armed conflict aside.
Nations may also compete economically. Sanctions can reduce activity, and competition can increase it. Indeed, one vision for the Arctic is a region of massive resource exploitation, exporting raw materials to the world.32 One can see the appeal both for the country selling its minerals or oil or fish, and for the country having access to big new sources for its industries and consumers. Pressure may therefore come from distant markets as well as local boosters. There is no particular reason that one Arctic country should follow others in a race to develop, but the coasts of Alaska and Norway both already see increased ship traffic as a result of development along Russia’s Northern Sea Route. Finland and Norway still live with the legacy of pollution from mines, nuclear waste, and other contamination across their borders with Russia,33 a major reason why Finland – with its 1991 Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS) inititiave – started the international forum that became the Arctic Council. The ability of existing institutions to reduce trans-boundary effects is doubtful for most sectors, especially if the activities in question are seen as essential for national security or related ambitions.
Climate change poses a major threat to the Arctic as we know it. These changes are alarming in their own right and will also exacerbate the effects of other human activities. Less ice may well lead to more shipping and more resource development, increasing the burden on the institutions managing those sectors. Climate change will also make all the more difficult the challenge of addressing cumulative effects. Climate change could also provide a convenient scapegoat on which to blame industry and management failures. In short, existing institutions have the theoretical capability to handle much of what we expect from climate change, but their actual political capacity is another matter. They have been designed and run largely to address minor and non-controversial matters. For example, the Arctic Council’s charter expressly excludes fisheries and military affairs. And their shortcomings with regard to cumulative effects will only become more apparent as climate change contributes more and more to the alteration of Arctic ecosystems.34
Before we look forward, a quick review of recent decades will help identify trends. In 2000, Arctic climate change was gaining attention, shipping was modest, fisheries were limited to historical areas such as the Barents and Bering seas, oil and gas development was going up and down in different areas, as was mining. China’s growing interest in the Arctic was not yet apparent to most observers. The Arctic Council held its second meeting in what was then Barrow, now Utqiaġvik, Alaska. Neither the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (published in 2005) nor the Arctic Marine Shipping Assessment (2009) had been started, though Arctic contaminants had drawn attention to a global problem that would lead to the signing of the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants the following year. Some of today’s Arctic institutions were new or not yet started, though cooperation was the dominant mode of international interaction within the region.
By 2020, Arctic climate change has been widely recognized globally. Indeed, it is generally spoken about as an emergency— even though there still appears to be more grandiose talk than actual grand-scale action. Shipping has increased and the IMO’s Polar Code entered into force in 2017. Fisheries have expanded to some degree, but precautionary measures have also been taken in the high seas of the Arctic Ocean and some nearby national waters. Cruise ships have sailed the Northwest Passage. Development in the Russian Arctic is increasing steadily –with Kremlin support and Chinese and other foreign investment. The situation is more mixed in other countries, as companies’ exploration costs for resources extraction are high and their activities are much less likely to be state-sponsored. The Arctic Council has attracted more observer countries and has completed many assessments and projects. The Arctic Circle has created a meeting point for businesses and others. China has declared itself a “near Arctic state,” issued its Arctic Strategy in 2018, signed the Central Arctic Ocean Fisheries Agreement, and invested in many Arctic projects. In some ways, institutions are stronger through longevity and through attracting more participants, increasing their legitimacy and their reach beyond Arctic states. For conservation, the Arctic record remains mixed, but there are good signs in some respects.
Future Horizons
Looking forward with some speculation, we can see divergent paths. One path might be imagined in the following way: by 2040, sea ice may have disappeared one summer. Perhaps shipping has increased in volume and in length of season, possibly including year-round voyages by ice-strengthened vessels. The Central Arctic Ocean Fisheries Agreement will have run its initial 16-year term—perhaps to be renewed, perhaps to be replaced by a regional fisheries management organization as exploitation begins. There are likely more mines and perhaps more oil and gas fields, depending on the state of renewable energy worldwide.35 Perhaps India has joined China as a rising force in Arctic affairs as in global affairs. With luck, today’s institutions concerned with the Arctic may have been strained but have not broken, thanks in part to the efforts of countless people to create ties across borders, develop a vision for the Arctic, and promote continued cooperation and mutual understanding. Conservation continues to be a challenge, but ecosystems and species have a chance at adapting to the ever-transforming climate. Indigenous peoples continue to sustain their own identities and ways of life and to pass on cultural traditions and values from one generation to the next.36 We look to 2060 with cautious optimism.
Without that luck, without that commitment to sharing an abundant Arctic, without the hard work of people in and alongside Arctic institutions, the second potential path to 2040 will be a very different story. Climate change will have affected nearly all aspects of life in the Arctic, exacerbated by poor management decisions driven by short-term, localized thinking. Shipping will be regulated to some degree by the IMO and its Polar Code, but enforcement is lax and accidents all too common. Arctic resources are available to the highest bidder, with little concern for environmental and cultural effects. Fish stocks have been plundered and yield a fraction of the catch they once supported. What’s more, fish and other marine life might be contaminated by microplastics with serious implications for human health.37 Today’s institutions have buckled and many no longer exist. Countries espouse cooperation even as they ignore the needs of their neighbors. Ecosystems are now shaped by human influence and conservation is a matter of preserving remnants of what once was. We look to 2060 and wonder what will be left.
The difference between these scenarios for 2040 is the reason that institutions matter, that the work of those involved in Arctic institutions matters, and that those of us who wish for something close to the first path laid out above must continue to fight for an Arctic characterized by abundance, cooperation, and an ever greater awareness of our responsibility to make decisions that are sound for the long-term, in a changing environment, across the full range of human activities. Today’s choices will determine what the Arctic is like in two decades’ time and beyond.38 The path our society is on may avoid major disasters,39 but by the same token, it involves an endless series of compromises made near and far, which together continue to degrade the Arctic. Finding a new path will not be easy in the face of inertia and active opposition from businesses and governments alike – all of which are more or less keen to exploit natural resources, to keep the economy buzzing, and to ensure their countries are at the forefront of industrial and technological progress. Yet, if in the process the environment is irrevocably damaged and degraded, living with the results of poor choices is likely to be even harder and costlier in human and economic terms.
Notes
1 1. https://arctic-council.org/en/about/.
2 2. https://www.northernforum.org/en/the-northern-forum/about-us.
3 3. http://www.arcticcircle.org/about/about/.
4 4. https://iasc.info/iasc/about-iasc.
5 5. Cf. Oran R. Young, “The Internationalization of the Circumpolar North: Charting a Course for the 21st Century,” http://www.thearctic.is/articles/topics/internationaization/enska/kafli_0200.htm.
6 6. Fridtjof Nansen, Farthest North (New York: Harper, 1907).
7 7. Maritime Executive, “IMO authorizes