For generations, the world has been taught through a map that makes some of the planet’s largest countries and continents look far bigger than they really are. That map may now be losing its place as the default.
On Friday, September 4, the United Nations General Assembly overwhelmingly approved a resolution calling for a more accurate and equitable representation of the world’s regions, with particular emphasis on Africa.
The resolution, introduced by Togo on behalf of the African Group and backed by the African Union, passed 164 votes to 1, with six countries abstaining.
The United States was the only country to vote against it. Estonia, Georgia, Lithuania, Moldova, Serbia and Ukraine abstained.
The resolution is called “Correct the Map: Rebalancing Global Cartographic Representation and Promoting Equitable Representation of the World’s Regions, Particularly Africa.”
Its central recommendation is the wider use of equal-area map projections, including the relatively new Equal Earth projection, which preserves the relative size of landmasses much more accurately than the Mercator projection.
The vote does not mean that the United Nations has literally issued a new map for the world. It does not redraw borders, change territorial claims or legally require countries to stop using Mercator.
Instead, it asks governments, schools, international organizations and technology companies to consider more accurate projections when the relative size of countries and continents matters.
In other words, the geography of the planet has not changed. The way people see it might.
Why the Mercator Map Makes Africa Look So Small
The problem begins with a basic fact about maps: Earth is round, but a map is flat. There is no way to flatten the surface of a sphere without distorting at least some aspect of it.
Different map projections simply choose what to preserve – shape, direction, distance, area or some combination of those characteristics.
Gerardus Mercator’s famous projection, first published in 1569, was designed primarily with navigation in mind.
It has an important advantage for sailors: lines representing a constant compass bearing can be drawn as straight lines. But that comes with a major trade-off.
The farther a location is from the Equator, the more its apparent area is enlarged. Countries and territories in the far north and south can therefore appear dramatically larger than their actual size.
The most famous example is Greenland. On a familiar Mercator world map, Greenland can look roughly comparable in size to Africa. In reality, Africa is about 14 times larger than Greenland.
Russia, Canada and parts of Europe and North America are also visually enlarged by the projection, while Africa and other regions closer to the Equator appear comparatively diminished.
That does not make the Mercator projection “wrong.” It makes it a projection designed for a particular purpose – and a poor choice if the goal is to compare the actual areas of continents. That distinction is at the heart of the UN initiative.
The Map Campaign Became a Political Issue
The campaign to “Correct the Map” argues that the issue goes beyond cartography. Supporters say that when generations of students repeatedly see Europe, North America and Russia occupying enormous areas while Africa appears relatively small, the visual imbalance can influence how people unconsciously understand the importance and scale of different parts of the world.
Togo’s Foreign Minister Robert Dussey argued before the General Assembly that maps are not simply technical objects. They shape education, imagination and perceptions of the world.
The resolution itself goes further, describing historical distortions in the representation of continental areas as having cognitive, educational, cultural, geopolitical and socioeconomic consequences.
It frames correcting those distortions as part of a broader effort toward recognition and greater equity, particularly for Africa.
For African governments and advocates behind the initiative, that makes the map part of a much larger conversation about how Africa has been represented internationally.
The argument is not that Mercator was invented to deliberately make Africa look smaller. It was not.
Rather, the campaign says that a projection created for European maritime navigation in the 16th century has remained deeply embedded in education, media and digital mapping long after its original purpose has changed.
The question is whether it should still be the default image through which much of the world learns geography.
Equal Earth Is Not the Only Possible Answer
The alternative receiving the most attention is Equal Earth, a projection developed in 2018 by cartographers Tom Patterson, Bernhard Jenny and Bojan Šavrič.
Unlike Mercator, Equal Earth is an equal-area projection. That means the relative areas of landmasses are preserved, even though shapes are inevitably altered to some degree.
Africa consequently looks much closer to its actual size relative to Europe, North America and Greenland.
But the UN resolution does not declare Equal Earth to be the only acceptable world map. Instead, it encourages the use of Equal Earth and other equal-area methods where relative size is particularly important.
It also calls for greater education about the characteristics and limitations of different projections. That is an important distinction.
There is no perfect flat map of a spherical planet. Every projection involves compromises. A map optimized for ocean navigation is useful for navigation.
A map designed to compare the size of continents is better suited to geography classrooms, statistical presentations and many institutional maps.
The argument behind “Correct the Map” is essentially that the world should stop treating one projection as though it were the neutral picture of reality.
Who Voted Against It – And Who Stayed Out of the “Yes” Column?
The final vote was strikingly lopsided. 164 countries voted in favor. The United States voted against. Six countries abstained: Estonia, Georgia, Lithuania, Moldova, Serbia and Ukraine.
Ukraine explained that it did not oppose the general principle of accurate cartography, but raised concerns about how the map associated with the initiative represented internationally recognized boundaries and occupied territory.
Its representative said the resolution should not be interpreted as modifying or affecting those boundaries.
India, meanwhile, voted in favor but clarified that its support should not be interpreted as an endorsement of Equal Earth as the world’s single preferred projection. Its position was that equal-area projections in general should be supported.
The overwhelming vote therefore masks a more nuanced debate over what exactly the world should use once it moves beyond Mercator.
Why the US Voted No
The United States took the strongest opposing position. Its representative argued that the resolution was not an appropriate use of the General Assembly’s time and described it as part of a broader “radical ideological project.”
After the vote, the US representative criticized the initiative as an example of the kind of ideological agenda that, in Washington’s view, distracts the United Nations from more pressing international problems and undermines the institution’s credibility.
The vote thus exposed a broader disagreement. For supporters, the resolution is a relatively simple correction: if a map is being used to teach people how big countries and continents actually are, it should not dramatically distort their relative areas.
For the United States, the issue was less about cartography and more about what it saw as an ideological use of an international institution. The fact that Washington was the only country to vote against the measure made the disagreement especially conspicuous.
France Decided to Change Its Own Maps
Perhaps the most visible government response came from France. On the same day as the UN vote, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot announced that France’s Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs would abandon the Mercator projection in its diplomatic uses. But France did not choose Equal Earth.
Instead, it announced a switch to Eckert IV, another equal-area projection that offers a different compromise between preserving area and limiting distortion of shape.
Barrot argued that maps are not neutral representations and that distortions can become embedded in people’s perceptions over time.
The practical consequence is also visually striking: France, like other countries at northern latitudes, appears smaller relative to Africa on an equal-area map than it does on Mercator. The same is true of the United States, Russia and Canada.
The Biggest Change May Happen Outside the UN
The most consequential part of the resolution may not be what happens inside the United Nations at all. It is what happens in classrooms, textbooks, newsrooms, government offices and digital mapping services.
The resolution encourages governments, educational institutions, international organizations and technology companies to use equal-area projections where relative size matters.
That does not mean Google Maps, Apple Maps or every online map will suddenly turn into Equal Earth. Nor does it mean Mercator disappears.
Mercator remains useful for certain navigational applications precisely because of the properties that make it misleading for comparing continental areas.
Instead, the change is likely to be gradual and selective: more maps designed to answer questions such as “How large is Africa compared with Europe?” may use an equal-area projection, while maps designed for navigation or other specialized purposes may continue using different systems.
That distinction could ultimately be more important than the symbolism of a single UN vote. For centuries, there has been no single “correct” way to draw the world on a flat surface.
What the United Nations has now endorsed is a simpler idea: the map should match the question being asked.
And when the question is how much land the world’s continents actually occupy, Africa is about to take up considerably more space.
Sources and Further Reading:
- United Nations news.un.org
- BBC bbc.com
- Reuters/AP reuters.com
- European Union eeas.europa.eu
