climate security

represented in red (uniform distribution, actual sea level rise will vary regionally). Hotspots of SLR can divert 3–4 times in the rate of rise, compared to the global average, such as projected for parts of the U.S. East Coast. Climate security (also referred to as climate, peace and security) is a political and policy framework that looks at the impacts of climate on peace and security. Climate security often refers to the national and international security risks induced, directly or indirectly, by changes in climate patterns. It is a concept that summons the idea that climate-related change amplifies existing risks in society that endangers the security of humans, ecosystems, economy, infrastructure and societies. Climate-related security risks have far-reaching implications for the way the world manages peace and security. Climate actions to adapt and mitigate impacts can also have a negative effect on human security if mishandled. The term climate security was initially promoted by national security analysts in the US and later Europe, but has since been adopted by a wide variety of actors including the United Nations, low and middle income states, civil society organizations and academia. The term is used in fields such as politics, diplomacy, environment and security with increasing frequency.…

represented in red (uniform distribution, actual sea level rise will vary regionally). Hotspots of SLR can divert 3–4 times in the rate of rise, compared to the global average, such as projected for parts of the U.S. East Coast. Climate security (also referred to as climate, peace and security) is a political and policy framework that looks at the impacts of climate on peace and security. Climate security often refers to the national and international security risks induced, directly or indirectly, by changes in climate patterns. It is a concept that summons the idea that climate-related change amplifies existing risks in society that endangers the security of humans, ecosystems, economy, infrastructure and societies. Climate-related security risks have far-reaching implications for the way the world manages peace and security. Climate actions to adapt and mitigate impacts can also have a negative effect on human security if mishandled. The term climate security was initially promoted by national security analysts in the US and later Europe, but has since been adopted by a wide variety of actors including the United Nations, low and middle income states, civil society organizations and academia. The term is used in fields such as politics, diplomacy, environment and security with increasing frequency. There are also critics of the term who argue that the term encourages a militarized response to the climate crisis, and ignores issues of maldistribution and inequity that underpin both the climate crisis and vulnerability to its impacts. Those who look at national and international security risks argue that climate change has the potential to exacerbate existing tensions or create new ones – serving as a threat multiplier. For example, climate change is seen as a threat to military operations and national security, as the rise in sea level can affect military bases or extreme heat events can undermine the operability of armies. Climate change is also seen as a catalyst for violent conflict and a threat to international security, although the causality of climate and conflict is also debated. Due to the growing importance of climate security on the agendas of many governments, international organizations, and other bodies some now run programs which are designed to mitigate the effects of climate change on conflict. These practices are known as climate security practices. These practices stem from a variety of actors with different motivations in the sphere of development, diplomacy and defense; both NATO and the UN Security Council are involved in these practices. ==Background== Climate security refers to the security risks induced, directly or indirectly, by changes in climate patterns. Climate change has been identified as a severe-to-catastrophic threat to international security in the 21st century by multiple risk and security reports. The 2020 Global Catastrophic Risks report, issued by the Global Challenges Foundation, concluded that climate change has a high likelihood to end civilization. 70% of international governments consider climate change to be a national security issue. Policy interest in climate security risks has grown rapidly and affects the policy agenda in relation to food and energy security, migration policy, and diplomatic efforts. , projected changes in food prices, depending on emissions scenarios, also factoring trade. While many International Relations (IR) scholars link climate change with security and conflict through a traditional military approach, there is an ongoing debate on whether climate change and environmental issues should be securitized and who and what is really protected. The scholars who theorized the concept of securitization allowed to deepen and broaden concepts of security beyond traditional military security through discourse methodology and 'speech acts.' For example, Copenhagen School scholars, such as Barry Buzan and Ole Wæver, argue that security justifies urgency and exceptionalism, focusing on defense, the military and the state and that climate change should instead be placed into 'normal politics' and removed from the security agenda. Furthermore, some scholars note how securitization theory, stemming as a response to traditional realism theory in the post-Cold War era, is mostly a Eurocentric field and does not include the legacies of colonialism and racial hierarchies inform global politics and