H-Diplo Article Review 1109- "Climate Change and Security in Canada"

George Fujii Discussion

H-Diplo Article Review 1109

17 May 2022

Wilfrid Greaves.  “Climate Change and Security in Canada.”  International Journal 76:2 (2021):  183-203.  DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1177/00207020211019325.

https://hdiplo.org/to/AR1109
Editor: Diane Labrosse | Commissioning Editor: Thomas Maddux | Production Editor: George Fujii

Review by Leanne Smythe, Trinity Western University

The 2021 Speech from the Throne was given on 23 November 2021 to open the first session of the 44th Parliament of Canada. It introduced the priority of climate change for the recently elected Liberal government, announcing: “This is the moment for bolder climate action.”[1] Framed as an integral component of a “resilient economy,” the speech outlined a plan of decarbonization and protection of biodiversity. It concluded by pledging that “the Government will also strengthen action to prevent and prepare for floods, wildfires, droughts, coastline erosion, and other extreme weather worsened by climate change. The Government will be there to build back in communities devastated by these events.” [2] This agenda indicates that mitigating climate change is a policy priority for the current Liberal government. What is clear, however, is that it is not a security priority for this government. At best, it is a public policy challenge that will require some strategic planning and investment.

Discussions about the security implications of environmental problems found a home within the contested space of post-Cold War security discourse.[3]  Academic works such as Ronnie D. Lipschutz’s edited book On Security[4] attempted to bring diverse security perspectives together for consideration, while Security: A New Framework for Analysis[5] by Barry Buzan, Ole Waever and Jaap de Wilde, made the case that the concept of security ought to be both widened and deepened by bringing in new types of security threats and new referents for security.

Around the same time, the political world started to recognize the importance of the environment to national security and human wellbeing. The 1988 Toronto Conference “The Changing Atmosphere: Implications for Global Security” was arguably the first major international event seeking to securitize the phenomenon we today call ‘climate change.’ The first line of the conference summary states: “Humanity is conducting an unintended, uncontrolled, globally pervasive experiment whose ultimate consequences could be second only to a global nuclear war.”[6] This sentiment, supported by the 300 participants representing a range of governments, international governmental and non-governmental organizations, and scientific communities, served to launch discussions about the national security implications of environmental change into the realm of public policy. By the late 2000s, climate change was beginning to figure in the national security and defense statements of several governments, along with reports from think tanks and intergovernmental organizations.[7]

Today, reference to climate change as a threat has become a mainstream part of political discourse in Canada. However, as the Throne Speech indicates, this threat remains unspecified – is it a security threat? A political threat? An economic threat? Scholars in Canada continue to press the government towards intentionally securitizing climate change; however, there has been no change in the government’s approach. [8] Wilfrid Greaves highlights this problem in his article “Climate Change and Security in Canada.”

Greaves’s article begins with a discussion of climate change and its implications for Canada. He argues that Canada will face a plethora of intersecting challenges and risks and questions the surprising lack of securitization of this issue in Canada’s recent history of security and defence policy. The remainder of the article seeks to make the case that climate change is a security threat to Canada.

The author discusses five security implications of climate change, starting with the human security implications for Canada. Using the definition of human security found in the 1994 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Human Development Report, Greaves argues that the implications for Canada are widespread but unevenly distributed across the country and will be exacerbated by “intersecting sociological factors” such as affluence, geography, and gender (187). The focus of this section is on the human security implications for the Canadian North and particularly on the effects of climate change for the health and well-being of the Indigenous populations that live there. Given the rapidity of change in the polar regions, this focus is unsurprising: there is an intense human vulnerability in Canada’s North caused by the interaction of the natural consequences of climate change and the difficult – even violent – social conditions experienced by many Indigenous communities because of historical government policies and their generational effects.[9]

Greaves groups the remaining four security implications of climate change separately under the banner of national security interests. He explains, “Each of these contributes to human insecurity but can also be understood as threatening the national security interests of the Canadian state” (189). They are economic threats, Arctic threats, humanitarian crises at home and abroad, and the threat of domestic conflict.

