Joan Nymand Larsen

Arctic Social Indicators : A follow-up to the Arctic Human Development Report

This report is a result of and follow-up to the Arctic Human Development Report (AHDR), which appeared in 2004 and had been conducted under the auspices of the Arctic Council’s Sustainable De ...

Cultures and identities

The Arctic Human Development Report is a scientific assessment commissioned by the Working Group on Sustainable Development in the Arctic Council. It describes Arctic societies and cultures, econom ...

Global Change, Northern Transformations, and a Changing Socio-Economic Landscape

Global change processes, economic and geo-political transformations, and the increased integration of the Arctic region with global markets all affect important economic and resource strategic interests. The changing demand and supply conditions for Arctic commercial resources affect market as well as non-market economies of the North. Global change is projected to have substantial future impacts on renewable resources. At the same time it may reduce the opportunity to engage in traditional activities important to the identity and way of life of northern residents. Life in the Arctic is increasingly shaped or influenced by events, decisions and activities happening elsewhere, with the future of the Arctic linked to and influenced by other, non-Arctic regional, social, political and economic interests. Socio-economic challenges related to global change pressures can be expected to play a growing role in decisions on resource allocation, resource use, ownership and control, and with important consequences for Arctic economies and prospects for their future economic sustainability. Strategies for sustainable development and Arctic environmental protection need to consider the economic, social and environmental linkages between the Arctic and other regions of the globe.

The New Arctic

In the late eighteenth century explorers and scientists started venturing into the Arctic beyond areas that were already populated by Indigenous peoples and a smaller number of new settlers, and ultimately towards the North Pole. It was about as far as anyone could get from civilization at the time, and in many respects it remains this way to this day. What the fi rst explorers saw had not yet been seen and recorded by Western civilization. They were the fi rst to tell the stories and document the state of the Arctic – its physical landscape and Indigenous cultures. The prosaic descriptions are many and colourful, moving and poetic, and they also soon began to provide detailed accounts of the state of Indigenous living conditions. A shared feature in these fi rst accounts, in prints and in paintings, is the descriptions of a harsh and barren landscape frozen in time; static and unchangeable, except for the swift sways in weather. Fanciful images of indigenous communities in isolated settlements, without any contact with “western civilization” came to shape the following generations perception of the Arctic. While the Arctic gradually became a place where new maps and lines drawn became a reality to outsiders, it was also, and had been for thousands of years, the homeland for many and diverse groups of indigenous peoples, surviving in at times unforgiving conditions while developing vibrant cultures, including strong traditions for adapting to changing conditions. The storytelling is today highly valued by itself and for its importance as a complement to science. And northern art has become more vibrant than ever as shown in some chapters here integrating the changes occurring on so many grounds. B. Evengård , MD, PhD (*) Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Clinical Microbiology , Umeå University Hospital , Umeå SE-901 85 , Sweden e-mail: birgitta.evengard@umu.se Ø. Paasche , PhD Bergen Marine Research Cluster , Professor Keysersgt. 8 , Bergen NO-5020 , Norway University of the Arctic (UArctic) , PO Box 122 , Rovaniemi FI-96101 , Finland e-mail: Oyvind.paasche@uib.no J. N. Larsen Stefansson Arctic Institute and University of Akureyri , Akureyri , Iceland e-mail: jnl@unak.is

The Arctic Economy in a Global Context

Change has been a characteristic of the Arctic economy since its early history. Today the pattern of change differs from the past in its magnitude, its rate of change, and the complexity of Arctic changes. The differences reflect a number of sources – climate warming, increased accessibility, and economic integration with global markets. This new pattern of change will produce significant impacts on the economies of the Arctic region, from main centers to smaller local communities. In this chapter we consider a number of sources of change, and reflect on the impacts for the new Arctic. We conclude that while the new Arctic will hold many promises and opportunities for formal and informal economies across the region, there are critical challenges to be addressed as the economy becomes an increasingly important player in the global context.

