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Strife Series: Arctic Maritime Security – Climate and the Securitisation of the Arctic

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A Russian icebreaker in the Arctic. Source: NASA, Public Domain.

The intersection of drastic climate change and the increasing securitisation of the Arctic is an issue policymakers and scientists cannot afford to ignore. With rising tensions between Russia and the West and prolonged disputes between the various eight Arctic States, Arctic conflict is increasingly a possibility despite the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)—the broad legal framework governing our oceans, including the Arctic, the work of the Arctic Council—and a general history of cooperation in the region. An increased likelihood of conflict is a direct result of increased securitisation of the rapidly changing, warming region that has historically remained excluded from global conflicts. Resolving this securitisation will require concerted cooperation between many states with competing interests across several issues, including territorial claims, climate change, and natural resource extraction.

Much of the geopolitical tension across the Arctic plays out in the maritime domain and is exacerbated by climate change. Because the region is easier to access due to melting sea ice and technological developments, arctic states are deploying more naval vessels for exploration, scientific studies, and defence posturing. Melting sea ice and increased accessibility can rekindle dormant territorial claims, or spark new ones, as new islands are uncovered and borders shift.

Future maritime skirmishes are likely to be limited to security incidents over local territorial claims, which could be initiated by climate change and technological advancements, which may lead to larger conflicts in the region. Despite the currently peaceful and passive nature of the contested territorial claims in the region, the combination of increased securitisation interwoven and climate change might collapse this fragile Arctic peace.

The Changing Arctic

The Arctic has been disproportionately affected by climate change and the region continues to warm over twice as fast as the rest of the world. From a maritime perspective, the most influential changes lie in the rapid decline of sea ice thickness, area covered, and age over the last few decades–determining factors. Recent studies suggest that there is a 60% probability that the Arctic Ocean will be ice-free by the 2030s, which are only reinforced after disappointment in the lacklustre commitments and outcomes at the UN COP26 climate conference in Glasgow. Less sea ice and more open water not only impacts the Arctic’s important function in regulating global climate patterns but also redefines the boundaries of geopolitics: especially transportation.

It is now easier than ever to access the Arctic shipping routes like the Northwest Passage through Canada and the Northern Sea Route, sometimes called the Northeast Passage, along the Russian coast, leading to an increased economic interest in the region. The effects of anthropogenic global warming and the ramifications of an ice-free summer in the Arctic are evident: In 2017, a Russian tanker carrying liquified natural gas from Norway to Korea traversed the Northern Sea Route through the Arctic without an ice breaker escort for the first time ever. As shipping companies increasingly look to the Arctic instead of traditional maritime routes, the increase of marine traffic may increase both tensions between Arctic states due to maritime border disputes and the propensity for maritime incidents between vessels.

The geophysical transformation of the Arctic represents an opportunity for a departure from the traditional state-centric view of international security. As the ice melts, the map of the Arctic is literally redrawn. With access to new natural resources caches and shipping routes, Arctic states are prioritising their sovereignty and territorial integrity across the region, securitising the region.

Maritime Securitisation of the Arctic

The liminal nature of ice complicates the permanence that underpins modern concepts of sovereignty.  Not only can borders within the Arctic change between decades due to the ice melt, but it also complicates subsea mapping, which is central to UNCLOS determinations. New islands are continuously found in the Arctic, previously covered by ice. This has given rise to cartopolitics to expand sovereignty claims. Some attempts have led to disputes between several Arctic states, such as the Danish claim over the Lomonosov Ridge, over which Russia and Canada also claim sovereignty. Nevertheless, despite the non-ratification of the treaty by the U.S., UNCLOS has provided the Arctic states with a successful framework from which to peacefully resolve disputes. Besides UNCLOS, the remaining portion of Arctic governance is routed primarily through bilateral agreements and the Arctic Council. However, the council focuses primarily on developmental and environmental issues. It has also been criticized due to its “weak institutional structure, soft law status and ad hoc funding system.” Fundamentally, the Arctic lacks a comprehensive legal regime analogous to that of the Antarctic Treaty.

