Perforated States in AP Human Geography

South Africa is perforated, Lesotho is the enclave

The term describes the outer country. South Africa is the perforated state because its territory wraps all the way around a foreign country. Lesotho, the country filling the hole, is an enclave, a state entirely surrounded by one other state.

The same applies to Italy. Italy is perforated, and Vatican City and San Marino are enclaves. Every enclave is also landlocked, but most landlocked countries aren't enclaves. Bolivia and Switzerland touch several neighbors, so they have more than one route out.

Multiple-choice answer choices can swap these terms on purpose. If the question asks about the larger country's shape, the answer is perforated. If it asks about the smaller country's position, the answer is enclave or landlocked.

What the hole does to both governments

Perforated states connect to Unit 4: Political Geography, Topic 4.7 (Forms of Governance), where the bigger question is how a state organizes power and control across its territory. A state's shape is one of the physical facts that governance has to work around, whether the country is run as a unitary state from the top down or as a federal state with power spread among regional centers.

For the surrounding state, the hole is a place where its laws and authority stop. It also gives the surrounding state leverage. Road and rail routes to an enclave cross the surrounding state, giving it substantial leverage over the enclave's overland access and trade.

For the enclosed state, the effects run in the opposite direction. Lesotho's economy has long depended on South Africa, with many Basotho historically working in South African mines and Lesotho selling water to South Africa through the Lesotho Highlands Water Project. Lesotho is sovereign, but its overland trade and migration flows pass through one neighbor.

Reading a map stimulus with a hole in it

A political map of southern Africa or Italy is an easy fit for a state-shape question that uses a stimulus. Look for a separate country sitting entirely inside another's borders. The perforated label goes on the larger country.

Three distinctions to watch for are:

• Fragmented, which means a state split into separate pieces, like Indonesia or the Philippines. A perforated state surrounds another state; unlike fragmentation, the label describes an enclosed territory, not whether all of the surrounding state's territory is connected. Italy has islands and is still perforated.
• Treating Eswatini as a second hole in South Africa. Eswatini also borders Mozambique, so it isn't fully enclosed and doesn't count.
• Calling South Africa compact. Its outline is fairly round, but the hole is what defines its shape category here.

Know one example for each of the five shapes (compact, elongated, prorupted, fragmented, perforated). For perforated, South Africa and Lesotho is the safest pick, with Italy as a backup.

Turning Lesotho into a free-response explanation

Question 1 (No-stimulus question) asks about state organization with no map, so you'd need to bring the example yourself. Question 2 or Question 3 could include a map where a perforated shape is visible.

A strong answer does three things. It names the perforated state and its enclave correctly. It explains a specific consequence, such as Lesotho needing South African cooperation to move exports overland or its citizens' reliance on jobs across the border. And it ties that consequence to governance, meaning who controls movement and how much independence the smaller state actually has in practice.

The weak version only defines the shape. Graders reward the explanation of what the shape causes. Because free-response questions can ask for analysis across scales, it helps to connect the national-scale shape to regional economic dependence or to individual workers crossing the border.