings and attacks by rebel groups not shown. My own work, using blank Sudan and South Sudan maps by NordNordWest / Wikipedia. License: CC BY-SA.