Showing posts by Wilson Center Staff.
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Weekly Reading
›An article in Time magazine surveys the growing awareness of climate change’s links to traditional and nontraditional security threats.
“Unless some way can be found to stop the explosive rise in food prices generally, and rice prices in particular, we will see sharply higher mortality….This will not be mass starvation, with people dying in the streets, but it will be sharply higher infant and child mortality and weakened adults succumbing prematurely to infectious diseases,” said Peter Timmer, an expert on agriculture and development and a current Center for Global Development non-resident fellow, in an interview earlier this week.
A report on “How a Changing Climate Impacts Women,” a high-level meeting sponsored by Council of Women World Leaders, the Women’s Environment and Development Organization, and the Heinrich Böll Foundation North America, is now available online. Gro Harlem Bruntland and Mary Robinson, among other speakers, explained that women—who constitute the majority of the world’s poor—will be more vulnerable to many of climate change’s expected impacts, including reduced crop yields, the spread of infectious diseases, and increasingly frequent and severe natural disasters. -
Jeffrey Sachs’ Memo to the Next U.S. President
›April 22, 2008 // By Wilson Center StaffIn his keynote address at the 5th Annual Unite for Sight International Health Conference, held earlier this month, Jeffrey Sachs argued that world leaders must redouble their efforts to alleviate poverty, protect human and environmental health, and balance economic growth and sustainable development. He advocated many of the same solutions that appear in his new book, Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet, including increasing investment in sustainable technology research and development; hastening the diffusion of sustainable technologies to the poorer regions of the world; and allocating a smaller percentage of the national budget for military spending and instead achieving the international target of 0.7 percent of GNP for foreign aid.
One part of Sachs’ presentation that was not included in his book was a memo to the next U.S. president, consisting of ten objectives to achieve global sustainability. Included in this list were the following recommendations, which illustrate Sachs’ view that human health, the environment, economic growth, and security are all integrally linked:
- “Stop putting food into the gas tank.” Sachs spoke out against the current U.S. subsidies for converting corn into ethanol. He linked the initiative to the recent global increase in food prices and the resulting turmoil in areas such as Haiti and Burkina Faso.
- Create a global forum for the leaders of dry lands. Sachs argued that it is important for leaders of areas such as Senegal, Mali, Chad, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and California to discuss water scarcity, its impact on livelihoods, and strategies to ensure human security.
- Immediately send a U.S. envoy around the world to back climate change negotiations. Sachs emphasized the need for the United States to step up as a leader on curbing climate change and its environmental and social impacts, rather than stalling international cooperation and progress, as he believes the current administration has done.
- Increase U.S. funding for the UN Population Fund (UNFPA). Sachs disapproved of the U.S. government’s decision to decrease its financial support of the UNFPA, which he argued is instrumental in fueling the voluntary decline of fertility rates in less developed countries. He identified access to contraceptives and reproductive services, the empowerment of girls and women, and the promotion of maternal and child health as crucial strategies for slowing population growth and maintaining resource sustainability.
- Make the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) the heart of international development policy. Sachs noted that he had heard President Bush make reference to the MDGs only once during his two terms in office. He hoped the new administration’s approach to foreign relations and international aid would put a stronger emphasis on achieving the MDGs, which aim to increase health, stability, and prosperity worldwide.
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Weekly Reading
›Earlier this week, the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), a three-year effort sponsored by a number of UN organizations, released its final report (executive summary; summary for decision makers), which offers guidelines for improving the stability, sustainability, and equity of global food supply.
“Natural disasters significantly increase the risk of violent civil conflict both in the short and medium term, specifically in low- and middle-income countries that have intermediate to high levels of inequality, mixed political regimes, and sluggish economic growth,” argue Philip Nel and Marjolein Righarts in an article in International Studies Quarterly.
