Environmental security

DEFINITION: The relationship between a nation’s natural resources and livable environments and threats to that nation’s social, economic, and political stability.

When a nation’s ecosystems or resources are degraded to a level that is not sustainable, the nation becomes destabilized economically and socially. A destabilized nation’s need to locate new sources of natural resources or livable environments may trigger military conflicts or initiate the migration of large numbers of people. Either outcome results in the escalation of regional and international tensions.

Environmental security issues result from the need to maintain access to natural resources and livable environments—the foundation of all national economies, as well as social and political stability. The basic environmental security of a nation-state involves maintaining the availability of access to sustainable sources of renewable and nonrenewable resources; protecting the soil, water, and air of sovereign territory from becoming unusable; and reducing hazards to the domestic environment as a result of human activities. The security of all these eco-based elements can be compromised by war, terrorism, pollution, unsustainable resource exploitation, overpopulation, ecosystem destruction, and political or philosophical agendas. Because natural resources are a vital component of a nation’s economic and social stability and international political potential, environmental security is a vital component of national security.

Nature of Security Risks

Many conflicts between nations arise from local or regional confrontations over access to natural resources, claims of overexploitation of common resources, border-crossing pollution, environmental disturbances perpetrated by one nation that adversely affect another, and environmentally based threats that indirectly extenuate preexisting regional tensions and conflicts. One common source of regional conflict concerning resource access is fresh water: Often one nation may draw down a shared aquifer or, if upstream, draw down a river so that the downstream nation’s access is depleted. Shared fishing grounds constitute another kind of resource that has been at the core of many international conflicts; overexploitation of such grounds has often resulted in opposing navies facing off in attempts to enforce their claims to the harvest.

When a nation disrupts an ecological zone, such as by clear-cutting forests, the ramifications for water quality and microclimatic change directly affect neighboring nations. Industrial pollutants that cross borders and ecological disasters such as nuclear accidents and spills from oil tankers can have outcomes that affect vast areas and escalate regional tensions. The quest for sustainable access to lifestyle-maintaining resources, especially energy resources—natural gas, oil, and coal—has been the basis of numerous conflicts over the past century. Indirect nonconventional environmental threats may include the use of prime agricultural lands to grow nonfood crops such as opium poppies, coca, and cannabis. Similarly, illegal mining operations, often using enslaved people for labor, clandestinely harvest emeralds, rubies, and, most notably, diamonds. The profits from these illicit botanicals and “conflict gems” are often used to finance criminal enterprises, civil insurgencies, or terrorist operations—all threats to a nation’s security.

Many internal and external conflicts remain ongoing because rebel and terrorist forces finance themselves entirely by plundering natural resources. In some parts of the world, cross-border poaching and theft of exotic animals for their meat and body parts, as well as the illegal taking of large marine mammals on the high seas, have escalated to the point where military forces are used to counter these activities, thus increasing the chance for armed conflicts. Another evolving threat to security is that of environmental terrorism, which can be as limited as the destruction of logging equipment in an attempt to disrupt local commerce or as large in scale as the systematic burning of oil fields to create an environmental catastrophe; both are examples of environmentally based security threats.

Environmental Refugees

One of the more pressing problems of environmental security is that of environmental refugees: people forced to migrate when the environmental conditions in their home areas deteriorate so severely that they can no longer thrive there. Among the environmental triggers that force such migrations are overpopulation, natural disasters, desertification, famine, drought, climate change, human-induced environmental degradation, and resource depletion. While environmental refugees are usually considered nonmilitary security threats, they can become a destabilizing factor in international relations if they place an unacceptable burden on the areas to which they migrate.

Scientists predict that as the expected effects of global climate change manifest, nearshore communities will be inundated by rising sea levels, weather patterns will shift, temperature regimes will alter, growing seasons will become unpredictable, and pests and diseases will invade new regions and hosts. As a result, many people will be displaced, forced to migrate to new environments. Such a mass movement of environmental refugees is likely to stress the environments or resource bases of their end destinations, making the refugees a threat to regional and international stability and security.

In the 2010s, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) instituted pilot programs in North Darfur, Sudan, and the Karnali River Basin in Nepal to explore climate change adaptation. This included water conservation and agricultural techniques, introduction of additional sources of income, and development of sustainable water infrastructure. The office of the UN High Commissioner on Refugees developed a Strategic Framework for Climate Action and a Strategic Plan for Climate Action 2024–2030. The latter supports governments by providing plans to address issues with the goal that by 2030, forcibly displaced and stateless people affected by climate crises have protections and options to be self-sufficient.

Bibliography

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