Polar economics: expectations and real economic futures

Polar economics: expectations and real economic futures Mixed economies of the Arctic are commonly described by their unique economic structures and the many associated challenges – e.g. small size, remote locality and high costs, – their significant resource constraints, market volatility and the many and diverse interests of different actors and stakeholders. In more recent times, the increase and spread of modern technology and communication networks has meant that many areas of the Arctic are successfully overcoming some of these well-known challenges as now work and business with world markets and external environments can be conducted long distance from even the most remote localities. With these and other economic changes, including increased economic diversification in many parts of the North, we are witnessing the new economic reality of a changing Arctic, including the region working its way to becoming well established on the global economic scene. It is today a story about the world getting smaller, and with this the Arctic becoming more integrated and connected across borders and regions – bringing along a mixed bag of costs and benefits. This special issue of The Polar Journal is about this new reality; the changes, development trends, risks and uncertainty, and future expectations, and some of the scientific contributions we are making as an economics and social science discipline in this regard.1 Today, the pattern of change differs from the past in terms of rate and magnitude, as well as the complexity of multiple changes and stressors along different scales and axes. Change has become a key buzz word in the Arctic discourse. This raises questions of whether the observed and predicted current and future pathways have brought innovative economic ideas, new ways of thinking in and of the North, or whether we are using old tools to solve new challenges. In light of the altered socio-economic landscape in the Arctic, in this special issue on Polar Economics, we take a closer look at why and how the Arctic economy is transforming, the main drivers – global and regional – and the impacts, threats and opportunities, to Arctic economies and sustainability.2 The new Arctic is described by diverse impacts of globalisation pressures, stepped up migration streams, urbanisation and population concentration, and the continued trend of economic integration. This is placing the Arctic increasingly alongside other regions in a global context, which also means a need to build capacity and to address resource gaps at all levels. Heightened economic expectations linked in particular to climate change, altered accessibility to important and strategic minerals, and a growing demand for northern resources, have been characterising more recent times. Yet, at the same time, and counterpoised to this, non-resource extractive industries – such as tourism and arts and crafts – are expanding in importance, signalling a trend towards economic diversification at the local and regional scale, and with this a growing potential for more income and economic benefits remaining in local communities.3 This special issue offers a contribution to the in-depth analysis of the northern economy, and explores further some of the many unresolved questions. It deals with questions of economic change and development in the Arctic in an era of multiple challenges, and represents in many ways an exploratory exercise and important contribution on the emerging new Arctic economic reality. The general questions addressed are a reflection of the big issues for the Arctic today:

Human Development in the New Arctic

In the decades ahead global change will have major consequences for the Arctic natural environment and human populations. In this chapter we reflect on the state of human development in the new Arctic and some of the key components of human wellbeing, including the basic sources of change. We address the importance of data and monitoring as ways forward to track changes in human development. The speed of Arctic change, its complexity, and the uncertainty about future directions, makes it increasingly important to understand how human development is changing, and precisely what and how individual aspects are changing. Rapid change in the Arctic has increased the emphasis placed on devising indicators for monitoring and measuring change in human development and quality of life. The Arctic Social Indicators (ASI) framework and method for monitoring and tracking change in human development is briefly discussed, and an application to the case of Nunavut, Canada, is presented.

The Political Economy of Northern Regional Development : Vol. I

“….Taking the structure and functioning of the Arctic regional economies and the degree of economic dependence as a point of departure, these regions self-reliance and comparative ...

Arctic Marine Resource Governance and Development

The Arctic has been an integrated part of the international system for centuries, and systemic developments have deeply influenced the region and its communities. Central Arctic Ocean marine resource governance is in the nexus of climate change and international systemic developments. The international systemic context for the Arctic is: The rise of China and emerging Asian economies driving gradual power transition from Western to Eastern states. Struggles continue over the domestic order and international position of post-Soviet Russia, where either side considers whether to escalate the Ukraine crisis horizontally to the Arctic. The USA and China interact concerning governing Arctic marine resources as Arctic Ocean coastal state/status quo power and fishing nation/rising power. Russia and the West choose not to escalate the Ukraine crisis horizontally into Arctic marine resource management. Co-creating of knowledge and epistemic communities are important for Arctic status quo and rising Asian countries to manage power transition in the Arctic and for Russia and the West to continue Arctic cooperation despite political crisis elsewhere.

Tracking Change in Human Development in the Arctic

Communities in the Arctic, the peoples, cultures, and societies of the region, are today facing multiple stressors, the sources of which are by now fairly well understood. They reach far beyond Arctic local and regional contexts – with change experienced in terms of both increasing rates and magnitude. Rapid change – now broadly accepted as a fact, with its multi-faceted impacts and many complex interactions of social, natural and physical systems – manifests itself in the socio-economic transformations of daily living and at different geographical scales. Beyond doubt, change puts human wellbeing and community adaptability to the test in today’s Arctic.