E3G

Delivering Climate Security: International Security Responses to a Climate Changed World

By Nick Mabey

Tackling instability

Over the next decades, the determinant of whether climate change drives serious conflict lies in how political systems respond to the tensions it creates. Too often, analysis of climate change impacts assumes that all governments will act to maximise the common good in response to change. But resource management regimes in much of the world are already built upon communal divisions and conflict, and are highly unlikely to respond in a predictable, rational and inclusive manner to climate stresses. Experience of current instability in the Sahel – especially Darfur – shows how quickly disputes over access to resources in times of environmental stress can become politicised and exacerbate existing communal conflicts based on ethnic, religious or other lines. These conflicts develop their own internal dynamics, but will see no sustainable solutions unless the root causes of resource grievances are addressed.

Achieving security in a climate-stressed world will require a more pro-active and intensive approach to tackling instability in strategically important regions with high climate vulnerability and weak governance. This will require changes across the security sector, with a stronger incorporation of long-term and structural risk factors into planning and a willingness to engage effectively with tough governance challenges; bringing diplomatic, development, intelligence and law enforcement capabilities to bear. This does not just require implementation of some general ‘conflict prevention’ agenda, but direct focus on the strategic necessity of managing increased resource use tensions. There will be no long-term stability in Afghanistan unless rural livelihoods and water management are robust to climate change. Attempts to build a ‘hearts and minds’ coalition against Islamist extremism will be crucially undermined when many of the main sources of job creation for young men in North Africa are being undermined by warmer temperatures and declining rainfall.

The impact of climate change on instability will also require changes to how climate adaptation is handled in the international climate change regime. To date climate adaptation has mainly been framed as a technical development activity, but in reality it will involve complex political and diplomatic interventions in difficult and highly charged internal resource management issues. The political economy of resource management must lie at the heart of all adaptation measures as they deal with the resources of subsistence and identity: land, water and security. More controversially, access to international adaptation finance may need to be made conditional on countries implementing reforms to internal resource management policies to improve social resilience and prevent conflict and marginalisation of vulnerable groups.

All these impacts are already occurring as the earth gradually warms in the early stages of climate change. If climate change is not controlled before we meet critical ‘tipping points’ in natural systems the impact will become catastrophic, with large parts of the world becoming uninhabitable for their current populations by the middle of the century. Such an outcome would overwhelm current security and humanitarian capacity to respond, and would make a mockery of the international community’s commitments to a ‘Responsibility to Protect’ and the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.