Before melting ice began changing the geography of the Arctic, there were already tensions between many nations present in the region. Canada and the U.S.  have prolonged disputes over both the status of the Northwest Passage and the Beaufort Sea. Canada, Denmark, and Russia have clashing continental shelf claims over the Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain chain intersection in the Arctic basin. These prolonged disputes are reemerging as heightened security issues due to the rapidly changing Arctic.

Despite the cold nature of Arctic competition, its warming is exacerbating tensions, which could eventually lead to open conflict over conflicting territorial claims. The increased uncertainty has led to the securitisation of both climate change and the region. U.S. President Biden has stated that “climate considerations shall be an essential element of United States foreign policy and national security.” His administration also recently appointed a slew of regional experts to “advance U.S. national security and economic security interests in the Arctic to keep the region secure and stable.” Despite its status as a non-Arctic state, China’s Arctic Policy directly links maritime navigational security and climate change together as key security concerns in Arctic affairs. Russia has also expanded its military footprint in the region to protect its northern reaches, despite general (public-facing) indifference from its leaders to the dangers of climate change.

Increased military presence in the region is following the rhetorical securitization, led by the maritime assets of Arctic and non-Arctic states alike: The U.S. Coast Guard is taking steps to address key challenges in the region, and expanding its fleet of icebreakers. Russia has upgraded the administrative status of its Northern Fleet for the second time in less than a decade. China is building a new heavy icebreaker and lift vessel for the Arctic, and the Canadian Coast Guard and British Royal Navy have signed a new agreement with Arctic cooperation. The increased number of naval vessels, in an area twelve times smaller than the Pacific Ocean, with at least as many competing interests, could easily lead to maritime incidents between naval forces.

Moving Forward

Climate change-induced transformation of the Arctic has increasingly led to its securitisation by numerous Arctic and non-Arctic states. The result is the increased presence of maritime assets in the region, which raises the propensity for Arctic conflict, and require concerted cooperation between states to manage. The rising tensions in the Arctic highlight the increasingly prominent intersection of climate change and geopolitics. While there is a need for global cooperation and continued information sharing between states, their militaries, and international organisations to reduce the likelihood of conflict in the region, the extensive problem of climate change and its contributory role in conflict remains unsolved. Comprehensive national security strategy should not only prepare for a ‘world on fire’, but also proactively work to reduce anthropogenic climate contributions to avoid conflict in the Arctic and beyond.

Resistance to Extinction Rebellion’s Press Protests Reveals Double Standards in the UK

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by Holly Barrow

Protestors block the entrance at Merseyside printing press (Image credit: Liverpool Echo)

On 5 September 2020, the global environmental movement, Extinction Rebellion, dominated headlines after blockading key printing sites in Merseyside and Hertfordshire, causing a significant disruption to the distribution of some of the UK’s leading national newspapers – including the Sun and The Times. Activists blocked exits to the print works, describing the protest as an attempt to hold these publications to account for their failure to report truthfully on the scale of the climate crisis and for ‘polluting national debate’ on a number of social issues, including migration.

Each of the newspapers affected by the blockade is owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who has been openly criticised on numerous occasions for his climate change denialism – not least due to his personal interests in the fossil fuel industry. By no coincidence, Murdoch’s newspapers have become renowned for being littered with rife climate skepticism, both across Australia and the UK.

Yet, despite the well-known murky ethics and questionable practices surrounding Murdoch’s publications, Extinction Rebellion’s protests were met with an onslaught of accusations by the likes of the Sun which claimed the organisation’s protests were ‘trying to destroy our greatest democratic principle: freedom of speech’. The Prime Minister himself echoed such sentiments via social media, suggesting that it is ‘completely unacceptable to seek to limit the public’s access to news in this way’ and that a free press is ‘vital’ in ‘holding the government and other powerful institutions to account.’

