by Elizabeth Minor, Researcher at Article 36

This article is part of the Remote Control Warfare series, a collaboration with Remote Control, a project of the Network for Social Change hosted by Oxford Research Group.

Later this month, governments will meet in Geneva to discuss lethal autonomous weapons systems. Previous talks – and growing pressure from civil society –  have not yet galvanised governments into action. Meanwhile the development of these so-called “killer robots” is already being considered in military roadmaps. Their prohibition is therefore an increasingly urgent task.

From 13-17 April, governments will meet at the United Nations in Geneva to discuss autonomous weapons – also referred to as killer robots. The week-long meeting will be the second round of multilateral expert discussions on “lethal autonomous weapons systems” to take place within the framework of the United Nations’ Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW).

Urgent and coordinated international action is needed to prevent the development and use of fully autonomous weapons systems. Such systems would fundamentally challenge the relationship between human beings and the application of violent force, whether in armed conflict or in domestic law enforcement. Once activated and their mission defined, these systems would be able to select targets and carry out attacks on people or objects, without meaningful human control. As states with high-tech militaries such as China, Israel, Russia, South Korea, the UK, and the US continue to invest in aspects of increased autonomy in weapons systems technologies, consideration of this issue is increasingly urgent. Campaigners are calling on states to tackle this issue by developing a treaty that pre-emptively bans these weapons systems before they are put into operation, by which time it may be too late.

The issue

Weapons systems that do not permit the exercise of meaningful human control over individual attacks should be prohibited, due to the insurmountable ethical, humanitarian and legal concerns they raise. The governance of the use of force and the protection of individuals in conflict require control over the use of weapons and accountability and responsibility for their consequences. This principle, rather than any particular piece of technology or format of weapons delivery, is at the heart of the issue of autonomous weapons systems. Some have argued that fully autonomous weapons systems might reduce the risk of conflict or be able to better protect civilians. However, the focus must remain on these systems’ overall implications for the conduct of violence, rather than on a small range of hypothetical possibilities.

Tasks can be given to hardware and software systems. Responsibility for violence cannot. The process of rendering the world ‘machine-sensible’ reduces people to objects. This is an affront to human dignity. Computerised target-object matching such as shape detection, thermal imaging and radiation detection may enable the identification of objects such as military vehicles, though in complex and civilian-populated environments, not necessarily with accuracy. However, assessment of information about these objects and the surrounding environment, including the presence of protected persons such as civilians or wounded combatants, is also essential to uphold the principles that govern the launching of individual attacks under International Humanitarian Law. These are not quantitative rules, but considerations that require deliberative moral reasoning and contextual decision-making. As such, they could not be translated into software code. Based on the principle of humanity, they implicitly require human judgement and control over the process of decision-making in individual attacks.

Other concerns about the development of fully autonomous weapons systems include the dangers of proliferation among state and non-state actors, hacking, and the use of these systems in law enforcement or other situations outside of warfare.

A preemptive ban as a solution

Whilst the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots is calling on states to move with urgency towards negotiations on a treaty to outlaw fully autonomous weapons systems, previous talks in Geneva have not yet galvanised governments into action.

Some states have suggested that existing law is sufficient to tackle this issue. Existing international law, which was developed prior to any consideration of autonomous weapons systems, implicitly assumes that the application of force is governed by humans. This body of international law is now inadequate as a reliable barrier to the development and use of fully autonomous weapons systems. A pre-emptive ban through an international instrument would not only halt any progress on these systems amongst states parties, but would help to stigmatise development by others.

Some states have argued that this issue can be dealt with by conducting individual reviews of their weapons technologies to ensure they continue to uphold current international law. States are already obligated to do this however, and whilst it is important, it will not be sufficient in preventing the development of these systems internationally. A clear legal standard and norm needs to be set, and this is best done through new international treaty law.

A ban based around prohibiting systems that operate without meaningful human control over individual attacks should be the starting point in international discussions among states, and so the elaboration and agreement of the elements of this principle are required as a next step.

International response so far

To date, autonomous weapons have been raised at the Human Rights Council in 2013 and considered by governments in dedicated discussions held at expert meetings of the CCW in 2014. The UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Christof Heyns, called in 2013 for national moratoria to be imposed by all states on the “testing, production, assembly, transfer, acquisition, deployment and use” of these systems, until an internationally agreed framework on their future has been established. The CCW could be a possible venue for developing this, having previously produced a pre-emptive ban on blinding laser weapons. One should note, though, that previous attempts within the CCW to deliver the responses needed to certain weapons systems have occasionally failed, often hampered by operating under the consensus rule and a tendency to defer to military considerations rather than focus on humanitarian or ethical imperatives.

Promisingly, the need to ensure meaningful human control has already been a prominent feature of the debate at the CCW, with several states recognising the importance of this approach. In upcoming discussions, governments should elaborate their policies for maintaining meaningful human control over existing weapons systems in individual attacks. Such an exchange would advance consideration of how human control can be ensured over future systems. This would in turn help clarify what practices and potential systems must be prohibited and the standards that states must demonstrate that they are meeting in their conduct. Elements to consider could include the need for adequate information to be available to commanders using any weapons system, positive action from a human being in launching individual attacks, and ensuring accountability.

