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Environmental Science and National Security: Overcoming Barriers to Connecting Research with Policy
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Beginning with the end of the Cold War, a relatively small but growing number of scholars began to investigate the connections between environmental change, conflict, peace, and changing notions of security. The recognition of these linkages wasn’t new, but as the heavy weight of superpower confrontation lifted and new foreign policy dynamics unfolded across the globe, an expanded range of research questions and tools emerged.
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Climate Concerns Dominate Reporting Outlook at Society of Environmental Journalists’ Annual Event
›January 30, 2020 // By Joseph A. Davis
The Society of Environmental Journalists’ annual look-ahead to environment and energy news in 2020 drew a crowd of some 300 (with more than 200 watching the live webcast) at National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C., Jan. 24.
And the overwhelming topic of discussion — climate change.
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Our Ocean and Cryosphere Under Threat
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Evidence of the effects of climate change continues to mount. We see it in extreme weather events, including droughts and intense hurricanes and cyclones, in biodiversity loss, and in erratic weather patterns around the globe. While many of these impacts rightfully make it into front-page news, climate change is also profoundly affecting parts of our planet that we do not understand well—the ocean and the cryosphere.In September 2019, the International Panel on Climate Change issued a Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (SROCC). The report provides a new and sobering analysis of current conditions, as well as projections into the future. Produced by more than 100 authors from 36 countries, the SROCC painstakingly reviews the latest scientific literature, referencing some 7,000 scientific publications in all.
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Disasters Have Changed. So Must Our Response.
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As disasters have changed over the years, so must the personnel who manage these crises.In 1932, sociologist Lowell Carr first described a predictable pattern of how disasters impact society. Refined over the decades by many researchers, the “disaster cycle” includes four phases: prevention, preparedness, response, recovery and rehabilitation.
This disaster cycle helped define the way societies respond to each disaster. Today, highly trained emergency personnel using many research, management, and epidemiological skills have helped improve survival and health outcomes after disasters. “Disaster medicine” now defines a sub-specialty for highly skilled professional health specialists. However, their many activities and skill sets primarily focus on only the response phase of the initial disaster cycle.
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Intense 2019 Amazon Fire Season May Become Dangerous Template for 2020
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The Amazon endured the most intense fire season in almost a decade in August 2019. On August 19, smoke from the faraway fires blackened the skies over Sao Paulo. By the next day, the hashtag “#PrayforAmazonia” was sweeping across Twitter. The social media outcry brought world attention to the already dire scientific warnings, and world leaders offered aid and pressured Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro to take action.
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It’s Time We Think Beyond “Threat Multiplier” to Address Climate and Security
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If you have even a passing familiarity with the climate and security literature, you undoubtedly have come across the phrase “threat multiplier.” The phrase conveys the idea that climate change intersects with other factors to contribute to security problems. It’s used as short-hand to avoid the charge of environmental determinism, that climate change somehow on its own causes negative security outcomes.The 2007 CNA Military Advisory Board (MAB) report on climate security introduced this formulation and, at the time, it served the purpose of recognizing that there is a link between climate change and security. But research on climate security has progressed and so must our framing of the risks and needed interventions.
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Where Do the Plastic Miners Go When the “Mine” Disappears?
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Usually after dinner, Mr. Ma would take off his shirt, shut the door, and begin work making plastic pellets from scrap. But tonight, he sits in his darkened yard staring at two SUV-sized plastic processing machines and a bundle of colorful scrap plastic. No lights are on, no machines grind, and no familiar theme song of CCTV-1 plays in the background. Walking through other villages in Wen’an County, more men meander around their yards filled with the same idle processing machines and mini-mountains of scrap plastic. Most have never studied English, but they are fluent in the language of plastics, sprinkling words like ABS, PP, and PVC into their conversations. They are the owners of small plastic scrap recycling workshops that were once booming—but are now silent.
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The Environmental Dimensions of Sustainable Recovery: Q&A with Ken Conca and Anita van Breda (Report Launch)
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Recognizing the need to address environmental challenges in the wake of war and disaster, American University’s School of International Service and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) joined together to launch the project “Environmental Dimensions of Sustainable Recovery: Learning from Post-Conflict and Disaster Response Experience.” As representatives of a leading conservation NGO (World Wildlife Fund) and a professional graduate school with extensive expertise in environment, development, and conflict resolution (American University’s School of International Service), Anita van Breda and Ken Conca’s partnership helped to conduct a truly cross-organizational, cross-perspective exchange and familiarized them with the challenges and opportunities that occur when working across sectors and organizational cultures.
Showing posts from category environment.