Only, this assertion neglects to acknowledge the inherent biases within the UK’s mainstream media and how it notably fails in its apparent duty to hold the powerful to account. The responses to Extinction Rebellion’s protests have revealed a deeply ingrained double standard regarding what is and is not considered ‘democratic’. In a recent article for the Guardian, George Monbiot wrote that Extinction Rebellion’s protests served to expose and fight against the ‘shallowness of our theatrical democracy’, and the ‘blatant capture of ours by the power of money’. It’s almost laughable, then, to witness those arguing that the movement’s protests threaten our way of life – that they attack the ‘freedom of the press’ that is considered so crucial to a functioning democracy – with zero irony. This glorified notion of the UK’s so-called ‘free press’ is a far cry from reality. As a matter of fact, it has long been in decline.

The increasing corporatisation of the media is what ought to be recognised as the real threat to press freedom. The UK’s leading newspapers are owned by a handful of billionaires and giant corporations. This drastically hinders the workings of an actual ‘free press’. From Murdoch to the Barclay brothers – 85-year-old British billionaire twins whose business empire spans from luxury hotels to budget retail – their deceitful dedication to protecting vested interests and setting political agendas through the UK’s leading publications has become well-established.

Former chief political commentator of the Telegraph, Peter Oborne, resigned from the paper after coming to recognise the unethical collusion between their editorial and commercial arms. The publication – owned by the aforementioned Barclay brothers – allegedly sought to bury criticisms against HSBC in 2013. In response, Oborne wrote in an article for OpenDemocracy: “HSBC, as one former Telegraph executive told me, is ‘the advertiser you literally cannot afford to offend.’” The media’s reliance on corporate advertising sees editors pandering to their whims.

What’s more, these billionaire-owners of the UK’s media and their publications are, unsurprisingly, right-leaning. The majority supported right-wing political parties in the 2019 general election, with a recent study by Loughborough University finding that the Labour Party was overwhelmingly targeted with negative coverage by national newspapers, while particular publications reserved positive stories almost exclusively for Johnson’s Conservative party. strong editorial support provided by the newspapers with the largest circulation (the Daily Mail and the Sun)

The political influence of the mainstream media is no new phenomenon. Former Prime Minister Tony Blair notoriously cosied-up to Murdoch in order to gain the backing of the Sun in the lead up to the 1997 general election – a move which many believe contributed to his landslide majority. In a recent BBC documentary on Murdoch’s media dynasty, former Sun deputy editor Neil Wallis told of how Murdoch played a crucial role in the paper’s drastic shift in support away from John Major’s Conservative party to Blair’s New Labour: “Rupert comes up and says ‘you’re getting this wrong. You’ve got this totally wrong. We are not just backing Tony Blair but we are going to back the Labour party and everything he does in this campaign 200%. You’ve got to get that right’.”

The relationship between Blair and Murdoch went on to be described as ‘incestuous’, with Murdoch’s decision to back him in 1997 allegedly arising as the two made a deal; Blair promised Murdoch he would not take the UK into the European currency without first having a referendum.

This relationship between media tycoons and leading politicians has been tirelessly scrutinised, with the 2012 Leveson inquiry revealing the extent of its impact, as editors admitted that Murdoch regularly interfered with content. Critics of Murdoch’s News Corp UK – which owns the Sun and The Times – have previously argued that ministers, chief constables, and regulators alike were unable to stand up to him due to the power of his company.

This enmeshing of media and commerce hardly screams the ‘pinnacle of democracy’ and press freedom. The insularity of the UK’s senior journalists only speaks further to a monolithic media – one which upholds the values, beliefs, and interests of a small section of society. A 2018 article by Jane Martinson described the UK media as ‘pale, male and posh’. Martinson – a British journalist and Professor of Financial Journalism at City University – broke down some extremely telling statistics regarding the background of some of the UK’s leading journalists: 51% are privately educated, as are 80% of editors. The journalism industry is 94% white with just 0.4% being Muslim. This inevitably plays a role in the way stories are reported, which stories are covered, and the interests of those reporting them.