Few states have elaborated any policy on human control over weapons systems. Current US policy on autonomous weapons systems stresses that there should be “appropriate levels of human judgement over the use of force”, but does not define what these should be. The policy leaves the door open for the development of fully autonomous weapons systems, whilst recognising the harm they could cause to civilians. The UK government has stated that it has no intention to develop fully autonomous weapons and that “human control” over any weapons system must be ensured. However, it has not given sufficient elaboration of what exactly this means and how it will be ensured.

States may see different types of operating, supervising or overseeing systems to constitute acceptable control. Agreement between states on the concept of meaningful human control is therefore an important element of international progress on the issue of fully autonomous weapons systems.

Work by states on an international framework should be supported by input from civil society and draw on the views of a range of experts. Ultimately, negotiation processes will determine the definitions of key concepts. If discussions do not advance towards a binding framework within the CCW, a freestanding treaty process may be required, as was the case previously in the processes to outlaw both anti-personnel landmines and cluster munitions.

The upcoming meeting of experts at the CCW in April is unlikely to result in particular concrete actions due to the nature and format of the meeting. It could pave the way for a decision in November that states continue to discuss this issue in 2016 and put it on the agenda for the CCW’s 2016 Review Conference. At that point it could be flagged as a subject on which States Parties should develop a new binding protocol. No clear group to lead this process has yet emerged. So far Cuba, Ecuador, Egypt, the Holy See, and Pakistan have endorsed a pre-emptive ban on autonomous weapons systems. France secured consensus for the CCW mandate in 2013 that established its work on lethal autonomous weapons systems, and Germany will be chairing the upcoming meeting, with the aim of seeking consensus on further consideration of the subject. However, the development of fully autonomous weapons systems is already being considered in military roadmaps. This makes their prohibition an urgent task.

Elizabeth Minor (@elizabethminor3) is a Researcher at Article 36, and was previously Senior Research Officer at Every Casualty, and a Researcher for Iraq Body Count (IBC). 

Featured image: The UK’s Taranis stealth UAV. The Taranis exemplifies the move toward increased autonomy as it aims to strike distant targets “even on other continents”, although humans are currently expected to remain in the loop. Source: Flickr | QinetiQ

A new alliance between the Mexican security forces and citizen ‘self-defence’ groups in Michoacán state has brought some short term success in the fight against the Knights Templar cartel. But what will be the long-term consequences of legitimizing heavily armed vigilante groups in Mexico?

The Rise of Las Autodefensas

In the western Mexico state of Michoacán, federal security forces carried out their first joint operation with citizen “self-defense” groups in early February, marking a new phase in the state’s ongoing fight against organized crime. Since February 2013, these militias, made up of armed farmers, businessmen, ex-military, former gang members and others fed up with high levels of rape and extortion, have been capturing one town after another from a powerful cartel that the federal government has been unable to remove from its seat of power.

Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto initially condemned these militias, calling for them to put down their arms. But the groups, known as vigilantes or “self-defense” groups, say they have little choice given local governments’ failure to protect their communities from the Knights Templar (Caballeros Templarios) drug cartel due to incompetence and corruption.

Vigilantes have cropped up in about 13 states including Veracruz, Guerrero and, most prominently, Michoacán, a stronghold of the Knights Templar and an important economic hub between Mexico City and the Pacific coast. Aside from being a key agricultural exporter, the state has become a center for narcotrafficking, as precursor chemicals for crystal meth (methamphetamine hydrochloride) arrive from Asia, before being manufactured and shipped up to North American markets. Since May 2013, the government has been deploying thousands of soldiers and federal police forces to Michoacán to target the cartels, but the security situation has continued to deteriorate.

At the same time, the vigilantes, now estimated to number 20,000 fighters, have grown in size and popularity, and have posed quite the public relations quandary for the Mexican government. Peña Nieto’s administration has grappled between a) coordinating with the vigilante groups, which carries the risk of being accused of protecting paramilitaries, and ultimately admitting its own failure to protect its citizens, and b) fighting against them, which risks accusations of protecting the cartels while becoming locked in a three-way battle.

In mid-January the government sent soldiers to Michoacán to disarm the vigilantes, which led to violent clashes and citizen deaths. Due to a strong pushback, the government has since moved to legalize the self-defense groups, rolling them into security forces in hopes of overtaking the cartels. This decision has the potential to bring success against the Knights Templar, as the vigilantes are poised to put up a formidable fight.

Armed with an intimate knowledge of the terrain and high caliber weaponry, which fighters claim was purchased on the black market or confiscated from cartel members, vigilante groups have now taken over several municipalities across western Mexico and have developed a semi-military structure. They even have accountants to help manage the funding coming from wealthy ranchers and businessmen within Mexico, many of whom have been displaced because of the violence. Immigrant workers in the United States also fund the vigilantes; about 1 million people in California alone have family in Michoacán.

