The foreign policy headlines are dominated by terrorism, Iraq and Afghanistan, the Arab-Israeli dispute, and North Korea and Iran’s nuclear weapons.

Under the radar, however, a quiet revolution is going on. Policymakers from the Pentagon to Capitol Hill are proposing ways to modernize development policy to meet the demands of foreign policy in the 21st century.

A fascinating and potentially game-changing geopolitical pas-de-deux unfolded in Copenhagen. The international media and punditocracy christened the United States and China the new G2 in reference to the expected preeminent leadership roles the two hold among their respective developed and developing country contingents. What increasingly became clear, however, was that a different G2 was influencing the agenda: China and India.

India demonstrated that, while it wants an alliance with the United States and its Western allies, a subservient allegiance is not an option.

This was clear in the way India approached a key Copenhagen sticking point—verification. India had been down this road before with the U.S.-India nuclear deal, where Washington’s insistence on external verification was seen by some Indian strategists as undermining India’s sovereignty and security, and as a potential excuse to impose costly sanctions.

Indian concerns about verification created an opportunity for China which, despite the vastly different mix of emissions in both countries, was able to entice India into an alliance. India brought along its IBSA partners, South Africa and Brazil, and it was this expanded group, meeting in conclave, that President Obama gatecrashed in his search for solutions.

Two very important messages were delivered in Copenhagen. First, India told the West it could no longer be taken for granted—it had options. Second, China told India it would be open to a new relationship based on mutual interest.

Going in to Copenhagen, visions for the conference were more varied than many realized. The West primarily thought it was negotiating a trade deal (as evidenced by the drop in EU carbon trading prices after the talks failed to deliver a climate market deal). China, too, was negotiating a trade deal, but remained open to opportunities to gain larger strategic advantages. India, on the other hand, sought a stage to drive home its major geopolitical positions.

Coming out of Copenhagen, the conference’s narrative is clearer: This was geopolitics pure and simple.

India—home to the world’s most populous democracy, a thriving economy, and one of the world’s largest English-speaking populations—is a natural U.S. ally. Its recent experience with the United States on nuclear cooperation, however, has made it wary. Such paranoia gave Beijing an opportunity to entice Delhi into an alliance at Copenhagen. Despite China’s development of Pakistan as a nuclear client state, ongoing border disputes and skirmishes, and other conflicts between the two emerging powers, Beijing succeeded.

If the United States and its Western allies are to coax India (and by extension, a substantial portion of the developing world) into going along with an ambitious emissions reduction program, or indeed any other trade regime, they will need to desist from seeking to impose measures that Delhi regards as protectionist and self-serving.

For the West, moving the world’s most populous democracy to its side, and not China’s, is worth certain concessions. Not just for the sake of a climate deal, but also for larger strategic purposes. At Copenhagen, the West incorrectly lumped India with China, and this mistaken assement proved to be self-fulfilling.

Analysis of India has long suffered from “hyphenation.” First it was India-Pakistan, now India-China. At the beginning the India-China link was competitive, but Copenhagen has shown it has the potential to become cooperative. India should be assessed on its own terms. If geopolitics abhors a stand alone, however, then the time has come to rehyphenate democratic, economically strong, English-speaking India. It would be in the United States and its allies’ benefit to create a new cooperative link: India-U.S.

A longer version of this article was originally published by UPI-Asia.com.

Cleo Paskal is a fellow at Chatham House in London and author of Global Warring: How Environmental, Economic, and Political Crises Will Redraw the World Map (Palgrave). Scott Savitt, a former Beijing-based correspondent for United Press International, is the author of the forthcoming memoir Crashing the Party (Atlas). ©Copyright Cleo Paskal and Scott Savitt.

Photo: Prime Minister of India Manmohan Singh. Courtesy World Economic Forum.

