Estonia sits on the eastern edge of the Baltic Sea, a small country with an outsized geographical story. Glaciers carved its lowlands, forests cover half its land, and thousands of lakes and wetlands sit between rolling uplands that rarely rise higher than a few hundred meters. This is a country shaped as much by ice as by history — and understanding one requires understanding the other.
This article works through Estonia’s physical geography, human geography, and environment as connected parts of a single system. The land determined where people settled. The coastline determined how they traded. The climate determined what they could grow. None of these threads stand alone, and this guide treats them that way.
Location and National Territory
Estonia is a sovereign country in Northern Europe, positioned on the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea between roughly 57.5° and 59.5° north latitude. Its northern coastline runs along the Gulf of Finland, separating it from Finland by open water rather than land. To the south, Estonia shares a land border with Latvia. To the east, it borders Russia. Its total area is approximately 45,335 square kilometers, according to Statistics Estonia, which includes thousands of lakes, hundreds of islands, and a long, irregular coastline.
This position between sea and land shaped nearly everything about how Estonia developed. Maritime access to the Gulf of Finland and the Baltic Sea opened trade routes to Scandinavia and Western Europe centuries before modern transportation existed. The land border with Russia connected Estonia to inland Eurasian trade and, at various points in history, to Russian political control. The result is a country whose culture, economy, and settlement patterns all carry the imprint of standing at a crossroads between two very different geographic worlds.
It helps to be precise about regional terms here, because they are often used loosely. Estonia is one of the three Baltic states, along with Latvia and Lithuania — a term referring to their shared coastline and shared twentieth-century history, not a shared culture or language family. Estonia is not part of Scandinavia, which refers specifically to Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. It is also distinct from the Nordic countries, a broader term that includes Scandinavia plus Finland and Iceland. Estonia belongs to Northern Europe and maintains close cultural and economic ties with Finland and the wider Nordic region, but it is geographically and historically a Baltic state, not a Nordic or Scandinavian one.
Physical Landscapes: Plains, Uplands, and Lowlands
Estonia’s terrain is low and gently rolling rather than mountainous. The dominant landform is the Estonian Lowland, a broad expanse of flat to slightly undulating land covering much of the country’s northern and western regions. Rising above this lowland are a handful of upland areas, most notably the Pandivere Upland in the north-central region, the Otepää Upland in the south, and the Haanja Upland in the southeast, home to Estonia’s highest terrain.
This flatness has a straightforward explanation: Estonia sits on ancient, stable bedrock that has not experienced the tectonic mountain-building seen in much of Central and Southern Europe. Add repeated glaciation over the last two million years, which ground down existing relief and deposited material evenly across the landscape, and the result is a country where elevation rarely becomes an obstacle.
The practical consequences run through nearly every other topic in this article. Gentle terrain makes land transportation straightforward, supports large-scale agriculture, and allows forests and wetlands to spread across enormous continuous areas rather than being confined to isolated valleys. Where the land is flat and drainage is poor, water accumulates instead of running off — a detail that explains why Estonia has so many lakes, bogs, and marshes rather than dry, well-drained plains.
Geological Foundations and the Legacy of Glaciation
Estonia’s bedrock belongs to the East European Platform, an ancient and geologically stable crustal block that has remained largely undisturbed by mountain-building for hundreds of millions of years. Sedimentary rocks dominate the surface geology: limestone across much of the north, sandstone in places, and Devonian-age formations in the south. There is no active volcanism here, and none of the seismic activity associated with tectonically active regions.
The landscape visible today, though, owes far more to ice than to this old bedrock. Estonia was repeatedly covered by continental ice sheets during the Quaternary period, the most recent of which retreated roughly 11,000 to 13,000 years ago. As these ice sheets advanced and retreated, they eroded existing terrain, transported enormous volumes of rock and sediment, and deposited that material unevenly across the land. This is why Estonia’s uplands are mostly moraine hills rather than folded mountains, and why features like drumlins (elongated hills shaped by moving ice) and eskers (ridges left by meltwater channels) appear across the northern and central regions.
Limestone deserves particular attention because of how far its influence reaches. It underlies much of northern Estonia, shaping groundwater flow, producing localized karst features such as sinkholes and underground drainage, and contributing to the mineral content of the region’s soils. Between the ancient stability of the bedrock and the more recent reshaping by ice, Estonia’s physical geography is a layered record: old rock underneath, glacial deposits on top, and a landscape that reflects both.