In late January the government signed an eight-point agreement with various self-defense groups that allowed them to become recognized as part of an existing community force under military control, known as the ‘Rural Defense Corps’. These little-known government-recognized volunteer militias have a history in Mexico, but have never reached this scale. The vigilantes must now submit a list of their fighters to the Defense Department and register their weapons.

A Dangerous Gamble

Many observers have heralded this decision as a pragmatic way to harness the movement’s momentum. But, as several analysts have noted, it is not without its risks and flaws. As InSight Crime noted, the groups’ mandate in the agreement is vague. It says the military will give the groups “all the means necessary for communications, operations and movement,” but does not say for which activities. The government has said the groups’ status is temporary, but has put no time limit on operations. Fighters must register their weapons, but it is unclear if this includes handguns, which Mexican citizens may already carry. The Mexican Congress will eventually need to clarify these items.

Latin America’s dark history with other government-sanctioned paramilitarism has also raised concerns about using this model. As one Guatemalan human rights activist warned: “the cure is going to turn out worse than the sickness.”

This has certainly been true in Colombia, where state-approved militias became the region’s largest paramilitary group (the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia or AUC), which went on to commit more human rights abuses than the leftist guerrillas they had risen up to fight. Ultimately it morphed into Latin America’s most powerful drug trafficking organization and developed strong ties to the government. Successor groups continue to traffic drugs, terrorize Colombians, and pose the greatest security threat to the government currently. Guatemala and Peru share experiences of state-backed paramilitaries that carried out human rights abuses, including mass killings, torture and kidnappings alongside those armies during their civil wars.

There are already signs the vigilantes are headed for a dangerous future. Some have been linked to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, a rival of the Knights Templar, an accusation they deny. Also worrying is that mining companies are now reportedly paying them protection fees to ward off drug cartel extortion. In Colombia, businesses looking to protect their economic interests provided much of the funding for the deadly paramilitaries, and in certain instances coordinated with the government to establish their own. The situation in Mexico has not reached these heights, but it is a cautionary tale.

Even the origins of the vigilantes and the Knights Templar are not wildly different. The cartel, started three years ago by remnants of the Familia Michoacana cartel, claimed to be protecting citizens and enjoyed a fair amount of public support before they turned to violent tactics, alienating much of their following. Today, the leader of the Knights Templar still describes the group as a ‘defender of communities,’ telling residents if it was not them there, it would just be another criminal group. While the vigilantes may stay on their intended path, the government should keep in mind the trajectory of previous “community defenders.”

What now?

Apart from creating more structure for these groups, the Mexican government will also need a plan for how to address the crimes they have already committed, and will likely commit going forward. While some of the vigilantes have technical fighting training, the majority has little or no human rights training. Given the Mexican armed forces extremely poor human rights record, this is another point of concern.

Locals are worried about what the future holds as the Mexican government scrambles to bring order to a lawless state overrun with various armed actors. The battles between the cartel and vigilantes have caused numerous deaths and upset commerce throughout Michoacán and Guerrero, but vigilante group leaders say they will continue to fight until the government captures key members of the Knights Templar.

The conflict in this region has already endured for almost a decade. It was Michoacán where former President Felipe Calderón first deployed the military marking the start of “The Mexican Drug War” in 2006. Since then the territory has fallen under the control of various organized crime groups that have battled their way to dominance. While some hope that this new level of coordination will eventually bring some peace, many are worried it will just usher in a new stage of the conflict.

Sarah Kinosian is a program associate for Latin America at the Center for International Policy, a nongovernmental organization based in Washington D.C. that promotes transparency and accountability in U.S. foreign policy and global relations. She works on their Just the Facts project, monitoring U.S. defense and security assistance to Latin America and the Caribbean.

The Anthropocene denotes the current geological age, in which human activity has had a significant impact on climate and the environment. The pressing issue of this epoch is whether the global consequences of these interactions between humans and the environment can be governed on a global scale.

The 1972 report to the Club of Rome on “The Limits to Growth” demonstrated the natural boundaries to human expansion which began in the Holocene era, following the end of the last glacial period around 12,000 years ago. The continued growth of human activities since the industrial revolution has become a driving force of reshaping the face of the planet into a new geological epoch, the “Anthropocene”, associated with multiple global consequences such as climate change, land degradation, resource scarcity and biodiversity loss. The Anthropocene is seen as a new geologic epoch in which humankind has emerged as a globally significant force capable of reshaping the face of the planet. The underlying human-environment interactions raise fundamental questions for global governance: Can nature be controlled and shaped on a global scale? Are human interventions a disturbing or regulating global force, avoiding or creating disasters? What are the limits of human expansion in the Anthropocene?