Africa’s elephants and black rhinos—already at risk—are increasingly threatened as the price of black market ivory rises, global markets contract, and unemployment rates rise. To fight poaching of these tusked animals, Ian Craig, founder of the Lewa Conservancy in Kenya and the brains behind the Northern Rangelands Trust, takes a unique approach to conservation that involves both local community members and high-level government officials, as well as private and public sector investors.

In the 1970s the black rhino population was at about 20,000. Less than three decades later, it had fallen to 200. Today, the population is about 600, of which 79 live in the Lewa Conservancy. The vast regions of Kenya covered by the Northern Rangelands Trust and the Lewa Conservancy are difficult to govern, so the conservancies partner with local communities to ensure the security necessary to protect the animals from poachers. By investing in community institutions, the conservancies create long-term sustainability and self-sufficiency.

But why should local communities—often beset by poverty, disease, and hunger—care about saving elephants or rhinoceroses rather than killing them for their tusks or meat? Revenue from tourism can total hundreds of thousands of dollars, especially because of the high cost and exclusive nature of tourism facilities in the area. This money is then injected back into community programs to improve adult literacy, school nutrition, health care, micro-credit, water and irrigation systems, community livestock and agriculture, and forestry and aquaculture.

In some politically volatile areas, the conservancy serves not only as a platform for ecological security, but also as a mediator of disputes. Where livestock theft is rampant, multi-ethnic anti-poaching teams have been able to act as intermediaries. Community elders and other traditional leaders serving on the conservancies’ boards have bi-annual meetings to further intra- and inter-regional cooperation. Along with regular managerial and council meetings, the board meetings set standards for good practices, open dialogue for policymaking and cooperation, and act as a unique platform for communication between different ethnic and regional groups.

Community members understand they have a stake in protecting not only the animals, but in ensuring security and building trust within the country. With its unique combination of local-level engagement, the cooperation and support of the Kenyan Wildlife Service and the national government, and with the resources available to the conservancies as a group, the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy hopes to create a model of conservation that can be used across Africa and in other at-risk regions.

The future is shaky: ivory prices continue to rise, the migration of animals has facilitated poaching, and small arms are abundantly available. However, the new community-focused approach has helped to create positive attitudes that aren’t just about saving animals, but about developing the nation.

Justine Lindemann is program assistant with the Africa Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

Photo: Elephants in Lewa Conservancy area, courtesty Flickr user Mara 1

The Copenhagen COP-15 was not a stand-alone event. It was a product of years of ongoing work around the globe, from the trenches of climate research laboratories to the highest levels of government. As a result, apart from anything else, it gave valuable insight into the current state of two of the most dynamic and overarching issues of the coming decades: the science of environmental change (and in particular the potential impacts) and dynamics of shifting geopolitics.

In both cases, based on what was seen in Copenhagen, the situation is disconcerting.

In terms of the science, the COP-15 had a dangerously narrow focus. Carbon emission-related issues, the main topic of the COP, are just one component of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). Other include, for example, livestock-related methane emissions and the release of exponentially potent industrial GHGs.

Due to feedback loops and other factors now in play, anthropogenic GHG emissions themselves are just one component of changing atmospheric GHG concentrations. Others include, for example, methane released from thawing permafrost and CO2 saturation in the oceans.

Meanwhile, GHG concentrations in the atmosphere are themselves just one potential component of major environmental change. Others include, for example, massive changes in consumption patterns, soil exhaustion, and groundwater depletion. Even without climate change, those factors alone are destabilizing.

While unquestionably important, from a scientific point of view, what was on the table at Copenhagen was severely limited. This was acknowledged by those involved, many of who talk in terms of a 2 degree C temperature rise as being a win.

The implications are staggering. Already, critical energy infrastructure, for instance, is feeling the effects of environmental changes. In some cases, such as French nuclear power stations, U.S. Gulf Coast infrastructure, and Indian hydroelectric installations, environmental change periodically severely affects production.

If an infrastructure that is as well-designed and funded as the energy sector is starting to feel the effects, it is hard to imagine the potential for disruption that the science now tells us is inevitable.