Forests, Wetlands, and Peatlands
Forests cover roughly half of Estonia’s land area, a mix of boreal and mixed woodland dominated by pine, spruce, and birch. Wetlands occupy an unusually large share of the remaining land — bogs, fens, marshes, and peatlands that together make Estonia one of the more waterlogged countries in Europe relative to its size.
This is not a coincidence of climate alone. Estonia’s flat terrain limits natural drainage, its humid climate delivers steady precipitation, and glacial deposits left behind a patchwork of poorly drained soils and depressions. Together, these conditions created ideal ground for peat to accumulate over thousands of years, layer by layer, in places where water could not easily escape.
Peatlands are not simply scenery. They store enormous amounts of carbon, more per unit area than most forests, and they regulate water flow across the landscape by absorbing heavy rainfall and releasing it slowly. Drainage for agriculture and forestry during the twentieth century damaged many of Estonia’s peatlands, releasing stored carbon and disrupting habitat. In more recent decades, restoration projects have worked to re-flood and stabilize damaged bogs, recognizing their value for both biodiversity and climate stability rather than treating them as land to be reclaimed.
Suur Munamägi and Estonia’s Highest Terrain
Estonia’s highest point is Suur Munamägi, a hill in the Haanja Upland in the country’s southeastern corner, with an elevation of 318 meters. That figure is worth sitting with for a moment: Estonia’s tallest natural point would qualify as a minor hill in most mountainous countries. This is the clearest possible illustration of how different Estonia’s terrain is from the mountain systems of Scandinavia or Central Europe, where peaks reach thousands of meters.
The Haanja Upland surrounding Suur Munamägi, along with the nearby Otepää Upland, forms Estonia’s most varied terrain — rolling hills, small lakes, and forested slopes that create a distinct regional microclimate slightly cooler and snowier than the surrounding lowlands. These uplands feed local streams and small lakes, and their relatively well-drained soils support settlement patterns and agriculture that differ from the flatter, wetter regions to the north and west.
Lakes and Rivers
Estonia’s freshwater geography is dense and interconnected. Lake Peipus, shared with Russia along the eastern border, is one of the largest lakes in Europe by surface area and a defining feature of the country’s eastern edge. It supports regional fishing communities and functions as a natural boundary as well as a shared ecological resource between the two countries. Lake Võrtsjärv, in south-central Estonia, is the largest lake located entirely within Estonian territory and an important habitat for fish and waterfowl.
The country’s major rivers connect its lakes, wetlands, and coastline into a single hydrological network. The Narva River drains Lake Peipus into the Gulf of Finland along the Russian border and has historically been important for both transportation and, more recently, hydroelectric power. The Emajõgi links Lake Võrtsjärv to Lake Peipus and flows through Tartu, Estonia’s second-largest city. The Pärnu River drains much of southwestern Estonia into the Gulf of Riga, and the Võhandu River is the longest river entirely within Estonian territory.
These waterways matter beyond their role as physical features. They have supported settlement, agriculture, and trade for centuries, and they remain sensitive to modern pressures. Nutrient runoff from agriculture contributes to eutrophication in several lakes and coastal waters, disturbing aquatic habitats and altering water quality — a challenge that connects directly to how land is farmed and managed upstream.
Coastline, Islands, and the Baltic Sea
Estonia’s coastline is long, irregular, and deeply shaped by its geological past. The Gulf of Finland lies to the north, the Gulf of Riga to the southwest, and the open Baltic Sea forms the western edge. Along this coast lie more than 2,000 islands and islets, most of them small, but two of them substantial: Saaremaa, Estonia’s largest island, and Hiiumaa, its second-largest, both located off the western coast along with the smaller island of Muhu.
Much of this coastal geography traces back to glaciation and its aftermath. Retreating ice sheets left behind uneven terrain that the Baltic Sea later flooded, and the land has continued to rise slowly in a process called post-glacial land uplift, still measurable in parts of the region today. Ongoing erosion and sedimentation continue to reshape shorelines, bays, and coastal wetlands in ways that are still active rather than finished.