The economic threats to Canada are twofold: the financial and economic devastation caused by catastrophic weather events, and the existential threat to the Canadian oil and gas industry should the global turn towards decarbonization succeed. Neither of these threats should be taken lightly. It is clear from Greaves’s informative discussion of recent disasters, along with the recent (November 2021) catastrophic flooding in British Columbia, that billions of dollars in losses will need to be financed by the government. In addition, the threat to the oil industry is real, and intersects with another of Greaves’s four national security implications – that of domestic conflict. Should the government fail to find a successful compromise between climate policy and the economic livelihood of so many in Canada, the ramifications of this economic threat could well affect other areas of societal health.

Next, in addition to the human security impacts on Northern communities, Greaves highlights an additional Arctic concern of the “complex regional security environment” (194). It combines potential interstate competition with non-traditional threats like smuggling and terrorism and overlays it with occurring and expected environmental harm. This is directly due to the melting of the Arctic ice, and the opportunities it presents for political, military, and commercial exploitation.

The third threat is that of humanitarian crises both at home and abroad. There is an expectation that the Canadian Armed Forces will be available to assist the Canadian government in responding to domestic crises, not only those with direct links to climate change, but also those with indirect links such as the emergence of future viral pandemics. Greaves’s assessment implies the question of whether Canada will have the capacity to respond to global challenges if it continues to be occupied with crises at home. And, if Canada does not, which nation will?

The final threat is that of domestic conflict. While Greaves notes that as of yet there has not been overt conflict in Canada, “the contentious politics of climate and energy have become one of the key divisive dimensions of Canadian domestic politics” (196). These contentious politics pit indigenous and environmental activists against a surge of conservative populism that maintains climate policy as one of many motivating grievances. The concern is that this may progress into radicalization, fueling popular discontent amongst certain groups in Canada and leading to the adoption of violent tactics of protest.

Greaves concludes the article with a number of assertations about the importance of securitizing climate change in Canada, noting that both policy and cultural shifts are needed in order to make this happen. He notes the problem of ambivalence on this issue, amongst both the Canadian public and policymakers. Thus, he asks: “what will it take to generate a political response to the threats associated with climate change commensurate to their gravity?” (203).

Greaves’s article includes a very carefully researched review of the current (2021) security implications of climate change for Canada. His copious citations are of great use for scholars who work on the subject. In addition, his style of writing presents a clear and cohesive argument on why climate change presents a threat to the security of Canadians.

Several statements made in the article that exemplify its strengths. First, Greaves lists the effects of climate change already manifesting in Canada and notes that “effective mitigation is unlikely” (184). This profound statement is much more than introductory rhetoric. While the on-going pursuit of mitigation strategies are necessary, the point of this statement is to argue that – at this point – mitigation efforts cannot be the full extent of the policy response. Thus, if policy makers cannot, through mitigation strategies, stop the disastrous effects of climate change, what must they then consider and strategically prepare for? Greaves’s answer is that the government must recognize and act on threats to human and national security.

Next, Greaves provides a critique of the incoherence of government policy in a couple of important areas of policy development. The first regards the human security implications of climate change. The pursuit of human security as a global policy and practice defined Canadian diplomatic action for about a decade from the mid 1990s-2000s.[10] While today the term ‘human security’ is not used explicitly in government documents, the focus on human rights exhibited by Global Affairs Canada is filled with allusions to the ‘Freedom from Fear’ policy focus of the Liberal government of the early 2000s. [11] Yet, as Greaves notes, Canada has not chosen to apply human security as “a framework for domestic policy” or to use it as a lens through which to examine and apply climate change mitigation strategies (189). A second critique regards the conflicting policies of the Canadian government in trying to balance the urgency of mitigating climate change with the importance of the energy sector to Canada’s economy. He writes,

“given the state of knowledge about anthropogenic climate change, government pursuit of politics that knowingly contribute to climate change worsens conditions of present and future insecurity for their citizens and everyone else, and represents a pathological approach to security and the national interest that is inherently unsustainable” (203).

