About the authors

Fernand Verger is Emeritus Professor of Geography at l'Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris. He was NASA Principal Investigator for the Landsat-1 and 2 programs, and project director of the preliminary program for assessing the SPOT satellite. His research focuses on earth observation techniques and analysis.

Isabelle Sourbès-Verger is a geographer at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (Laboratoire Communication et Politique) and senior research fellow at the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique, Paris. Her research focuses on space occupation and comparative analysis of national space policies. She also conducts analysis on international issues of space activities.

Raymond Ghirardi is a cartographic engineer at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique and has worked on many geographical and geopolitical projects, developing original graphical semantics.

Xavier Pasco is a political scientist working at the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique. He is also Associate Professor at the Université de Marne-la-Vallée and research fellow at the Space Policy Institute, George Washington University. His research focuses on the US space policy and the US-European development in high tech and space policies.