The coastline’s importance goes well beyond scenery or tourism. Islands like Saaremaa and Hiiumaa have distinct ecological communities shaped by their isolation, supporting migratory bird populations and coastal plant species not found in the same concentration inland. Historically, this same coastline gave Estonia access to Baltic trade networks, fishing grounds, and maritime cultural exchange with Scandinavia that shaped settlement patterns for centuries before modern statehood.
Climate and Seasonal Patterns
Estonia has a climate shaped by its position between the moderating influence of the Baltic Sea and the more extreme continental air masses that move in from Eurasia. Winters are cold, with regular snow cover and temperatures that frequently drop below freezing for extended periods. Summers are mild to warm, rarely extreme, and daylight hours vary dramatically between seasons given the country’s northern latitude — long summer evenings, short winter afternoons.
Coastal areas experience a somewhat softer version of this climate, since the Baltic Sea moderates temperature swings in both directions. Inland regions, cut off from this maritime buffering, tend to see colder winters and warmer summers, a pattern typical of continental climate influence. Southeastern uplands, including the area around Suur Munamägi, tend to receive more snow and hold it longer than the lowlands.
This is not a climate that fits neatly into one category, and it should not be reduced to one. It supports boreal forest growth, sustains extensive wetlands through steady precipitation, and defines a relatively short but workable agricultural growing season. Nearly every other topic in this article — from forests to farming to settlement patterns — depends in some way on this seasonal rhythm of cold, snow-covered winters and mild, wet summers.
Natural Hazards and Environmental Risk
Estonia’s natural hazards are modest compared to many parts of the world, but they are not absent. Flooding occurs seasonally, particularly during spring snowmelt and periods of heavy autumn rainfall, and low-lying terrain along rivers and coastal areas makes some regions more vulnerable than others. Winter storms bring strong winds and heavy snowfall, occasionally disrupting transportation and power infrastructure. Coastal storms can produce erosion along exposed shorelines, particularly on the western islands.
Wildfires occur during dry summer periods, especially in forested regions, though on a smaller scale than in more fire-prone climates. Ice-related hazards, including ice jams on rivers during spring thaw, add another layer of seasonal risk.
Climate change is expected to influence several of these hazards over time: heavier and more erratic rainfall, changing snowmelt timing, and shifts in storm intensity along the Baltic coast. None of this represents an unusual level of risk for a Northern European country, but it does mean environmental planning has to account for a climate that is shifting rather than staying fixed.
Ecosystems and Biodiversity
Estonia’s ecosystems fall into a few broad categories: boreal and mixed forests, extensive wetlands and peatlands, freshwater lakes and rivers, coastal habitats, and the Baltic marine environment. Their distribution follows directly from the physical geography already described — latitude and climate set the broad conditions, glacial history and soil determined drainage, and water availability shaped where wetlands versus drier forest could form.
Wildlife here reflects this mix of forest and wetland habitat. Moose, brown bear, Eurasian lynx, and wolf all live in Estonia’s forests, supported by continuous woodland cover rare in more densely developed parts of Europe. Beaver populations have recovered strongly in wetland areas. Migratory birds rely heavily on Estonia’s coastal wetlands and lakes as stopover points along Baltic flyways, making the country ecologically significant well beyond its borders during migration seasons.
Conservation efforts distinguish carefully between native species long established in these ecosystems and species introduced more recently, some of which have become invasive and disruptive to local balance. Estonia’s relatively large forest and wetland area gives it an outsized role in Northern European biodiversity conservation relative to its small size.
Marine Geography and Fisheries
The Baltic Sea, including the Gulf of Finland and Gulf of Riga along Estonia’s coast, is a semi-enclosed sea with limited water exchange with the open ocean. This gives it unusually low salinity for a marine environment and makes it highly sensitive to pollution, since contaminants and excess nutrients take far longer to flush out than they would in an open ocean system.
Fisheries remain important for coastal communities, supporting employment and food production along Estonia’s Baltic coastline. But the same enclosed geography that shapes the Baltic’s ecology also makes its fish populations vulnerable. Overfishing, nutrient-driven eutrophication, and warming waters have all altered fish stocks over recent decades. Addressing these problems requires cooperation beyond Estonia’s borders, since the Baltic Sea is shared among multiple countries whose combined pollution and fishing pressure determine its overall health.