Perhaps most embarrassingly, Johnson’s denouncement of Extinction Rebellion’s protests as a threat to Britain’s apparent free press is one riddled with hypocrisy. In December 2019, in the lead up to the general election, Johnson threatened to revoke Channel 4’s licence after they held a leaders’ debate on climate change – to which Johnson did not show. In his absence, Channel 4 placed a melting ice sculpture where Johnson would have stood; a symbol to mark the urgency of the crisis, with Johnson’s non-attendance speaking volumes. The Conservative party went on to launch a formal complaint with Ofcom, threatening to have Channel 4’s public broadcasting licence revoked.

Fast forward a few months and the Conservative government faced backlash again, this time for attempting to ban specific journalists – those most critical of the party – from attending a Downing Street briefing. Suffice to say, Johnson and the elite seem only to value the UK’s ‘free press’ when activists fight back against a heavily skewed media.

XR’s protests come at a time when the increased accessibility of social media helps to provide a necessary balance to the partisan traditional media. Twitter in particular has become key in challenging powerful political and social figures, succeeding where traditional media outlets often now fail. In July, Twitter fact-checked tweets made by Trump, after he incorrectly claimed that mail-in ballots would result in “a rigged election.” The platform then went on to flag any posts he had shared which included manipulated media.

The social media platform also caused a stir when it permanently banned the account of Katie Hopkins – notorious for espousing dangerous islamophobia and xenophobic rhetoric. Hopkins had previously been given a free pass to spout such views in the likes of the Sun. In refusing to provide a platform for such deeply hateful, divisive language, some – such as Trump – have denounced this as a form of censorship; a ‘policing of conservative voices’. However, this seems more like a balancing of power; no longer allowing for the dominant narrative to prevail unabated.

Holly Barrow is a features writer for the Immigration Advice Service – an organisation of OISC-accredited immigration lawyers providing assistance with Spouse Visas, British citizenship, and more

Why do so few Scholars Study the Intersection of Climate and Security?

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by Matthew Ader

Climate change or security, a question of the one or the other? (Image credit: Lisa Benson)

I have had two and a half hours of teaching on climate change and security in two years, and I am unlikely to get any more. BA and MA courses at the King’s Department of War Studies do not offer any modules about climate change. Neither do security studies courses at Exeter, St Andrews, Oxford, or Cambridge. The US has equally slim pickings. Where tuition does exist, it tends to focus on human security and development; not strategy and operations.

And yet climate change is reshaping the world in unpredictable ways. Multiple governments even named it as a major security threat. Academics correlate climate change, if a little tentatively, with increased rates of conflict. However, scholars of strategy and war do not seem to focus on it. I surveyed thirty-four International Relations and Security Studies journals – all those with an H-Index above 30. Since 1995, these journals have, between them, published 45 articles about the intersection of climate change and conflict. As a matter of contrast, just one of those journals, International Organization, published 4356 total articles in the same period.

This initial survey reveals a worrying gap in the literature. Security courses that rely on this research are the incubator for future policymakers and analysts, while academics are often called upon to advise governments. A failure to address climate change risks depriving the next generation of security leaders and thinkers of a solid grounding in an important subject. At best, this may leave governments scrambling to cope with unforeseen challenges. At worst, it could lead to the creation of bad policy – or even open the door for malign actors who take advantage of climate change to push other agendas.

Why has security academia not fully engaged in this subject? Partially, it is because academics are very busy and have many existing commitments. Undertaking novel research or designing new courses, especially when the literature is so sparse, is time-consuming. It is also risky; work on climate change may not be valued in the same way as more conventional topics when hunting for jobs. Worse still, there is little research funding in climate change and security. Ministries and Departments of Defence have declared climate change to be a threat but have yet to put their money where their mouth is. These challenges, combined with the broader structural precarity of academic careers, militate against researchers investigating climate change and security.