Human growth and complex crises

In the course of its history, the human population has been growing by increasing birth rates and lowering death rates, leading to the expansion of the human sphere in terms of capital, investments, income, technology, energy and resource flows, political power and violent forces of destruction. Despite Malthusian concerns about population growth causing scarcity of natural resources, intolerable pollution, mass starvation and other catastrophes, humans were able to overcome resource constraints and expand into new spaces through problem-solving capabilities, technical and social innovations that generated more wealth on a shrinking natural resource base. Continued pressure on natural resources and ecosystems challenge planetary boundaries in the Anthropocene, raising the question of whether a balance will be established by increased death rates or the reduction of birth rates. While the first pathway implies crisis, disaster and death, the second path may be associated with a sustainability transformation in demographic, economic and societal conditions within natural boundaries.

These pathways are part of the “complexity turn” in the Anthropocene which is characterized by globalized networks among people, markets and institutions, accelerated processes and flows in transportation and communication, and manifold micro-macro interactions between natural and social systems. While complex systems are often robust against disturbances in the core region of stability, on the edge of critical thresholds between stability and instability, small variations and uncertainties can make a big difference and decide whether systems break down or create new ones, as symbolized by the famous “butterfly effect” in chaos theory.

Beyond thresholds and tipping points chain reactions and risk cascades may be triggered which propagate in space and time and induce qualitative system changes. These include complex events such as natural disasters, stock market crashes, revolutions, mass exodus or violent conflicts. A world of ever growing complexity where responsibilities and solutions of crises are hidden behind smokescreens, may provoke over-simplifications, religious, populist and nationalist fundamentalisms, rhetoric against science and intellectuals, or resistance against globalized structures.

With the chaotic breakdown of the East-West conflict in 1989, actions of individuals and groups triggered a chain reaction that within weeks led to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the breakup of the Eastern Block. A new world (dis-)order emerged in which multiple crises interacted in fractal and fragile international landscapes that continue to be unstable and full of surprises (see van Creveld 1991, Kaldor 1998, Münkler 2005, Scheffran 2008). Numerous factors and actors are interrelated, involving national, subnational and transnational actors in complex networks, crises and conflicts. Tight couplings lead to cascading crises that spiral out of control, including September 11, global economic crises, the Arab Spring, the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and Syria, the civil war in Ukraine, the Greek debt crisis, the European refugee crisis and terror attacks in many countries. These events are interconnected through multiple channels that are often invisible.

Climate change as a risk multiplier

In this complex chain of crises, environmental change is connected with other problem areas through multiple linkages from local to global levels. More tipping points may emerge in the nexus of environmental degradation, climate change, poverty, and hunger which affect the living conditions in many parts of the world and could turn into severe security threats. Climate change is considered a risk multiplier, which disturbs the balance between natural and social systems and amplifies the consequences through complex impact chains. Among key pathways, climate change can affect the functioning of critical infrastructures and supply networks; intensify the nexus of water, energy and food; lead to production losses, price increases and financial crises in other regions through global markets; undermine human security, social living conditions and political stability; and induce or aggravate migration movements and conflict situations.

In the most affected regions the erosion of social order and state failure may trigger a spiral of corruption, crime and violence. Particularly critical is the situation in fragile and failing states with social fragmentation, weak governance structures and inadequate management capacities. Human insecurity and personal instability interacts with social and political instability. The impact of environmental change could undermine the ability to solve problems and further dissolve state structures, possibly leading to their collapse.

The Darfur conflict in Sudan has served as a prominent case where climate change is suggested as a threat multiplier in the complex nexus of population pressure, exploitation of land and forests, declining agricultural productivity, food insecurity, and the spread of diseases. While in some studies drought and desertification exacerbate the competition for resources between herders and sedentary farmers, others point to the long-term political roots of instability and violent conflicts, reinforced by national power games, regional struggles and global geopolitics that marginalized the Darfur region and fueled a spiral of violence.

Similarly, several authors found devastating droughts in the years before the Syrian rebellion that hit the main growing areas of the country and forced many people to move to the cities. These changes combined with many other conflict drivers rooted in the country’s economic, social and demographic conditions, political failures of the Assad regime as well as the events following the US invasion of 2003, the Arab Spring of 2011 and the emergence of the Islamic State which question the role of climate change as a dominant factor.

Limits to the Anthropocene

In this complex nexus of overlapping crises and interconnected problem areas, the world may continue on a slippery slope of escalation, running full speed into natural boundaries and their forces. The challenge is to anticipate and avoid risky pathways by counteracting forces that slow down and change course towards a more sustainable, peaceful and viable world which avoids dangerous pathways and interventions (such as risky climate engineering),  allowing for a timely and self-organized system transformation that takes the limits of the Anthropocene into consideration. These include finite natural resources and limits to growth; ethical, social, political and legal constraints; limits of scientific knowledge and uncertainty. In an increasingly interconnected world, stabilization of human–environment interactions under conditions of climate change needs an integrative and interdisciplinary understanding of human–environment interaction to assess destabilizing developments that threaten survival and adapt to changing circumstances to ensure their viability.