Population, Tallinn, and Settlement Patterns
Estonia’s population was approximately 1.37 million as of 2024, according to Statistics Estonia, making it one of the least densely populated countries in the European Union relative to its land area. Population is heavily concentrated around the capital, Tallinn, with additional concentrations in Tartu, Narva, and Pärnu, while large stretches of forested and wetland interior remain sparsely settled.
Tallinn’s dominance is not accidental. Its position on the Gulf of Finland made it a natural maritime hub for trade with Scandinavia and Western Europe for centuries, while its inland connections gave it access to broader Baltic and Russian trade routes. That combination made it Estonia’s political, economic, and cultural center, and it remains the country’s largest port and primary transportation hub today.
Tartu, in the south-central region, has developed instead as an educational and research center, home to Estonia’s oldest university. Narva sits directly on the Russian border in the northeast, shaped historically by industry and its cross-border position. Pärnu serves as a regional center along the southwestern coast. Together, these cities illustrate how Estonia’s settlement pattern follows its geography: coastal access, river valleys, and border position all playing a role in where people chose to build.
Culture, Language, and National Identity
Estonian is the official language and belongs to the Finno-Ugric language family, closely related to Finnish and distinct from the Baltic and Slavic languages spoken in neighboring Latvia and Russia. This linguistic connection to Finland reflects centuries of contact across the Gulf of Finland and reinforces Estonia’s cultural orientation toward the Nordic region even as it remains geographically and politically a Baltic state.
A significant Russian-speaking population lives within Estonia, concentrated particularly in the northeast around Narva, a legacy of settlement patterns during the Soviet period. This linguistic diversity shapes regional culture and remains a factor in Estonia’s social and political life.
Estonian cultural identity draws on a strong tradition of choral singing and folk music, distinctive wooden and stone architecture in towns like Tallinn’s Old Town, and a literary tradition shaped by both Baltic German and later national influences. Food traditions reflect the country’s agricultural and coastal geography, drawing on rye, dairy, fish, and forest products like mushrooms and berries. These cultural threads connect back to geography rather than existing separately from it — coastal access, forest resources, and centuries of contact with neighboring regions all left their mark.
Government and Administrative Geography
Estonia is a parliamentary republic. The Riigikogu, a unicameral parliament, holds primary legislative authority, while the Prime Minister leads the government and day-to-day administration. The President serves as head of state with a largely representative and ceremonial role rather than direct executive power.
Administratively, Estonia is divided into counties, which are further subdivided into municipalities responsible for local governance. This structure reflects the country’s regional geography, with counties generally corresponding to historical and physical divisions such as the northern coastal region around Tallinn, the southeastern uplands, and the western island territories.
Estonia’s sovereign territory is clearly bounded by its land borders with Latvia and Russia and its maritime boundary across the Gulf of Finland from Finland. It has been a member of the European Union and NATO since 2004, connections that shape its economic and security relationships well beyond its immediate neighbors.
Historical Geography
Estonia’s geography has shaped its history as much as its history has shaped its geography. Early Finno-Ugric settlement took advantage of forest, coastal, and lake resources long before written records began. Medieval trade brought Baltic German, Danish, and Swedish influence, largely funneled through Tallinn’s coastal position and its access to Baltic Sea trade routes. Later centuries brought Russian imperial control, followed by a brief period of independence in the early twentieth century, Soviet annexation, and the restoration of independence in 1991.
Throughout these shifts, Estonia’s position between Scandinavia, the Baltic region, and Russia repeatedly placed it at the intersection of competing spheres of influence. Coastal access brought trade and cultural exchange; the land border to the east brought periods of foreign control. Modern Estonia, oriented toward the European Union and Nordic economic ties while maintaining a land border with Russia, continues to sit at this same geographic crossroads.
Agriculture and Rural Geography
Estonia’s agricultural geography reflects its lowland terrain, moderate climate, and relatively short growing season. Cereal crops, particularly rye, barley, and wheat, are grown across the country’s flatter lowland regions, while dairy farming and livestock production make use of grassland areas less suited to intensive cropping. Regional farming patterns follow soil quality and drainage, with better-drained limestone-influenced soils in the north supporting different crops than the wetter, more forested south.