governance. The impacts of climate change, highlighted in 1990 by the First Assessment Report (FAR) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and in 1992 by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), highlighted the need for climate change to be viewed as a security threat and influenced international entities to do so. A report in 2003 by Peter Schwartz and Doug Randall looked at potential implications from climate-related scenarios for the national security of the United States, and concluded, "We have created a climate change scenario that although not the most likely, is plausible, and would challenge United States national security in ways that should be considered immediately." In 2008, the EU published a report on climate change and international security, defining climate change as a 'threat multiplier' affecting EU own security and interests. Social movements and organizations, such as Climate Justice alliance, We are Dissenters, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, Indigenous Environmental Network, call for a bigger emphasis on climate justice and environmental justice rather than climate security. Climate justice puts the emphasis on the root causes of climate change, like colonialism and neocolonialism, global inequality, globalization and exploitative economic systems such as the exploitation of natural resources. Many call this addressing the era of climate colonialism. Indeed, many proponents of climate justice call for bigger support for Indigenous people and other frontline communities that are fighting for climate change and also already protecting 80% of Earth's biodiversity. Many civil society actors also call for climate reparations on top of more climate finance, and also the establishment of Loss and Damage Finance Facility (LDFF), which has been proposed by low-income countries, as well as sovereign debt cancellation. This way, low-income countries could tackle the impacts of climate change for which they are bear the least responsibility. From an academic standpoint, the concept of ecological security, allows for a more systemic approach to climate change that examines the structural roots of the climate crisis as the overlapping economic, political, and social issues of the global system. ===Conflicts=== Studies have shown that extreme weather events can damage economies, lower food production and raise inequality, which can increase risks of violence when combined with other factors. An article by leading experts found that climate change has influenced between 3% and 20% of armed conflict in the last century, that an increase of 2 °C above pre-industrial levels more than doubles the current risk of conflict, increasing it to 13%, and that an increase of 4 °C multiplies the risk by five, up to a 26% risk. Other researchers have specified the conditions under which climate change increases the risk of conflict and violence. These include a history of political instability, agricultural dependence, low levels of development, the political of ethnic groups from the political system, and insufficient conflict resolution institutions. At the micro level, temperature volatility associated with climate change has likewise been found to act as a risk multiplier for short-term spikes in interpersonal violent crime. A report by the Global Peace Index found that 971 million people lived in areas with either a high or very high climate change exposure and that 400 million of those people lived in countries with low levels of peacefulness. It warned that climate change can increase the likelihood of violent conflict by impacting upon resource availability, job security, and by causing forced migration. Predicting future risks of climate change and conflict remains difficult, despite the existence of several predictive models and tools. Future climate change is likely to be very different from what humanity has experienced previously and the ability of societies to adapt is unclear. A 2016 article suggested that conflict over climate-related water issues could lead to nuclear conflict between India and Pakistan. However, other scholars believe that climate change are unlikely to have major impacts on the nature of interstate wars, but have expressed concerns about its impacts on civil wars and communal conflicts. Based on a meta-analysis of 60 studies, Hsiang, Burke and Miguel concluded in 2013 that warmer temperatures and more extreme rainfall could increase interpersonal violence by 4%, and intergroup conflict by 14% (median estimates). However, their results have been disputed by other researchers as being not sufficiently robust to alternative model specifications. Recent studies by authors like Buhaug, Detges, Ide and von Uexkull have been more careful. They agree that climate-related disasters (including heatwaves, droughts, storms and floods) modestly increase armed conflict risks, but only in the presence of contextual factors like agricultural dependence, insufficient infrastructure, the political exclusion of ethnic groups, insufficient conflict management, and high disaster vulnerability. Climate change is therefore rather a "risk multiplier" that amplifies existing risks of conflict. In line with this and other reviews of the topic, an expert assessment published 2019¹ in Nature concludes that between 3% and 20% of intrastate, armed conflict risks in the previous century were affected by climate-related factors, but that other drivers of conflict are far more important. The expert assessment itself notes that major knowledge gaps and uncertainties continue to exist in the research field, especially regarding the pathways connecting climate change to conflict risk. Recently, researchers have paid increased