A special issue of Development focusing on water and development features articles from ECSP contributors Tony Turton who analyzes the impact of abandoned mines on South African water supplies, and Hope Herron, who proposes steps to increase the overall resilience of post-Katrina Louisiana’s coastal wetlands. -
Weekly Reading
›The theme of this year’s World Health Day, observed on April 7, was “Protecting Health From Climate Change.” This World Health Organization report outlines many of the links between climate change and human health.
Kenya’s post-election strife has decimated its once-thriving nature tourism industry, reports Reuters. The displacement of hundreds of thousands of people has driven up demand for bush meat, and in the absence of tourism revenues, reserves can no longer afford to pay rangers to protect the wildlife.
Per capita water availability in the Middle East and North Africa will be halved by 2050, estimates the World Bank, so it is critical for governments to address growing water scarcity now, including making agriculture—which accounts for 85 percent of total water use in the region—more water-efficient. -
Sexual and Gender-Based Violence in DRC Destroying Women, Families, Communities
›April 9, 2008 // By Wilson Center StaffThe Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo, a film about sexual and gender-based violence (GBV) in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), premiered yesterday on HBO. GBV is perhaps nowhere more prevalent than in the war-torn eastern provinces of the DRC, where untold numbers of women and girls—likely in the hundreds of thousands—have been raped, mutilated, and abused. GBV encompasses rape, sexual mutilation, and abduction into sexual slavery, and is often worsened by war and civil strife.
The Wilson Center’s Africa Program and Environmental Change and Security Program, in conjunction with Catholic Relief Services, recently hosted a discussion on GBV in the DRC. Kristin Kim Bart, a gender-based violence program officer at the International Rescue Committee, delivered a powerful presentation that outlined the nature and scope of the problem and offered suggestions for how to address it. She explained, “This rape is not about sexual desire—it is about the domination and decimation of the woman, her family, and entire community. And we have seen that it works as strategy of war again and again, and today in DRC.”
GBV can have severe health consequences, including traumatic fistula, severed limbs, transmission of HIV/AIDS and other diseases, and unwanted pregnancy, but “it is the social and psychological consequences of sexual violence that are sometimes the hardest to overcome,” said Kim Bart. “Survivors are stigmatized, shunned, rejected by their families and communities, and blamed for the violence they suffered.”
Despite this bleak picture, there is hope for women and girls who have suffered from GBV. NGOs like CARE and the International Rescue Committee have become increasingly active in providing health, psychological, and economic assistance to survivors, and governments and other donors have begun to make funding these services a higher priority. In addition, Senator Joe Biden (D-DE) and Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) recently introduced the International Violence Against Women Act, which would make the prevention of violence against women a key priority in U.S. foreign assistance.
“The silver lining of this is that conflict opens a door to address and discuss what is usually a totally taboo subject,” said Kim Bart in an email to the New Security Beat. “And with the proper resources and technical expertise, we see small changes resulting from our work over time. We have witnessed communities begin to recognize the violence women and girls are facing [and] local health professionals treating survivors with care and compassion.” -
Weekly Reading
›The Population Reference Bureau recently published several new resources on global family planning, including a data sheet on worldwide family planning and an article by James Gribble examining trends and patterns in family planning in West Africa. Gribble also recently co-authored an article on the successes and failures of Peru’s family planning policy, particularly among the poor.
An article published in Human Dimensions of Wildlife (subscription required) found that crop destruction by wildlife in three villages in northeastern Tanzania significantly reduced both food security and household income. The article recommends implementing several incentives—including microcredit for non-agricultural activities—for conservation.
A report from the Center for International and Strategic Studies’ Global Strategy Institute examines the future of water and energy in an increasingly urbanized Asia, with a particular focus on China.
The International Institute for Sustainable Development released a summary of the proceedings at the first African Water Week, which took place March 26-28, 2008. -
U.S. Military Must Respond to Climate Change’s Security Threats, Argues Air University Professor
›April 1, 2008 // By Wilson Center Staff“Africa is especially vulnerable to climate change, with many African states already suffering varying degrees of famine and food scarcity. Climatic changes could push these states toward failure and collapse,” writes John T. Ackerman in “Climate Change, National Security, and the Quadrennial Defense Review: Avoiding the Perfect Storm,” published in the Spring 2008 Strategic Studies Quarterly. Ackerman argues that climate change could cause a large-scale breakdown of natural ecosystems, which could destabilize or collapse weak, impoverished states. Terrorist organizations operate most effectively in weak or failed states, so it is clear that climate change poses serious traditional security threats, in addition to nontraditional ones.