Social systems are not determined to aggravate crises situations but also have the ability to cope with problems like climate change and develop alternative pathways. To succeed, human responses and actions need to be timely and adequate compared to the speed, intensity and complexity of change. Concepts of anticipative and adaptive governance are needed to influence critical decision points and adjust actions along multiple causal chains to protect human security, strengthen societal resilience and sustainable livelihoods, and to develop collective adaptive strategies driving the planet through the complex and foggy landscapes of the future where information is limited and uncertain, but continuously updated. A lack of agreement on the underlying causes, on the risks to be expected and on the actions required is impeding progress.

Governing transformations to sustainable peace

Concepts of resilience, security, viability and sustainable peace can strengthen people’s social and economic capabilities in their effective, creative and collective efforts to handle the challenges of the Anthropocene. In a resilient social environment, actors are able to cope with and withstand the disturbances caused by climate change in a dynamic way that will enable them to preserve, rebuild, or transform their livelihood.

Sustainable development seeks to balance economic, social and ecological issues for present and future generations and integrate the human sphere (socio-sphere) into the boundaries of the natural environment (eco-sphere), making conflicting objectives compatible:

1. Sustain refers to preservation and upholding of natural resources as the life-enabling base of society and precondition for human existence.
2. Development means the unfolding of opportunities and abilities to improve human well-being and promote societal progress.

Peace rests on similar principles regarding the existence and development of human rights:

1. Preservation and protection of the existence, integrity and identity of each individual by excluding violence.
2. Self-fulfillment and unfolding of the individual through equal distribution of development opportunities.

Thus, upholding and unfolding of humans and nature are common principles of sustainable peace, which addresses both the negative interactions between armed conflict, environmental destruction and low levels of development (vicious cycle) as well as positive linkages between human development, environmental protection and peace-building (virtuous cycle).

In addition to preservation and development (upholding and unfolding), a third task includes the shaping of a viable world, aiming for its “conformation” to fit the current state into  a  proper  shape,  form  or  design,  creating a balanced relationship between the real and the desired world, between human society and nature. In the triangular relationship between sustainability, development and peace, upholding current abilities serves as a basis for unfolding enabling opportunities to facilitate the conformation of human–environment interaction pathways towards a viable world. This approach is compatible with the multi-level-perspective of socio-technical transformations that describe micro-macro transitions between regimes, niches and landscapes.

Key viability strategies, supporting a “new climate for peace”, include climate mitigation and adaptation; the building of networks, the cultivation of diversity, flexibility and justice; migrant networks that facilitate the exchange of knowledge, income and other resources; new capabilities to manage disasters; arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament; regional security concepts, crisis prevention, conflict resolution and confidence-building; as well as innovative institutional frameworks and legal mechanisms.

The 2015 Paris Agreement offers a first framework of opportunities through setting boundaries of global warming and national commitments of emission reductions as well as instruments for financial and technology transfer between industrial and developing countries. While the scope and effectiveness of these measures may not yet be sufficient to prevent dangerous climate change, they could lay the foundations and attract political support from local to global levels for a sustainable and peaceful transformation towards governing the Anthropocene.

Further readings by the author

Brauch, H.G., Scheffran, J. (2012) Climate Change, Human Security, and Violent Conflict in the Anthropocene. In: J. Scheffran, M. Brzoska, H.G. Brauch, P. M. Link, J. Schilling (Eds.) Climate Change, Human Security and Violent Conflict, Springer, 3-40.

Lüthje, C., Schäfer, M., Scheffran, J. (2011) Limits to the Anthropocene. What are the challenges and boundaries of science for the post-normal age? Geophysical Research Abstracts, 13, EGU2011-11795.

Maas, A., Scheffran, J. (2012) Climate Conflicts 2.0? Climate Engineering as Challenge for International Peace and Security, Special Issue, Security and Peace, 30(4): 193-200.

Scheffran, J. (2008) The complexity of security. Complexity 14(1): 13-21.

Scheffran, J., Brzoska, M., Kominek, J., Link, P.M., Schilling, J. (2012) Disentangling the Climate-conflict Nexus: Empirical and Theoretical Assessment of Vulnerabilities and Pathways, Review of European Studies, 4(5): 1-13.

Scheffran, J., Ide, T., Schilling, J. (2014) Violent climate or climate of violence? Concepts and relations with focus on Kenya and Sudan, The International Journal of Human Rights, 18 (3): 369-390.

Scheffran, J. (2015) Complexity and Stability in Human-Environment Interaction: The Transformation from Climate Risk Cascades to Viable Adaptive Networks. In: Kavalski (ed.), World Politics at the Edge of Chaos, 229-252.

Scheffran, J. (2016a): Der Vertrag von Paris: Klima am Wendepunkt?, WeltTrends, Nr. 112, 24(2): 4-9.

Scheffran J. (2016b) From a Climate of Complexity to Sustainable Peace: Viability Transformations and Adaptive Governance in the Anthropocene, in: Brauch et al. (ed.) Handbook on Sustainability Transition and Sustainable Peace, Springer, 305-346.

