Weather of mass destruction
Pastor Dale Morgan
Weather of mass destruction*
04 May 2007 13:59:00 GMT
Megan Rowling
Drought, crop failure, submerged coastal cities, mass migration, armed
conflict - those are the kind of horrors we can look forward to if the
world fails to get its collective act together on climate change, and
temperatures and sea levels continue to rise.
As the implications of "weather of mass destruction" - to quote
Greenpeace - become better understood, climate change is being framed in
a new way. These days, whether you talk to politicans, scientists,
academics or environmental campaigners, it's all about security. But
what does that actually mean?
Climate security enthusiasts agree that global warming is, well, a
global issue. It cuts across national boundaries, and while most people
on the planet will be affected by climate change in some way, it's
likely to be the poorest who suffer the worst.
"Climate change is a security issue but it is not a matter of narrow
national security - it has a new dimension," British Foreign Secretary
Margaret Beckett argued last month in a speech to the U.N. Security
Council, where climate change was debated for the first time. "This is
about our collective security in a fragile and increasingly
interdependent world."
The distinction between the narrow and broad interpretations of security
is an important one for many environmentalists.
A group of disasters experts argue in their report "Climate Change and
Human Security" that climate change will affect both "inter-state
relations and international and national security in a narrow,
geo-strategic sense" and "the well-being and survival of human beings
and humankind and thus human, water, health and livelihood security".
The paper, available on disaster website Radix, also makes a stab at
outlining how geo-political and human security might be affected over time:
* Short term (2007-2020) - Expect local conflicts over dwindling
water supplies, failure to meet the U.N.-set Millennium Development
Goals on food and health, a growing inability of states to cope with
major disasters, and small numbers of people displaced by rising sea levels.
* Medium term (2021-2050) - The forecast is for more local and some
international conflict over water, significant numbers of people
uprooted by famine, higher sea levels and mega-projects to help produce
energy, and political unrest stemming from state failure to cope with
disasters.
* Long term (2051-2100) - The crystal ball sees major international
conflict over water, mass displacement because of food shortages,
epidemics and submerged land - sparking international tensions - and
huge upheaval caused by weather catastrophes.
A quick scan around the globe suggests that some of the poorest
countries in Africa and Asia are already feeling the heat.
Take Sudan. The Guardian recently suggested that the conflict in the
western region of Darfur is "likely to be seen as the first climate
change war". Julian Borger traces the roots of the conflict - which
began in 2003 - to the mid 1980s, when a severe drought and famine
pitted pastoralists against settled farmers.
And while the causes of Sri Lanka's civil war lie in the political and
economic grievances of the island's Tamil ethnic minority, it may soon
take on a climate-change dimension.
The U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) points out
that parts of northern and eastern areas claimed by Tamils as their
homeland will be submerged when sea level rises, and that's likely to
happen by 2025. "So people are fighting and dying over areas that may
soon not be there," IPCC Vice-chairman Mohan Munasinghe told Inter Press
Service.
The hope of those who believe governments have already left it rather
late to act is that the new "climate security" discourse will push them
to get their skates on. Painting climate change as a top global risk
"makes political sense", wrote Jonathan Freedland in Britain's Guardian
newspaper after the Security Council debated the issue. "Cast it as a
problem for the big boys, on a par with nuclear proliferation or
international terror, and then it should get a big-boy budget and
attention," he argued.
Perhaps so. But we musn't forget the wider "human security" implications
of climate change. Leaving the "big boys" to come up with solutions -
guided by their own interests - risks shutting out large swathes of
those likely to be worst affected: the world's poor.
The onus may be on wealthier polluting nations to make up for their
carbon profligacy by helping poor countries most vulnerable to the
consequences. But that doesn't mean they should call all the shots.
The Radix paper suggests an alternative. "Ironically, climate change
offers humanity an opportunity for a quantum leap in sustainable
development and in peace making," it argues. Stronger international
cooperation on tackling climate change - rather than competition - could
also bring benefits for global stability, governance and development,
the paper says.
It's still far from certain that the climate change cloud will turn out
to have such a shiny silver lining.
But expect the debate to heat up again later this year with the release
of the Human Development Report 2007, which will focus on the challenges
of helping the world's poorest people cope with the social and economic
impact of climate change.