Meanwhile, geopolitically, the conference quickly took on the developed-versus-developing world framing that has increasingly paralyzed other global negotiations. As one Zambian delegate told me, “This is even worse than the WTO.”

While the Financial Times called Lumumba Di-Aping, the Sudanese head of the G-77 group of developing countries, “belligerent,” the largest circulation English language newspaper in the world, the Times of India, ran a headline reading: “India suspects foul play on draft declaration.”

In some cases the day-to-day management of the COP incited and inflamed the feeling of fragmentation. The location itself was criticized from the start: Copenhagen is lovely, but very expensive. Many stakeholders from the developing world could not afford to attend, assuming they could get visas.

Once they did arrive, the long registration lines in the cold took a toll on those just off long flights from the tropics, and some just gave up as coughs set in. It is worth noting that on several key days, members of negotiating parties had to wait in line with the NGOs, severely limiting their ability to contribute to the work going on inside.

Some of those who braved the lines, including an Indian journalist colleague, got inside and to the registration desk after hours only to find that their accreditation had been unilaterally cancelled.

The restrictions on NGOs hit the developing world particularly hard, as many of the government negotiating teams were actively supported by think tanks and others who were registered as NGOs.

In an atmosphere already rife with distrust, those sort of organizational issues were not helpful, to say the least, and they fed into conspiracy theories about a deliberate concerted effort by the developed world to bulldoze through secret drafts. It doesn’t matter if it is not true, what matters is that it is now widely believed – and on the front page of the Times of India.

The implications are troublesome. The government officials and negotiators involved will be sitting across the table from each other in a wide range of other treaties and agreements. The distrust resulting from COP15 will feed into existing geopolitical tensions and will be carried in the hearts and minds of those involved for years.

This is not good. When we combine the two trends – a failure to manage (or even acknowledge) the scientific importance of non-carbon environmental change factors and increasingly polarized geopolitics – it is easy to see some very unsettling times on the near horizon.

As we start to experience accelerating problems with everything from water scarcity (including in the United States and Europe) to infrastructure failure (including along the U.S. coasts), we are all going to need as many friends as we can get. If the Titanic is going down, it doesn’t help to compete over who can steal the most silverware.

The sort of behavior on show in Copenhagen may suit some narrow interests, but unless the full complexity of environmental change is addressed, those interests will lose out—as will we all.

Cleo Paskal is a fellow at Chatham House, a consultant to the Department of Energy’s Global Energy and Environment Strategic Ecosystem (GlobalEESE) and author of Global Warring: How Environmental, Economic, and Political Crises Will Redraw the World Map.

The second week of negotiations here in Copenhagen has been marked by dramatic events, as the deadline for a new global agreement to address climate change approaches.

Blocs of negotiators from developing countries have walked out, and returned. Thousands of NGO representatives who have been denied access to the proceedings are shivering in the cold. Observers inside the Bella Center have staged sit-ins. And yet slivers of hope remain for some form of a global deal that is fair, ambitious, and binding as negotiators prepare for the arrival of more than 100 heads of state on Friday.

Leaders from the African Union,the European Union, NATO, and the United Nations have agreed unanimously that climate change threatens international peace and security, and urged that the time for action is now.

To communicate a sense of urgency, the security paradigm is being used to push for self-sufficiency in energy, and hence “national security,” at COP-15. Such a connection, if configured with carbon-free energy sources, could provide a win-win outcome for many.

This argument has been embraced both by the left and the right of the political spectrum in the United States. But compelling as it may be politically, there is a discomforting insularity and isolationism embedded in this approach, as emphasized by the delegations from some countries that export fuels (e.g., OPEC members, emergent oil and gas economies, and uranium exporters such as Namibia and Niger).

The Canadian delegation, which was targeted by activists with a “fossil of the day” award, used the security argument to show how it could send relatively “conflict-free” fuels to the United States by developing its oil, uranium, and bituminous tar sands.