Jürgen Scheffran is professor in the Institute of Geography at the University of Hamburg and head of the Research Group Climate Change and Security (CLISEC) which is part of the Excellence Cluster Integrated Climate System Analysis and Prediction (CliSAP) and the Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability (CEN). After his PhD at Marburg University he worked in interdisciplinary research and teaching at Technical University Darmstadt, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, and the University of Illinois. His fields of interest include: climate change, resource conflicts and human migration; energy security and water-energy-food nexus; land use, rural-urban interactions and river-coastal regions under sea-level change; governance in the Anthropocene (mitigation, adaptation, climate engineering, sustainability transition); technology assessment, arms control and international security; mixed methods in complex systems research (agent-based modelling, social network analysis, field research). He was a Visiting Professor at the University of Paris (Sorbonne), consultant to the United Nations, the Technology Assessment Office of the German Parliament, the Federal Environmental Agency, and the German delegation to the climate negotiations.

 

There is no region of the world that faces more threats from climate change than South Asia. Of particular concern is the littoral surrounding the Bay of Bengal, including the Eastern Indian states of West Bengal and Odisha, Bangladesh, and coastal Burma. This region is uniquely vulnerable to a changing climate because of a combination of rising sea levels, changing weather patterns, and uncertain transboundary river flows. Away from the seashore, China holds the high ground in the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalayas, and complicates the geopolitical picture further by acting as the source of the region’s fresh water.

On the Bay of Bengal’s coast these problems of a changing climate combine with already existing social problems like religious strife, poverty, political uncertainty, high population density, and rapid urbanization to create a very dangerous cocktail of already security threats. Climate change has been called a “threat multiplier” or “an accelerant of instability” by military and intelligence communities because of how it will impact these already existing threats. With a population of more than 300 million people (91 million in West Bengal, 42 million in Odisha, 142 million in Bangladesh, 52 million in Burma), tense militarized borders, overlapping ethnic and religious communities, and uncertainty about the future, there is no region in the world that faces a more dangerous combination of threatsfrom climate change than here.

Rising Sea Levels

One of the key tenets of national security is the ability of a country to ensure the integrity of its sovereign territory. Yet, as glaciers far from South Asia melt, the sea rises and encroaches upon its farms, villages, and cities. As Hemingway wrote about going bankrupt, sea level rise happens “gradually, then suddenly.” Slowly, a rising ocean brings increasing intrusion of brackish water into groundwater, harming costal agriculture. Moreover, gradual ocean encroachment harms the coast’s natural protections, whether dunes, reefs, barrier islands, or mangrove forests. Then, suddenly, when a major cyclone blows in a storm surge will overcome previously unsurmountable barriers.

The shorelines of the Bay of Bengal stand to lose swaths of territory from sea level rise. Bangladesh, as a country predominantly composed of river delta, is most at risk. It stands to lose 11% of its territory – home to 15 million people – from a sea level rise of only 1 meter, a level that is not a particularly extreme prediction over the next 4 decades. Few invading armies could do worse damage.

Oddly enough, the world’s oceans do not rise at the same rate. With rising global sea levels, in some areas the sea level could actually fall while it rises in others. A recent study from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) found that sea level rise will be particularly high along the Bay of Bengal, due to changes in currents caused by rapid surface warming of the Indian Ocean.

In the region, the cities of Dhaka, Kolkata, and Yangon all lie in major river deltas and are vulnerable to storm surges. In its 2007 report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) specifically listed cities in Asian mega deltas as “hotspots for vulnerability” because of sea level rise and changing patterns of river flow. Already straining at their infrastructure limits, these densely packed cities are becoming more vulnerable in a warming world.

Changing Transboundary Water Flow

Water does not stay within lines on a map. Instead, gravity draws it inexorably from the mountains to the sea. China, through its control of Tibet, controls the headwaters of almost all of the major rivers of Asia – only the Ganges lies outside of China’s control, originating in India. Of the major rivers that empty into the Bay of Bengal, all cross borders. Water is only plentiful during the monsoon season, so these rivers provide much-needed sustenance to agriculture, people, and ecosystems throughout their trip to the sea during the dry season – when they are fed by glacier and snow melt. Competition and tension over that flow is evident around the world when water crosses borders.

This is true of Bangladesh and India, for which the flow of the Ganges are a source of tension. The Farakka Barrage on the Ganges River, just 10 miles upriver from the Bangladesh border, allows India a measure of control over the river. The dam allows India to divert the flow of the Ganges down a canal to the Hooghly River and into the port of Kolkata. Since the dam was built in 1975, there have been allegations from Bangladesh that India diverts water in the dry season and releases too much in the monsoon season. In 1996, the two countries agreed to a 30 year treaty to share the Ganges’ flow, but tensions still remain.