These generally applicable concerns are worsened by personnel policy. Security studies departments are not hiring climate change experts. For example, of the eighty academics in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London, only two mention climate as a research interest. This makes cross-sectoral research more difficult. Even more concerning still is that such a deficit reduces opportunities for students interested in climate and security to study the issue. This, in turn, perpetuates the existing scarcity, creating a negative feedback loop. Of course, it would be unfair and inaccurate to blame this purely on hiring practices. A department cannot hire scholars who do not exist. However, it is at least partially a chicken-and-egg problem. The lack of cross-sectoral research and limited tuition opportunities addressing climate and security make it harder to attract additional academic talent to the field.

A related challenge is that climate change does not fit within traditional models of security analysis. It is not a human actor, it does not deploy discrete methods, and it is difficult to analyse through the conventional lenses of IR theory or grand strategy. Grappling with the climate requires scientific and geographical knowledge which falls outside the specialisms of most security scholars. For example, the fierce debate among geographers over the linkage between climate and conflict depends on comparing rainfall data against incidences of violence. Unless an academic is trained to a high level in meteorological modelling, they are unlikely to be able to engage with the discussion in depth. The one partial exception to this is the Human Security field. Human security, with its focus on different issues impacting ordinary people, has covered climate change in more detail. However, its perspective has more to do with development and local interventions than big-picture decision-making. While there are absolutely insights to be gained from that discipline for national policymakers, it does not answer the broader questions required to inform strategic decision-making.

Lastly, while we are seeing the impacts of climate change now, its most dramatic impacts lie in the future. Mass climate migration, unprecedented littoral urbanization, and irreversible water scarcity are not science fiction but their true implications are only just emerging. Scholars are understandably reticent to engage in speculation – it is risky and can lead to poor quality research. This is especially true for security studies and international politics, which are wildly unpredictable. As General McMaster noted, “we have a perfect record of predicting future wars…and that record is 0%.”

This is compounded by the creeping nature of climate change. On 12 September 2001, nearly every security scholar turned their attention to terrorism and the Middle East. I’m sure that a similar statistical analysis of journals from 1985 to 2000 would show relatively few articles about Salafi jihadism, but academics were able to apply their existing knowledge to the new problem. It is not clear that this will happen with climate change, because there will probably not be a single dramatic event which changes conversations and research priorities. Rather, it will incrementally alter global conditions over the span of decades, shaping a new normal.

Such a slow-moving emergency is unlikely to attract enough research to effectively inform policy – especially given that great power competition, terrorism, and biosecurity will, among other issues, remain pressing concerns throughout the period. This is worsened, as noted, by the requirement for expert scientific knowledge to properly study climate change. In short, there is unlikely to be a catalyst for the study of climate change, and if there is, security scholars may struggle to obtain the necessary scientific knowledge to properly engage with the issue in a timely fashion.

There is no single policy prescription that can magically fix this deficit. However, it is a problem – and it must be rectified. Climate change is actively reshaping the world. If security academics do not provide perspectives on it, the security implications may be ignored. Worse, they might be dishonestly weaponised to achieve a larger agenda. We have seen this already with alt-right groups using fear of climate migration as a recruiting tactic. The past four years have clearly shown that radical ideologies can find purchase at the highest levels of government. In the absence of informed views from authoritative sources, decisionmakers may turn to confident ideologues for answers.

At the end of that lecture on climate change, I asked the lecturer what the strategic plan was for dealing with the mass migrations, droughts, and water wars he predicted. He said that there was not a single one. The gap in the research is no one’s fault. But catastrophe does not care about intention. Policymakers will require effective advice to navigate the new challenges of this century. The academic community should mobilise to provide it – and security academics should lead the charge.

[1] This was achieved by searching their archives for all articles from 1995-2020 with “climate change” in the title and manually sorting through. This method is necessarily vulnerable to personal judgement and can exclude work on topics adjacent to climate change & security i.e. food scarcity.

Matthew Ader is a second-year student doing War Studies. He has worked as an intern in a number of security consultancy firms. His academic interests gravitate loosely towards understanding challenges and opportunities for Anglo-American strategy in the 21st century (and also being snide about Captain America’s command ability). He is also an editor for Roar News, and has written for a number of security publications – most especially Wavell Room. You can follow him on Twitter: @AderMatthew.