This agricultural geography looks very different from that of mountainous European countries, where farming is often confined to valleys and terraced slopes. Estonia’s gentle terrain allows continuous, large-scale field agriculture, though the trade-off is a shorter growing season than countries farther south. Extreme weather, soil management on drained wetland areas, and water quality concerns tied to nutrient runoff all pose ongoing challenges for the sector.
Forestry, Oil Shale, and Natural Resources
Forestry is a major part of Estonia’s natural-resource economy, supported by the extensive forest cover described earlier. Timber, wood products, and pulp and paper production draw directly on this resource base, concentrated in regions with the most substantial forest cover.
Oil shale is Estonia’s most geographically and economically significant mineral resource, concentrated in the northeastern region around Ida-Viru County. It has been used for decades as a domestic fuel for electricity generation, giving Estonia a degree of energy independence unusual for a country its size. That benefit comes with a real environmental cost: oil shale extraction and combustion produce substantial carbon emissions and generate large volumes of ash, making it one of the more carbon-intensive energy sources still in widespread use in Europe. Peat extraction adds another resource activity tied to the country’s wetland geography, though one that raises similar habitat disturbance concerns already discussed in the context of peatland conservation.
Economy
Estonia’s modern economy centers on services, information technology, and digital industries, alongside manufacturing, forestry, energy, and trade. Tallinn anchors the country’s technology and service economy, drawing on its transportation access and concentration of skilled labor. Tartu contributes through education and research. The northeastern region around Narva retains a stronger industrial and energy-sector presence tied to oil shale.
Ports and maritime trade remain economically important given Estonia’s coastal geography, with Tallinn functioning as the primary gateway for goods moving between Estonia, Finland, and wider European markets. Estonia’s economic ties with Finland, its European Union membership, and its connections with the other Baltic states all shape trade patterns that extend well beyond its small domestic market.
Energy
Estonia’s energy geography has historically depended on oil shale, extracted and burned domestically for electricity generation. This resource gave the country a level of energy self-sufficiency that many small nations lack, but it also left Estonia with one of the more carbon-intensive electricity sectors in the European Union.
That balance is shifting. Wind energy has expanded along Estonia’s coastline and open lowland areas, taking advantage of consistent wind conditions in a country with few terrain obstructions. Biomass, drawn from forestry byproducts, and smaller-scale solar development add further diversification. The overall direction is a gradual transition away from oil shale dependence toward a more varied energy mix, driven by both environmental concerns and the economic reality that oil shale’s carbon costs are becoming harder to justify.
Transportation
Estonia’s flat, low-relief terrain makes land transportation considerably easier to build and maintain than in mountainous countries, where roads and railways must contend with steep grades and difficult passes. Roads and railways connect Tallinn, Tartu, Narva, and Pärnu directly, forming the backbone of domestic transportation.
Maritime transportation carries outsized importance given Estonia’s coastal geography. Tallinn’s port handles significant passenger and freight traffic, including regular ferry connections across the Gulf of Finland to Helsinki, one of the busiest passenger ferry routes in the world. These connections tie Estonia’s transportation network directly to Finland and the broader Baltic Sea shipping system.
Connectivity challenges remain for smaller communities, the western islands of Saaremaa and Hiiumaa, and other remote rural regions, where ferry schedules, road maintenance, and lower population density make transportation infrastructure harder to sustain economically.
Environmental Challenges and Climate Change
Estonia faces a familiar set of Northern European environmental challenges, several of which connect directly to the physical geography already covered. Climate change is bringing rising temperatures, altered precipitation patterns, and reduced snow cover, all of which affect forests, wetlands, and agricultural growing seasons. Extreme rainfall events raise flooding risk in low-lying areas, while shifting conditions also affect wildfire risk during drier summer periods.
Baltic Sea pollution and eutrophication, discussed earlier in the context of fisheries, remain persistent problems tied to nutrient runoff from agriculture and limited water exchange within the sea’s semi-enclosed geography. Wetland degradation from historical drainage continues to affect biodiversity and carbon storage, even as restoration efforts work to reverse some of that damage. Oil shale extraction and combustion remain a significant source of both habitat disturbance and carbon emissions.
None of these challenges exist in isolation. Coastal change affects fisheries and settlement; wetland degradation affects both biodiversity and flood control; oil shale’s energy benefits come paired with environmental costs that Estonia continues to weigh against alternatives. Environmental management here means balancing these connected systems rather than addressing them one at a time.