While this dualistic approach to policy reflects very real tensions within Canada, it is also a reflection of a government that does not seem to have a plan for reconciling these tensions. In fact, he calls this approach “pathological’ and ‘unsustainable” (203) – neither are words one would want to associate with security policy. These two critiques provide an example of the disconnect in current government policy towards climate change, which is arguably part of the reason for why the Canadian government has been unable or unwilling to attempt the difficult political process of securitizing climate change for Canadians.

Third, scattered throughout the article are suggestions of why the Canadian government lacks the ability to act on climate threats. For example, regarding the economic threats of climate change, Greaves remarks that “the unequal distribution of these effects across Canada makes a political response exceptionally challenging” (192). Additionally, in his concluding remarks, he writes that “[t]he political contestation around climate change in Canada precludes its effective securitization and an effective government response to it as a security issue” (203). There are structural and political reasons for government inaction on climate security.

Greaves’s point that “without substantial policy and cultural shifts, the country will continue to experience serious physical, political, and economic harms in the coming years” (201, my emphasis) is vital. The idea of a security ‘culture’ is enormously important for the discussion of securitization and may present an additional avenue for research into the lack of climate change securitization in Canada.[12] A further exploration of security culture combined with research into the political and structural challenges mentioned offers an excellent program for future research.

While overall this article provides a strong analysis of the security implications of climate change for Canada, there are some areas where further exploration would be helpful. First, while Greaves includes the classic UNDP definition of human security, there is otherwise no definition of what security is or why climate change as a security threat should be distinguished from climate change as a societal challenge. A clear definition of security would help to create a more compelling argument for why the securitization of climate change in the political realm needs to happen. Relatedly, there is no clear argument for who should be doing the securitization. Government leadership on this issue is taken for granted, and thus is the implied securitizing agent; however, there is also a place for Canada’s “security players” to play a role (185). Unfortunately, these players are left unspecified.

Second, Greaves highlights the tendency for Canadian politicians, when they do address the security implications of climate change, to “wrongly impl[y] that climate impacts only endanger the Canadian North or distant regions of the world” (185). While he is careful to base his analysis on a range of threats to Canada as a whole, he also devotes significant attention to the Arctic region, including almost the entire section on human security. The Canadian North is extremely vulnerable to climate change and there are significant human and national security concerns inherent in the region: thus, any discussion of climate security in Canada cannot ignore it. At the same time, it is clear that a focus on the Canadian North has not inspired the Canadian government to securitize climate change. Perhaps if it were focused on the threats posed to the majority of voters, the argument might find greater resonance in the halls of power.

Finally, Greaves writes: “It is worth noting that this empirical discussion reflects an updated assessment of climate impacts, but otherwise is not particularly new” (201). As indicated earlier, this ‘updated assessment’ is valuable for scholars of climate security and the state of security policy in Canada, and so is not itself a weakness. However, a decade ago it was clear that the Canadian government had little interest in securitizing climate change[13] and, according to Greaves’s article, this has not changed. Thus, the reader is left asking the same questions as Greaves: why has this not changed? Can it change? Under what conditions? To truly make progress in the fight to recognize climate change as a security threat to Canada and its people, it is time to focus on these questions and develop the knowledge necessary for producing change.

Greaves writes “This article responds to the call for scholars to reverse the academic marginalization of climate change within International Relations and security studies by directly engaging with the local, national, and international security implications of a climate-changed future” (186). His article achieves this goal, engaging well with the multiplicity of climate threats for Canadian human and national security. Indeed, Greaves highlights important considerations in his work and raises some vital questions for future research.

