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NewSecurityBeat

The blog of the Wilson Center's Environmental Change and Security Program
Lauren Herzer

Lauren Herzer Risi

Lauren Herzer Risi is the Project Director for the Environmental Change and Security Program at the Wilson Center and Managing Editor for New Security Beat.

She leads research and programming focused on the intersection of environmental change, climate change, demographic trends, conflict and peacebuilding, and foreign policy, international development, and security.

Lauren previously worked as a Peace Corps volunteer in Bulgaria and served as a Crisis Corps volunteer with the Peace Corps and FEMA in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina. She has a BA in History from UCLA and a Master’s degree in Environmental Security and Peace from the University for Peace in Costa Rica.

Email: Lauren.Risi@WilsonCenter.org

  • Investigating Climate Migration: Global Realities and Resilience

    ›
    From the Wilson Center  //  January 30, 2023  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi
    _MG_2055

    Climate change has become part of our daily lexicon. Rarely does a week pass when a hurricane, drought, wildfire, or some other climate disruption is not front page news. These headlines often offer dire predictions of mass migration as well—a bracing vision of hordes of people moving to greener pastures, often found further inland and further north, where some political leaders leverage the narrative to push their own agendas.

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  • “We are so worried we are going to be forgotten”—A Doha Forum Discussion on the Global Displacement Crisis

    ›
    From the Wilson Center  //  March 31, 2022  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi
    Screen Shot 2022-03-31 at 11.40.12 AM

    The humanitarian needs for those who are displaced are unprecedented, said Amb. Mark Green, President of the Wilson Center and former USAID Administrator, at a Doha Forum panel hosted by the Wilson Center’s Middle East Program.

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  • The Biden-Harris Administration Releases a (Nearly) Whole-of-Government Response to Climate Security

    ›
    October 29, 2021  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi
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    Last week, in an unprecedented show of coordination to address the connections between climate change and security, the Biden-Harris Administration released four reports—which taken together, mark significant progress in the effort to center climate change in U.S. national security and foreign policy. The documents—which fulfill key requirements laid out in two Executive Orders issued by President Biden in the early days of his administration—describe how climate change will increasingly heighten instability and influence the United States’ strategic interests, including shaping competition with other great powers—most significantly, China.

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  • New U.S. Global Fragility Strategy Recognizes Environmental Issues as Key to Stability

    ›
    Reading Radar  //  January 14, 2021  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi
    Cover_us-strategy-to-prevent-conflict-and-promote-stability

    A new Global Fragility Strategy, released late last year by the U.S. Department of State, signals a growing awareness of the role that environmental issues play in fragility, conflict, and peace. According to the State Department’s Office of Foreign Assistance, in the last five years alone, “the U.S. government has spent $30 billion in 15 of the most fragile countries in the world.” These “large-scale U.S. stabilization efforts after 9/11 have cost billions of dollars but failed to produce intended results,” writes Devex’s Teresa Welsh. As a result, Congress passed into law in 2019 the Global Fragility Act, legislation that directed the Department of State to lead the development of a new 10-year Global Fragility Strategy that sets out a new U.S approach to conflict prevention and stabilization in fragile contexts.

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  • 21st Century Diplomacy: Foreign Policy is Climate Policy (Report & Project Launch)

    ›
    From the Wilson Center  //  October 1, 2020  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi & Alexander Carius

    This article is an excerpt from “21st Century Diplomacy: Foreign Policy is Climate Policy,” a new report by the Wilson Center and adelphi.

    Climate change will upend the 21st century world order. It will redefine how we live and work, and change the systems of production, trade, economics, and finance. Even now, in the midst of a global pandemic, it is clear that climate change will be the defining issue of this century. In fact, COVID-19 has only underscored the inadequacy of our responses to global crises and heightened the urgency of this call to action. 21st century diplomacy will have to raise climate ambition, shape the transformative systems change needed, and promote and facilitate new modes of multilateral collaboration.

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  • Foresight for Action | Improving Predictive Capabilities for Security Risks Related to Extreme Weather Events

    ›
    Foresight for Action  //  November 12, 2019  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi, Sherri Goodman & Roger Pulwarty
    48698288003_b0563d3e68_k

    The Wilson Center is partnering with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research to develop a framework to improve predictive capabilities for security risks posed by weather, water, and climate events. Our “Foresight for Action” series highlights the research used to develop the framework.

    Evidence that extreme weather, water, and climate events pose critical security risks to the U.S. homeland, national security, and global stability has been mounting in recent years. From destabilizing droughts in Africa to devastating hurricanes and flooding in the United States, we are clearly seeing an increase in not only the frequency and severity of these events, but also their physical, social, and economic impacts.

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  • New Year, New Challenges—and New Questions for our Audience

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    From the Wilson Center  //  January 3, 2018  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi
    Lauren-Herzer-Risi

    The new year promises some big changes for the field of environmental security—and some big moves for the Environmental Change and Security Program (ECSP). As we say hello to 2018, we wave goodbye to Roger-Mark De Souza, and welcome him to our team of advisors and fellows. And I’m excited (if a bit daunted) to step into his shoes as our Acting Director and tackle the challenges to come.

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  • Security Links: An Emerging Congressional Common Ground on Climate Change?

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    July 26, 2017  //  By Lauren Herzer Risi
    USAID-Military-Airlift

    Earlier this month 46 House Republicans voted with Democrats to protect an amendment in the current National Defense Authorization Act that acknowledges that “climate change is a direct threat to the national security of the United States” and requires the secretary of defense to provide “a report on the vulnerability to military installations and combatant command requirements resulting from climate change over the next 20 years.”

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