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Many Arctics: What Does it Look Like and Why Is it Important for the Future of Governance in the Far North?
The Arctic is transforming in dramatic and complex ways through a myriad of pressures related to changes in climate, social trends and demographic patterns, economic opportunities, geopolitics, and technology. Although many discussions surrounding the Arctic’s future rightly focus on climate change, the concept of “many Arctics” – or the inherent diversity within the Arctic region – reminds us that multiple factors and drivers of change shape different areas in the north in different ways. This diversity is something to be celebrated in cultural and other contexts, but it can also create challenges for local communities and policymakers alike in navigating intense changes and resolving the many visions of the region’s future that exist among rights- and stake-holders.
This lecture will focus on aspects of ongoing research titled “Converging Pressures on Arctic Development” that is funded by the National Science Foundation’s Navigating the New Arctic program. It will highlight geographical and geospatial research focused on characterizing the current and potential future human footprints in the region as a basis for exploring alternative scenarios for how today’s many Arctics might look by 2050. It will also present the results of a recently published paper examining diverging scenarios of socio-economic change. Despite the fact that the Arctic has been highlighted as an important area of dialogue and cooperation for decades, this research suggests that finding common priorities – despite being more important than ever – may become even more difficult in the future.