The Brahmaputra River, meanwhile, provides a source of tension between the two regional powers, India and China. China recently announced that they are building a series of hydroelectric dams along the Brahmaputra’s upper reaches in Tibet, but they have forsworn any attempt to divert or hold back the great river’s flow. However, these assurances have not quieted all voices in India, who point to plans in China’s South-North Water Diversion Project to divert water from the Brahmaputra in order to ensure water for industry and the cities of China’s parched north. China’s leaders have denied these extravagant plans, but their engineers have lobbied for such a project. It would complete a dream of Chairman Mao’s, who said: “Southern water is plentiful, northern water scarce. If at all possible, borrowing some water would be good.”

Climate change exacerbates these concerns about transboundary water management in the region. Climate change is threatening both the glaciers that sit at the top of these mighty rivers, feeding them during the dry season, and the very viability and predictability of the Indian Monsoon rains. Temperatures in the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalayas have risen 1.5 degrees Celsius since 1982, a rate more than three times as fast as the global average. Meanwhile, changes in weather patterns due to climate change could cause repeated failures in the monsoon. While there is little likelihood of an immediate and total melting of the glaciers, uncertainty about their future flows is enough to stoke tension in the region.

The Potential for Conflict

Climate change is altering the environment of the region; the glaciers are retreating, the rivers’ flows are becoming more unpredictable, and the seas are rising. However, whether those changes manifest themselves into either civil or interstate conflict will depend upon how both the populations and the governments in the region react to those changes. How long governments have to adapt depends upon unpredictable weather and climate patterns – but as the Stern Review bore out, earlier action is almost always cheaper and more effective than waiting. How governments adapt is important as whether; some adaptations, like capturing water that would otherwise flow across borders in new reservoirs could actually make the threat of conflict worse. If countries do not work cooperatively, they could stoke conflict.

Throughout history, one of the most effective ways to deal with climate change has been migration – from a climate that is no longer hospitable to one where living is easier. However, modern borders do not reflect the historical ties between the regions. Migration is a natural response. However, in areas with already high population density and an overlapping patchwork of ethnic and religious communities, new immigrant communities often come into direct conflict with established communities. Last year saw ethnic strife in the Indian state of Assam between indigenous Bodos and immigrant Muslims, many of whom hailed from over the nearby border in Bangladesh. Over 75 people died, and over 400,000 people were temporarily displaced. In this region, it is impossible to say whether a group of migrants are “climate refugees” or simply moving to a place with better economic opportunity, but this is what we should expect in the future.

It is difficult to find examples of any interstate wars fought directly over water; to the contrary, water has been a catalyzer of cooperation. However, as countries realize that they can control and shape water flow through mega dams and water diversion projects, there is a danger that the claims of downstream countries could be ignored. Along the Mekong River, for example, China has proceeded to dam and control the river’s flow through its territory – leading downstream neighbors to complain that China is causing droughts. Yet because of the power imbalance between China and smaller countries like Laos and Cambodia, the Chinese have little to fear. Similar thinking by Chinese leadership over dam building along the Brahmaputra, their shared river with India, could lead both countries to stumble into a conflict that neither of them want.

In the age of climate change, conflict is more likely as threats are multiplied. Nowhere is this truer than around the Bay of Bengal. However, war is never pre-ordained. Instead, the threat of conflict is determined by how countries react. Good international governance can encourage countries to not simply pull up the drawbridge and think only of themselves, but will encourage them to see what their actions will mean for regional neighbors. Climate change is increasing the threat of wars and unrest around the Bay of Bengal; but foresight about its impacts can help the region’s leaders work together to solve a problem that knows no boundaries.

Andrew Holland is Senior Fellow for Energy and Climate at American Security Project, a Washington D.C based think tank. He is an expert on energy, climate change, and infrastructure policy. He has over seven years of experience working at the center of debates about how to achieve sustainable energy security and how to effectively address climate change.

Image source: amioascension

The Somali fishermen’s registration programme was lauched to help Somalia’s fisheries management and to secure its waters against piracy. Though commendable, the programme has yielded serious problems.

Following the end of the civil war, the fisheries sector re-emerged as an important economic activity in Somalia, evidenced by the increase in the number of artisanal fishermen operating in the Puntland, Galmudug, and Somaliland regions. The exact number of these fishermen is unknown since neither the respective Ministries of Fisheries nor the District Fishing Associations register Somalis who fish. The lack of information on the number of fishermen, fishing fleet, services, the state of marine resources, and landings reduces the ability of decision makers to make informed decisions regarding the establishment of a robust fisheries management structure in Somalia.

In support of the various Ministries, the United Nations Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO) is involved in projects to improve the understanding of Somalia’s fisheries sector. One of these activities is the development of a biometrics-based, artisanal fishermen -specific, registration system (Biometric Information Technology System or BITS) for the Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources in Puntland, Galmudug, and Somaliland.

The data collected using BITS is expected to help formulate a more nuanced understanding of fishermen livelihoods in Somalia—which is necessary for effective fisheries management at the regional and national levels. The information can also prove useful for the government and international naval forces in the attempt to secure Somali waters against piracy and enable legitimate fishermen to operate more freely at sea.

