Climate change impacts, adaptation, and the technology interface - Environmental and Human Security in the Arctic - page 113

Climate change impacts,
adaptation, and the technology
interface
David Malcolm
Introduction
Environmental security represents one of the dimensions in a discussion of
overall human security in the Arctic, according to the soon 20-year-old 1994
UNDP Human Development Report. The notion of environmental security
plays an important role in understanding broader human security issues in
an Arctic context. Key to understanding Arctic environmental security is the
study of linkages between ecosystems and social systems in the circumpolar
world. The purpose of this chapter is to explore these linkages in terms of both
Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation (CCIA) and the importance of sus-
tainable engineering and construction practices in Canada's northern regions.
Engineering and construction practices in the Arctic must become appropri-
ate adaptation responses to climate variability. This variability is expressed by
large ranges of temperature fluctuation and the increased frequency of extreme
events in the natural environment. CCIA and the technological responses to
CCIA represent significant impacts on human security in the Arctic.
There is considerable argument as to what should, and what should not,
be part of the human security dialogue beyond the conventional militaristic
view of security. As outlined by Huebert (2004), indigenous views of Arctic
security have been primarily concerned with survival, so that human secu-
rity takes on the context of any influences that threaten that survival. He
refers to human security in the Arctic in terms of three important issues:
health security, cultural security and food security. Heininen (2004) refers
to a prevalent view of civil security including human health and social and
economic conditions as a replacement for the militaristic view of security in
the region, whereby southern actors 'interpret the region as a potential mili-
tary arena'. Both Huebert (2004) and Heininen (2004) refer to the natural
and human environment, sometimes linked to pollution from military and
industrial sources, as being an integral part of human security in the Arctic.
Climate warming affects virtually all aspects of sustainable living in the North
(Malcolm 2010) including infrastructure, transportation and health as well as
environment and ecology. So climate warming affects all decision-making in
the areas of governance and policy for sustainable living.