scholarly journals Climate Change and Mental Health: A Snapshot of Arctic Indigenous People’s Resiliency and Suffering as the World Transforms

2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Caitlyn Madden

For years, the Arctic region, home to 4 million people, ten percent of whom are indigenous, has provided an example of rapidly changing climate patterns impinging on human ability to adapt to the change (Arctic Centre, University of Lapland). The Circumpolar region has experienced warming at a rate roughly two to three times greater than …

2016 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 282-295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Westerstahl Stenport ◽  
Richard S Vachula

In spite of overwhelming agreement between scientists and scientific agencies around the world that anthropogenic climate change is currently occurring, many American citizens and politicians alike continue to doubt its validity. In this article, we examine 21st-century media reporting and 20th-century cinematic examples that provide possible reasons for why this is the case, especially foregrounding Western cultural perceptions and connotations of the Arctic region, which have constructed an intellectual framework that resists scientific findings of anthropogenic forcing of climate change.


2019 ◽  
Vol 25 ◽  
pp. 5-19
Author(s):  
María J. Gunnarsdóttir ◽  
Sigurður Magnús Garðarsson ◽  
Hrund Ólöf Andradóttir ◽  
Alfreð Schiöth

Climate change is expected to have impact on water supply and drinking water quality in Iceland. Foremost there are three influential weather-related factors; increase in temperature; rise in sea level; and seasonal and regional change in precipitation in both quantity and intensity. In this study international and local reports and articles were analyzed for expected impact on the water resource with emphasis on the northern and the arctic region. Water quality risk factors were analyzed based on surveillance data of the water supplies from the Local Competent Authorities. Preliminary risk assessment of landslides and flooding was performed in one surveillance area in northern Iceland.


Author(s):  
Anna Borisovna Nikolaeva ◽  

The Arctic is the richest and at the same time the most difficult region to develop in the world. Exploration and exploitation of its deposits are inevitable for Russia and mankind as a whole. The Arctic region is characterized by extreme nature-climatic conditions, with a rather low level of economic development and remoteness from industrial centers, a low level or lack of any infrastructure as well as by instability of the ecological system to anthropogenic impact and a long recovery period. Since the potential of the resources currently being developed will be exhausted within several decades, and the world economies are not yet ready for a full transition to alternative energy resources, it is necessary to search for and develop new hydrocarbon reserves that determines the relevance of the study.The aim of the study is to identify the main problems arising when exploiting hydrocarbons in the Arctic region. The set of problems identified predetermines an integrated approach to their solutions. In this case, it is about reforming legislation, increasing funding, and attracting new participants in the international cooperation. Since the export of oil and gas is traditional for the Russian Federation, exploitation of hydrocarbons in the region is a prerequisite for the further economic development of the country. A state policy aimed at development and improvement of new technologies, reducing environmental risks, and deep scientific research of the Arctic, is needed. The method of expert assessment was used, which is applied for solving complex tasks with lack of information, and impossibility of mathematical formalization of the solution process. The basis for the application of this method is the possibility and ability of experts to assess the importance of the problem under study and development prospects for a certain research direction. The expert assessments were highlighted during the study and analysis of the literature.


2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-99 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott MacKenzie ◽  
Anna Westerstahl Stenport

Impactful communication remains a vexing problem for climate science researchers and public outreach. This article identifies a range of moving images and screen-based media used to visualize climate change, focusing especially on the Arctic region and the efforts of the United Nations. The authors examine the aesthetics of big data visualization of melting sea ice and glaciers made by NASA and similar entities; eye-witness, expert accounts and youth-produced documentaries designed for United Nations delegates to the annual COP events such as the Youth Climate Report; Please Help the World, the dystopian cli-fi narrative produced for the UN’s COP 15; and Isuma TV’s streaming of works by Indigenous practitioners in Nunavut.


Author(s):  
Sergey Rabkin

The search for a new model of collective security is one of the most important institutional challenges in a multipolar world. Despite the fact that modern processes of regionalization are increasingly determined by cognitive factors, the Arctic region is becoming a macro-region of the world, where the balance of national interest of countries with different economic systems can determine the institutional criteria for future global interaction or confrontation in achieving the goals of sustainable development.


