Environmental, Health and Resource Geopolitics

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Environmental, Health and Resource Geopolitics
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• Environmental Determinism
• Chernobyl and environments beyond borders
• Oil and Resource Wars
• Food scares
• Infectious diseases
• Climate Change
• Global South

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Environmental Determinism

• 1890s Geopolitics
• 1990s-2000s Environmental Geopolitics
• Physical differences cause economic and political
  differences, i.e. with development
• or, environmental problems are the direct result
  of simply understood political or economic
  phenomena (i.e. capitalism)

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• Since World War Two shift to recognise human
  impact on earth
• But discussed as major topic only relatively
  recently (c25 years)
• 1940s- present nuclear weapon testing
• 1963 atmospheric test ban treaty
• Pesticides
• Mercury poisoning
• Oil spills Exxon Valdez in Alaska. March 24,
  1989, 11m gallons

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Chernobyl

• April 26, 1986 at 0123 a.m
• Steam explosion that resulted in a nuclear
  meltdown, a series of additional explosions, and
  a fire
• Fire and rescue workers not warned about dangers
• 237 people with acute radiation sickness

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Chernobyl

• May 12th 1986 contamination cloud
• First reports came from Finland and Sweden,
  where radiation was detected at a nuclear plant
  that had not leaked.
• The Chernobyl Forum estimated 4000 deaths, plus
  up to 9000 extra predicted from cancer other put
  this much higher 30-60,000 by alternative
  report 200,000 in Greenpeace study

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Beyond borders

• Environmental hazards produced in one state but
  felt in another acid rain, polluted air, or
  rivers
• Environmental side effects of other processes
  (economic, political etc.)
• Ozone layer depletion, CFCs

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Beyond Sovereign Territory

• Global warming (climate change)
• Nuclear and biochemical weapons and accidents
• nuclear-free zones
• Over-fishing
• Genetically modified foods imported
• Dangers from over there are now potentially
  in here (Simon Dalby)

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Military security

• Gulf War syndrome (1991-)
• Anthrax (2001)
• Disposal of nuclear weapons in USSR and elsewhere
• More general issues of disposal of nuclear fuel
  anywhere, and other toxic waste
• Deliberate sabotage
• Jan 23 1991, Iraq opened oil terminal and dumped
  oil in Gulf
• Burning oil wells in Kuwait

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Oil

• Oil crisis of 1973
• Oil embargo of OPEC
• Manipulation of prices
• Iranian revolution 1979
• Carter doctrine
• Gulf War 1991
• War in Iraq 2003

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• How did our oil get under their sands?
• No blood for oil
• Peak Oil
• National Energy Policy (The Cheney Report) May
  2001
• Didnt stress conservation or renewable energy
• Domestic oil production in decline so lead to
  more imports (from which areas?)
• US energy independence (i.e. exploit resources in
  Alaskan National Wildlife Reserve)

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Flows of wealth

• Resource rich countries
• New elites
• Wider disparities between rich and poor
• Low social indicators, tendency to be
  authoritarian, corrupt, ineffective, prioritise
  military expenditure and more likely to be
  involved in conflict (Philippe le Billon)

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Materiality and illicit economies

• Minerals hard to extract, easy to smuggle
• Illegal logging of trees for timber
• Drug trade
• Colombia
• Afghanistan
• Oil

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Resource Wars

• Michael Klare, Resource Wars (2001) and Blood and
  Oil (2004)
• Philippe de Billon, Fuelling War Natural
  Resources and Armed Conflict (2005)
• Oil
• conflict diamonds
• Agriculture

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Spratly Islands
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Caspian Sea
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http//www.dur.ac.uk/resources/ibru/arctic.pdf
http//www.dur.ac.uk/resources/ibru/south_atlant
ic_maritime_claims.pdf
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Food Scares

• Genetically modified foods (GM foods)
• Fertilisers and pesticides vs. organic
• BSE animals eating parts of other animals
• Foot and mouth

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Farm subsidies

• European Union Common Agricultural Policy
• Shift from smaller family farms to
  agri-business

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Infectious diseases

• Bird flu
• SARS
• HIV/AIDS
• 5-6000 people die a day
• two thirds in sub Saharan Africa

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Four geopolitical themes

1. Porous borders closing borders
2. Transport networks flights (closing, who
   flies), roads
3. Militarisation of aid response
4. Logistics

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Climate Change

• May produce warming, but also cooling
• Sea level rise
• Gulf stream
• Kyoto
• Emissions trading
• Carbon off-setting

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Kyoto

• Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework
  Convention on Climate Change, Dec 12th 1997, in
  force Feb 16th 2005

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Press Release

• "The Kyoto Protocol is an agreement under which
  industrialised countries will reduce their
  collective emissions of greenhouse gases by 5.2
  compared to the year 1990 (but note that,
  compared to the emissions levels that would be
  expected by 2010 without the Protocol, this
  limitation represents a 29 cut). The goal is to
  lower overall emissions of six greenhouse gases -
  carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, sulfur
  hexafluoride, HFCs, and PFCs - calculated as an
  average over the five-year period of 2008-12.
  National limitations range from 8 reductions for
  the European Union and some others to 7 for the
  US, 6 for Japan, 0 for Russia, and permitted
  increases of 8 for Australia and 10 for
  Iceland."

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Common but differentiated responsibilities

• Developed countries originated the problem
  (industrial revolution)
• Developing countries still relatively low in
  terms of emissions (per head)
• Share of emissions allowed should reflect
  development
• Therefore China and India largely exempt

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Scepticism and Inaction

• It isnt happening
• It is, but humans didnt cause it
• Humans caused it, but we cant do anything
• What we do doesnt matter look at China and
  India

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The Day After Tomorrow

• Environmental catastrophe
• North becomes uninhabitable
• Mass migration to the south

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The Rise of China

• Economic liberal reforms without political
  reforms (compare to USSR)
• 10 growth per year since 1991
• Produces half worlds toys two thirds of shoes
  and most of its bicycles and power tools
• Most of the US flags bought after September 11th
  manufactured in China
• Predicted to outstrip US economy

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Environmental and social costs

• Poor employment rights
• Water shortages
• Environmental degradation
• Human rights
• Tibet and Xinjiang province
• legacy of Tiananmen square (1991)

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Global South Issues

• Industrialisation and attendant costs of lower
  emissions etc.
• Deforestation and CO2
• Population growth
• Impact of North on South

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Moral issues

• High consumption vs. poverty and famine
• the polluter pays
• Duty to future generations

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• The production of the Third World
• Decolonization
• Cold War Struggles
• Development and Neoliberalism
• Migration
• The Rise of China
• The End of the Third World?
• Disconnection and integration

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The production of the Third World

• First world US and allies
• Second world USSR and allies
• Third world the remaining, non-aligned
  nations developing nations

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Organisation of African Unity

• The Cairo declaration 1964
• the borders of African States, on the day of
  their independence, constitute a tangible
  reality
• weak elites who wanted to minimise threats to
  their rule
• avoiding chaos in recognition of the mosaic of
  racial and national distribution
• states to act as the motor of pan-African unity

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End of Third World

• Non-aligned world
• Developing world
• Global south
• Geographical determination
• But Australia and New Zealand in south India and
  China north of equator

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Contemporary challenges

• Reduction in aid and investment from North to
  South
• Rise in racism and anti-immigration policies in
  the North
• Pressure on the South on debt rescheduling and
  trade access for Northern firms (creation of new
  markets)
• Continued subsidies to Northern companies
• i.e. 300bn to farmers in North per year
• G8 gave 8bn to Africa in aid in 2001-02