 

Leanne Smythe (Ph.D. University of British Columbia) is an Assistant Professor of Political Studies at Trinity Western University. She is co-author of the article “From Obscurity to Action: Why Canada must tackle the security dimensions of climate change,” International Journal 65:2 (2010) that is cited in both the original article and review.


Notes

[1] Canada, Governor General, “Building a resilient economy: a cleaner & healthier future for our kids, Speech from the throne opening the First Session of the 44th Parliament of Canada. Ottawa, Government of Canada, 23 November 2021, 14, https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/pco-bcp/images/pm/2021-sft/SFT_2021_EN_WEB.pdf accessed 10 December 2021

[2] Canada, Governor General, “Building a resilient economy,” 16 https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/pco-bcp/images/pm/2021-sft/SFT_2021_EN_WEB.pdf

[3] For a brief but excellent overview of the recent history of the evolution of the international environmental security debate, see Peter Hough, “Environmental Security” in International Security Studies: Theory and Practice, eds, Peter Hough, Andrew Moran, Bruce Pilbeam and Wendy Stokes (New York: Routledge, 2021), 207-220.

[4] Ronnie Lipschutz, ed., On Security, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995).

[5] Barry Buzan, Ole Waever and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis, (Colorado: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1997).

[6] Conference Statement, “The Changing Atmosphere: Implications for Global Security” (Toronto, Canada, 27-30 June 1988), 292. Retrieved from the archives of the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society, https://cmosarchives.ca/History/ChangingAtmosphere1988e.pdf

[7] This surge in global support for including climate change as a security threat was prompted by the release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s fourth assessment report in 2007. IPCC, Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. Contribution of Working Groups I, II, and III to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, eds., R.K. Pachauri and A. Reisinger, (IPCC, Geneva, Switzerland, 2007). For discussion of the significant reports from this era, see Margaret Purdy and Leanne Smythe, “From Obscurity to Action: Why Canada Must Tackle the Security Dimensions of Climate Change,” International Journal 65:2 (2010): 415-419.

[8] Aaron Shull and Wesley Wark, “Reimagining a Canadian National Security Strategy,” (Waterloo: Centre for International Governance Innovation, 2021), 8. In this report, climate change is grouped with four other major threats, including geopolitical disruption, pandemics, technological change and economic insecurity as the most pressing national security concerns for Canada.

[9] Shaugn Coggins and James D. Ford, et al., “Indigenous Peoples and Climate Justice in the Arctic,” Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, February 23, 2021 https://gjia.georgetown.edu/2021/02/23/indigenous-peoples-and-climate-justice-in-the-arctic/; H.P. Huntington, M. Carey, and C. Apok, et al., “Climate Change in Context: Putting People First in the Arctic,” Regional Environmental Change 19: 1217-1223 (2019) https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-019-01478-8For a more personal understanding of this situation, see Sheila Watt-Cloutier, The Right to be Cold: One Woman’s Fight to Protect the Arctic and Save the Planet from Climate Change, (University of Minnesota Press, 2018).

[10] For the initial discussion regarding human security as a foreign policy option for Canada, see Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Human Security: Safety for People in a Changing World, Ottawa: DFAIT, 1999. http://www.summit-americas.org/canada/humansecurity-english.htm accessed 10 December 2021.

[11] Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Freedom from Fear: Canada’s Foreign Policy Agenda for Human Security, Ottawa: DFAIT, 2002. https://gac.canadiana.ca/view/ooe.b3688185E/5?r=0&s=1 accessed 10 December 2021.

[12] Theories of strategic culture and securitization are both derived from constructivist explanations for national security priorities and seek to show that these priorities are changeable over time given certain societal political influences. For a greater discussion of strategic culture as it relates to national security policy, see Jeffrey S. Lantis, “Strategic Culture and National Security Policy,” International Studies Review 4:3 (December 2002): 87-113.

[13] See Margaret Purdy and Leanne Smythe, “From Obscurity to Action: Why Canada Must Tackle the Security Dimensions of Climate Change,” International Journal 65:2 (2010): 411-420.