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Tag Archives: climate security
Geopolitics and the COP
By Scott Moore
Fighting climate change is supposed to be about cooperation for the common good. Or at least that has been the main message of every United Nations climate conference for the past two decades, the latest iteration of which just wrapped up. But high-minded calls to cooperate for the sake of the climate are increasingly running headlong into a hard-nosed reality: growing geopolitical competition between great powers. Unfortunately, geopolitics can make it harder for countries to work together to solve the climate crisis. But if you look carefully, they can also create opportunities to advance climate action.
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The Story Behind Climate Security and What it Means for US Foreign Policy
This piece is cross-posted on New Security Beat, the Blog of the Wilson Center’s Environmental Change and Security program.
By Noah Fritzhand and Angus Soderberg
Hurricanes Helene and Milton battered the southeastern US in September and October and caused a combined estimate of $300 billion in damages. These storms were only the latest example of a cascade of disasters that is expected to worsen as climate change intensifies. Yet the impacts do not stop at dollars and human lives. Threats to security and stability also will multiply as rising temperatures increase the variability of rainfall patterns and the intensity of storms.
A recent event co-hosted by the Wilson Center with the Center for Climate and Security examined the underlying dynamics of climate security and their implications for US foreign policy. Peter Schwartzstein, Wilson Center Global Fellow and environmental Journalist in Residence at the Center for Climate and Security, who was among the speakers at the event, observed that “climate change’s most debilitating and greatest impact on violence is when it is acting on other drivers of instability.”
Climate change can exacerbate regional instability by altering the availability of life-sustaining resources such as water, food, and land. And US officials are discovering that the sheer scope of climate stress can challenge US interests as well. Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization at the US Department of State (DoS) Anne Witkowsky noted that close to “3.6 billion people [are] living in regions susceptible to climate change, [and] more than 1 billion of those people living in regions experiencing conflict.”
Communities around the world are facing climate stressors that threaten their lives and livelihoods, compound conflict risks, and challenge the ability of governments to provide services for their citizens. Recognizing that climate change is no longer just a future threat, countries and multilateral institutions now have taken a new interest in understanding the interactions between climate, conflict, and security.
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Marketplace Podcast Highlights Center for Climate and Security Experts
For the past six years, the radio program Marketplace, hosted by Kai Ryssdal, has run a “climate solutions” podcast called “How We Survive.” The latest season, which debuted last month, focuses on the intersection of climate change and national security – specifically, how the US military is dealing with, and could ultimately shape, the changing climate. Ryssdal himself served in the Navy during the 1980s but, by his own admission, never heard much about climate change or global warming during his time in uniform. Forty years later, however, it’s become a major topic of discussion and debate within the Department of Defense (DoD). Over six episodes, Ryssdal explores those debates and speaks with a number of prominent members of the Center for Climate and Security (CCS).
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Reshaping Multilateralism Episode 4: Recent Climate Security Successes and Opportunities for 2025
This week, the Nexus25 project released Episode 4 of the Reshaping Multilateralism podcast featuring Erin Sikorsky, Director of the Center for Climate and Security; Iris Ferguson, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Arctic and Global Resilience; and Laura Pavlovic, Senior Deputy Assistant to the Administrator of USAID’s Bureau for Conflict Prevention and Stabilization. This week’s guests discuss key climate security successes in the United States over the past four years, leveraging programmatic co-benefits, and opportunities for the next Administration in 2025.
“Reshaping Multilateralism” is a production of the Nexus25 project, a joint Istituto Affari Internazionali / Center for Climate and Security initiative funded by Stiftung Mercator in Germany and produced in partnership with storielibere.fm. Subscribe via your favorite podcast platform, visit www.nexus25.org, and stay tuned for insider analysis from global experts on global security, climate security, climate finance, the future of multilateralism, and more.