attention to the impacts of climate change on low-intensity and even non-violent conflicts, such as riots or demonstrations. Even if people do not have the means or motivation to use violence, they can engage in such forms of conflict, for instance in the face of high food prices or water scarcity. Studies indeed show that in vulnerable societies, the anticipated consequences of climate change such as reduced food and water security increase the risk of protests. These conflicts often add to and trigger the escalation of deeper social and political struggles. On a country by country basis, several case studies have linked climate change to increased violent conflicts between farmers and herders in Kenya and Sudan, but have found mixed results for Ghana, Mali, Nigeria and Tanzania. Evidence is also ambiguous and highly contested for high-intensity conflicts such as civil wars. Some experts suggest a contribution of climate change to civil wars in Mali, Nigeria, Somalia and Sudan. Other studies suggest that there is very little evidence for these causal claims, including for the cases of Darfur, Egypt, and Lake Chad. The most prominent example of these debates is the Syrian civil war. Several studies claim that a climate-induced drought between 2006 and 2009 led to mass migration into urban areas, contributing to grievances and unrest that erupted in the 2011 protests. The repression of the latter marked the start of the civil war. A team around Jan Selby argues that these claims are overstated and that political decisions and mismanagement, rather than climate change and migration, have caused the onset of the war. Several recent studies find that the debate is not yet settled because there is evidence for both positions, yet a lack of comprehensive empirical data. There are a number of studies that criticize how climate-conflict research is based on a deterministic and conflict-oriented worldview, that findings of statistical studies on the topic are based on problematic models and biased datasets, and that constructivist approaches are largely ignored. Existing research also predominantly focuses on a few, well-known and already conflict-ridden regions, such as Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. This raises questions about sampling biases as well as implications for less-considered regions like Latin America and the Pacific, with topics such as peaceful adaptation and environmental peacebuilding also understudied. The IPCC's Sixth Assessment Report concluded in 2022: "Climate hazards have affected armed conflict within countries (medium confidence), but the influence of climate is small compared to socio-economic, political, and cultural factors (high confidence). Climate increases conflict risk by undermining food and water security, income and livelihoods, in situations where there are large populations, weather-sensitive economic activities, weak institutions and high levels of poverty and inequality (high confidence)." Many politicians, decision makers, and journalists have drawn a connection between climate change and conflict. Already in a 2007 study on the topic, the German Advisory Council on Global Change identified four pathways potentially connecting climate change to conflict: degradation of freshwater resources, food insecurity, an increasing frequency and intensity of natural disasters, and increasing or changing migration patterns. A more recent 2021 report from the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence predicts intensifying physical effects of climate change "will exacerbate geopolitical flashpoints, particularly after 2030, and key countries and regions will face increasing risks of instability and need for humanitarian assistance." The United Nations Security Council has discussed the links between climate change and security various times, even though the position of its member states vary. Other key decision makers in the USA, the European Union, and NATO are also concerned about climate conflict risks. In some cases, climate change could also decrease conflict risks. This happens either if climate-related disasters impose financial and logistical constraints on conflict parties or if various social groups come together to cooperate about the shared challenge of climate change (environmental peacebuilding). The military's sustainability plans have been criticized as 'greenwashing.' Additionally, militarism and war have caused devastating environmental damages. The chemical contamination left in Afghanistan and the nuclear contamination in the Marshalls Islands are some examples of American imperialism and its environmental legacy. ==Political approaches== The transnational character of climate-related security risks often goes beyond the capacity of national governments to respond adequately. Many parts of governments or state leaders acknowledge climate change as an issue for human security, national or regional security. Despite ongoing concerns about the securitization of climate change, it has had little effect on the policies and activities of national governments, which have tended to take 'business as usual' approaches to managing and containing international migration. ==See also== Climate resilience Energy security Environmental monitoring Food security Water conflict Water security ==References== ==External links== Climate Security Mechanism at the United Nations Global Military Advisory Council On Climate Change How Climate Change Became a National Security Problem (Wired, 2015) National Security in the Fourth National Climate Assessment (2018) Primer on Climate Security - The dangers of militarising the climate crisis (Transnational Institute, 2021)

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