Protected Areas and Sustainable Development
Estonia maintains a network of national parks and nature reserves designed to protect its most significant forest, wetland, and coastal ecosystems. Lahemaa National Park, the country’s largest, protects coastal forest and wetland habitat along the northern coast. Soomaa National Park, whose name translates roughly to “land of bogs,” protects one of Estonia’s most significant peatland systems. Matsalu National Park protects wetlands and coastal meadows that serve as a critical stopover for migratory birds, while Karula National Park protects forested upland terrain in the south.
These protected areas serve concrete ecological functions: preserving biodiversity, maintaining wetland carbon storage, protecting migratory bird habitat, and safeguarding watersheds that feed the country’s rivers and lakes. Sustainable development in Estonia means balancing these protections against continued forestry, oil shale extraction, renewable energy expansion, agriculture, and urban growth. Estonia’s natural environment functions simultaneously as an economic resource and an ecological system that requires deliberate, long-term management rather than one-time protection.
Estonia’s Regional and International Importance
Estonia’s geographic position gives it a role in Northern Europe and the Baltic region that extends beyond its small size. Baltic Sea cooperation on fisheries, pollution, and shipping connects Estonia with Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, and other Baltic Sea states. Membership in the European Union ties Estonia’s economy, environmental policy, and trade relationships to a much larger regional framework, while close ties with Finland reflect the historical and cultural connections built across the Gulf of Finland.
Sitting between Finland, Latvia, Russia, and the Baltic Sea, Estonia occupies a position where Nordic economic and cultural ties, Baltic regional cooperation, and a land border with Russia all intersect. That position, more than any single feature, defines Estonia’s ongoing importance within Northern Europe.
Key Geographic Facts About Estonia
|
Geographic Fact |
Information |
|---|---|
|
Official name |
Republic of Estonia |
|
Region |
Northern Europe / Baltic region |
|
Capital |
Tallinn |
|
Location |
Eastern coast of the Baltic Sea |
|
Total area |
Approximately 45,335 sq km (Statistics Estonia) |
|
Population |
Approximately 1.37 million (Statistics Estonia, 2024) |
|
Highest point |
Suur Munamägi, 318 meters (Haanja Upland) |
|
Major physical landscape |
Lowlands, uplands, forests, and wetlands |
|
Major lake |
Lake Peipus |
|
Other major lake |
Lake Võrtsjärv |
|
Major river |
Narva River |
|
Major islands |
Saaremaa and Hiiumaa |
|
Major surrounding waters |
Baltic Sea, Gulf of Finland, Gulf of Riga |
|
Official language |
Estonian |
|
Currency |
Euro |
|
Government |
Parliamentary republic |
|
Head of state |
President |
|
Major economic sectors |
Services, technology, manufacturing, forestry, energy, trade |
|
Major natural hazards |
Flooding, winter storms, coastal storms, wildfires |
|
Major environmental challenges |
Climate change, Baltic Sea pollution, wetland pressures, oil shale impacts |
How Geography Defines Modern Estonia
Estonia’s identity as a country cannot be separated from the land beneath it. Ancient, stable bedrock gave it a landscape without mountains. Repeated glaciation flattened that landscape further while leaving behind the lakes, moraines, and uneven drainage that created its forests and wetlands. Those same wetlands store carbon and regulate water, while the forests around them shelter wildlife found across few other parts of Europe in such continuous stretches.
The coastline and islands connected Estonia to Baltic and Scandinavian trade centuries before national borders existed in their current form, shaping where cities grew and how the economy developed. Tallinn’s position on the Gulf of Finland made it the country’s natural center of political and economic gravity, while Tartu, Narva, and Pärnu each developed around distinct geographic and historical roles. Oil shale in the northeast gave Estonia energy independence at a real environmental cost, one the country is now working to offset through wind, biomass, and other renewable sources.
None of this happened by accident, and none of it happened in isolation. Geology shaped terrain. Terrain shaped drainage, forests, and wetlands. Those systems shaped where people settled, what they farmed, and how they built their economy. Climate change now tests all of these connected systems at once — coastal erosion, shifting precipitation, and Baltic Sea pollution all trace back to the same physical geography described throughout this article. Understanding Estonia means understanding how thoroughly its ice-carved land, its forests and waters, and its people remain bound together.