2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 201-242
Author(s):  
Yuanyuan Ren ◽  
Dan Liu

In an era of climate change, economic globalization, and technological innovation, the Arctic region has been increasingly open to competing jurisdictional claims, commercial activities, and outside players. In the meantime, China’s engagement in the Arctic has drawn great attention. While some Arctic commentators are concerned about China as a threat to the region, many Chinese officials and scholars tend to portray China as a “rule-follower” in the Arctic. However, this “rule-follower” image fails to take full account of the evolving nature of Arctic governance and Arctic international law. This paper recasts China’s role in the Arctic. It argues that, to fulfill a “constructive participant” role in Arctic development, China can participate as a rule follower, a constructive challenger, and a keen learner concurrently, depending on the different issue-areas involved.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (12) ◽  
pp. 1396 ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Liang ◽  
Qingsheng Liu ◽  
Gaohuan Liu ◽  
He Li ◽  
Chong Huang

Land cover is a fundamental component of crucial importance in the earth sciences. To date, many excellent international teams have created a variety of land cover products covering the entire globe. To provide a reference for researchers studying the Arctic, this paper evaluates four commonly used land cover products. First, we compare and analyze the four land cover products from the perspectives of land cover type, distribution and spatial heterogeneity. Second, we evaluate the accuracy of such products by using two sets of sample points collected from the Arctic region. Finally, we obtain the spatial consistency distribution of the products by means of superposition analysis. The results show the following: (a) among the four land cover products, Climate Change Initiative Land Cover (CCI-LC) has the highest overall accuracy (63.5%) in the Arctic region, GlobeLand30 has an overall accuracy of 62.2% and the overall accuracy of the Global Land Cover by the National Mapping Organization (GLCNMO) is only 48.8%. When applied in the Arctic region, the overall accuracy of the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) is only 29.5% due to significant variances. Therefore, MODIS and GLCNMO are not recommended in Arctic-related research as their use may lead to major errors. (b) An evaluation of the consistency of the four products indicates that the classification of the large-scale homogeneous regions in the Arctic yields satisfactory results, whereas the classification results in the forest–tundra ecotone are unsatisfactory. The results serve as a reference for future research. (c) Among the four products, GlobeLand30 is the best choice for analyzing finely divided and unevenly distributed surface features such as waters, urban areas and cropland. Climate Change Initiative Land Cover (CCI-LC) has the highest overall accuracy, and its classification accuracy is relatively higher for forests, shrubs, sparse vegetation, snow/ice and water. GlobeLand30 and CCI-LC do not vary much from each other in terms of overall accuracy. They differ the most in the classification accuracy of shrub-covered land; CCI-LC performed better than GlobeLand30 in the classification of shrub-covered land, whereas the latter obtained higher accuracy than that of the former in the classification of urban areas and cropland.


2020 ◽  
pp. 28-34
Author(s):  
A. Lukin

The process of transforming international relations goes on under the influence of globalization mechanisms together with the development of integration processes. The establishment of more complex and at the same time simple mechanisms of cooperation in the system of international relations between its actors is the result of a change in the methods of introducing cases. Moving away from the classical principles of cooperation-diplomatic contacts, alliances, the world ceases to be a bipolar system of world device, thanks to the process of globalization, a multipolar world structure is being built with the new actors inherent in the globalization process, gives an example of multinational corporations and NGOs. Under the influence of globalization, the usual tools of international politics are being modified, since within the framework of the new system of transnational interaction, national states are forced to adapt to a changing, interconnected and interdependent world in which there is no longer a clear division between external and internal affairs. State power is forced to transform, transferring to a larger extent part of its functions to supranational structures, sharing its administrative functions with these structures and creating new models of world political governance. The Northern Forum acts as an organization uniting the regions of the subjects for solving common problems in the Arctic region.


2018 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 380-402
Author(s):  
Natalie Dobson ◽  
Seline Trevisanut

Abstract The effects of global warming in the Arctic region present a particular challenge for the European Union (EU), which seeks to profile itself as a leader in responding to climate change. Although the EU strives to prioritize climate protection, the Arctic region remains one of the EU’s major suppliers of energy, particularly oil and gas. The EU must thus strike a balance between climate change mitigation and adaptation, and energy security. The present article analyses the developments of the EU position in this field, particularly in light of the COP 21 negotiations, and the more recent 2016 Integrated European Union Policy for the Arctic. In doing so it seeks to explore to what extent the EU truly is fulfilling its own leadership aspirations in the field of climate change and energy in the Arctic.


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