Australia played a similar security card behind the scenes. The former Environment Minister Robert Hill also served as defense minister and is now head of Australia’s Carbon Trust–connections which he suggested were very valuable in an onsite interview with journalist Giles Parkinson.

Nuclear energy was prominently discussed as a solution by numerous delegations. At a side event organized by the Danish Federation of Industries, Energy Secretary and Nobel physicist Steven Chu indicated that his biggest concern about nuclear energy was not the waste problem but rather, the potential dangers to national security from the proliferation of radioactive materials.

The other security connection that environmentalists like to make–but is empirically more tenuous–concerns the increased pressures on existing strife in resource-scarce communities potentially inflicted by climate change. I attended a presentation by an OECD research team that empirically considered the impact of climate change on the security of the vulnerable states of the African Sahel. While generally rejecting the direct linkage between climate change and the threat of violent conflict, the OECD study, launched with UK Rear Admiral Neil Morisetti, identified three hotspots where existing resource scarcity and population pressure could be exacerbated by climate change, especially agropastoralist communities, who are highly sensitive to any climatic fluctuations.

So far, the rather meandering encounter with the security agenda I’ve witnessed here in Copenhagen could greatly benefit from further integrative work such as that offered by the Wilson Center.

Saleem H. Ali is associate professor of environmental planning at the University of Vermont and the author most recently of Treasures of the Earth: Need, Greed and a Sustainable Future.

In a meeting with business leaders in Lahore in late October, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pointedly warned of the potential economic impacts of Pakistan’s rapidly growing population: “There has to be…in any plan for your own economic future, a hard look at where you’re going to get the resources to meet these needs. You do have somewhere between 170 and 180 million people. Your population is projected to be about 300 million as the current birth rates, which are among the highest in the world, continue,” she said.

Pakistan is ranked 141 (out of 182 countries) in the Human Development Index. High rates of unemployment are compounded by low levels of education and human capital. Clinton noted that Pakistani women are more vulnerable to poverty; only 40 percent are literate, compared to 68 percent of men.

The Secretary’s emphasis on the need to provide adequate education, jobs, and resources to motivate economic growth and improve well-being is welcome. But demography also has important political consequences. U.S. policymakers and the Pakistani government should consider the impact of population dynamics on the country’s intensifying instability.

As Pakistan’s population grows rapidly, it is maintaining a very young age structure: in 2005, two-thirds of its population was younger than age 30. Research by Population Action International has shown that countries with very young age structures are three times as likely to experience outbreaks of civil conflict than those with a more balanced age distribution.

The members of a “youth bulge” are not inherently dangerous, but when governments are unable to foster employment opportunities or the prospects of stability, a young age structure can serve to exacerbate the risks of conflict, as recently noted by John O. Brennan, assistant to the president for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, in a speech on “A New Approach to Safeguarding Americans.”

As Secretary Clinton and her colleagues consider the complex barriers to achieving peace and stability for Pakistan’s people, their humanitarian and development strategies should include demographic issues. When couples are able to choose the number and timing of their children, very young age structures like Pakistan’s, can change.

Family planning and reproductive health services are fundamental human rights, but remain out of reach for many in Pakistan, where one-quarter of all married women (and 31 percent of the poorest) have an unmet need for family planning.

Greater access to family planning would lower fertility rates and increase the share of working-age adults in the population. In this transition, countries can harness the “demographic dividend”—a change that could turn Pakistan’s age structure into an economic opportunity.

However, funding from the United States—the world’s largest single donor for international family planning—has declined by one-third over the past 15 years. The foreign assistance funding priorities of the Obama administration should reflect this recognition of the linkages between population, development, and stability.

By addressing the high unmet need for family planning and reproductive health services of women in countries like Pakistan, the United States could help to create a more balanced age structure in future generations—and promote stability at the same time.

Elizabeth Leahy Madsen is a research associate at Population Action International (PAI). She is the primary author of the 2007 PAI report The Shape of Things to Come: Why Age Structure Matters to a Safer, More Equitable World..