Ackerman asserts that climate change could cause four varieties of security challenges: traditional, irregular, disruptive, and catastrophic.- Traditional challenges—which the U.S. military is currently best-equipped to address—include droughts, floods, and heat waves, which are set to increase in frequency and severity.
- Irregular challenges are nonlinear, and their timing or severity is therefore often unexpected. Examples include ocean acidification; mass migration due to environmental causes; and the unintended negative side-effects of geo-engineering schemes to mitigate climate change (such as installing 50,000 reflective mirrors above the atmosphere to deflect incoming sunlight).
- Disruptive challenges threaten or eliminate the United States’ and other developed countries’ advantages. Examples include famine, changes in water quality or quantity, and pandemic disease.
- Catastrophic challenges include melting ice caps, mass extinctions, and state failure. The archetypal catastrophic challenge among the U.S. traditional security community is terrorists’ use of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) against the United States. Ackerman believes a one-to-eight meter rise in sea level (resulting from the partial or complete melting of the polar ice caps) or a temperature rise exceeding 1.5 – 2.5 degrees Celsius (which could cause widespread plant and animal extinctions) could produce comparable harm to the United States as a WMD attack.
Taking a reasoned and critical eye to current U.S. military thinking, Ackerman urges the Department of Defense (DoD) to “embrace a broader conception of security that incorporates environmental and climate concerns, focuses on the long-term, and emphasizes sustainability.” He calls this broader conception “sustainable security.” More generally, he argues that “all activities using US instruments of power [must] be unified to create sustainable security by peacefully spreading democracy, encouraging economic cooperation, and leveraging the cooperative functions of international organizations.”
The DoD receives the largest share of the U.S. government’s budget and is the single largest U.S. consumer of energy—although less than 10 percent of the energy it uses is derived from renewable sources. With these realities in mind, Ackerman calls for the DoD to aggressively embrace environmentally sustainable technologies and practices. The DoD possesses enough purchasing power that its new commitment to long-term sustainability could jumpstart the production of environmentally responsible products in both global and domestic markets. “The DoD’s existing approach to the natural environment is shallow and unremarkable,” says Ackerman, mincing no words.
Ackerman also calls on the DoD to be attentive to issues of political and social equity. Many countries that could desperately use U.S. military assistance with infrastructure and basic services projects distrust the U.S. military’s motives. “In sum,” he concludes, “democracy, prosperity, and security cannot counter the long-term threat of climate change without environmental sustainability and social justice.” -
Weekly Reading
›The UN Security Council must take quick, decisive action on climate change, argue U.S. Representative Gregory Meeks (D-NY) and George Mason University’s Michael Shank in an op-ed in the Christian Science Monitor. “A concerted international strategy, on a par with the seriousness and scope of an UN Security Council resolution, is what’s needed to counter this climate crisis.”
The Environment for Development Initiative, a joint venture by U.S. NGO Resources for the Future and the Environmental Economics Unit at Göteborg University in Sweden, has released a set of discussion papers on environmental management in developing countries around the world. The papers highlight case studies from Kenya, Costa Rica, Ethiopia, and Indonesia.
“New Limits to Growth Revive Malthusian Fears,” published earlier this week in the Wall Street Journal, examines whether limited quantities of key resources—including arable land, fresh water, and oil—will curb the world’s growing prosperity. “The resource constraints foreseen by the Club of Rome are more evident today than at any time since the 1972 publication of the think tank’s famous book, ‘The Limits of Growth.’ Steady increases in the prices for oil, wheat, copper and other commodities—some of which have set record highs this month—are signs of a lasting shift in demand as yet unmatched by rising supply.”