Piracy and Somalia

Somali piracy and illegal, unreported, and underreported (IUU) fishing are two issues that have long been entangled in rhetoric and practice. According to the grand narrative of Somali piracy, without a government to police the coastline or prosecute offenders, Somali waters and resources were vulnerable to foreign illegal fishers. In order to protect their livelihoods, Somali fishermen took up arms against the illegal fishers as a form of retribution and/or taxation for plundering their fish and natural resources (see also Hansen, 2011; Bueger, 2013; Gilmer 2016).

More than a decade after the perceived beginnings of Somali piracy, the grand narrative is still invoked by pirates and members of the Somali public. As artisanal fishermen, pirates, and foreign illegal fishers continue to operate within the same vast maritime spaces, inevitably, accusations of mistaken arrests began to emerge. Coastal communities claimed their fishermen were being picked up by foreign navies. Piracy prisoners held in foreign prisons maintained they were innocent fishermen who were mistaken as pirates. These stories not only raised questions of possible injustices, but they also spotlighted the issue that other than the members of Somalia’s coastal communities and local fishing organizations, no one could say for certain (or prove) who was or was not a pirate/fishermen/illegal fisher.

Establishing a system for identifying Somalia’s maritime community, and sharing that information with international naval forces, was imagined as a starting point for more objective monitoring of Somalia’s waters (i.e., protecting against further potential injustices).

The Somalia fishermen’s registration programme

From 2013 to 2015, FAO utilized the BITS while conducting the Somalia fishermen’s registration programme (hereinafter referred to as the registration programme). The program is/was funded by the Trust Fund to Support the Initiatives of States to Counter Piracy off the Coast of Somalia of The Contact Group on Piracy off the Coast of Somalia (CGPCS). Collectively, the registration program consisted of three Trust Fund to Support Initiatives of States to Counter Piracy off the Coast of Somalia projects: Project #55 Fishermen Identification Database System; Project #69 Galmudug and Jubbaland Fishermen Fleet Registration; Project #70 “Somaliland” Fishermen and Fleet Registration.

Via field officers, the Ministries collected basic information about more than 5,000 fishermen from all associations within Puntland, Galmudug, and Somaliland during face-to-face structured interviews. This data was entered into a database held by the Ministries. In 2016, a data analysis workshop was conducted in Bossaso, Somalia to “ground truth” the collected data and to discuss the overall successes and challenges of the registration program. Discussions revealed how the registration program became part of a broader struggle over the power to (re)construct the identities of people, labor niches, and maritime spaces of Somalia.

The registration programme helped shift the site for identifying legitimate fishermen from at sea to onshore in Somalia at the various fishing landing sites where the registration exercises took place. Consequently, landing sites became the new key political sites in the struggle to define and identify legitimate fishermen. More specifically, the process of submitting/entering an individual’s data into the BITS was overseen by the heads of the local fishing associations.

By discouraging the field officers from registering the data of pastoralists and pirates, the heads of the local fishing associations helped create a new group of maritime “others”. These “others” are considered potential criminals (i.e., pirates or illegal fishers) nand will not be afforded the same freedoms of mobilities at sea as legitimate fishermen. Indeed, by not having their data registered, these individuals were also rendered ineligible for future development programming geared towards registered fishermen.

The data linked to those labeled legitimate fishermen is used to design future fisheries sector development programming. Those labeled legitimate fishermen become a target group for future FAO- or other agency-facilitated fisheries development projects. Maritime others, however, are left out of this development target group. As a result, the heads of the local fishing associations not only reshaped future development to exclude pirates (former or current) and pastoralists, but they may also have contributed to a future increase in piracy activity by pushing certain maritime “others” back out to sea without the occupational legitimacy/protections provided by a fishermen identification card (See Gilmer, 2017).

Because who they are and what they are doing in maritime space remains an unknown, they must remain under the watchful eye of law enforcement. Although some individuals do, indeed, return to the sea with the intent to commit crimes, most do not. Thus, this reveals the paradox that the programme that set out to simultaneously develop and decriminalize Somali fishermen has only effectively displaced the criminalization onto a more specific maritime population of Somalis.

Beyond the politics of submitting/entering data, the process of distributing fishermen identification cards also played an important role in reshaping future geographies of development and mobilizing certain bodies. In Puntland, government officials utilized the distribution of fishermen identification cards as leverage to bargain with FAO representatives for future planning meetings in Somalia. By securing these future planning meetings, Puntland officials were also able to secure future patronage in exchange for all-expenses-paid trips for the heads of the local fishing associations.

The future planning meetings were also relocated from the coastline to the inland city of Garowe to maximize the FAO-provided daily service allowance each attendee (i.e., head of the local fishing association) would receive. However, moving the meetings away from the coastline greatly diminishes the likelihood that fishermen will be able to participate in any of the meetings. Thus, the fishermen and their respective communities remain on the margins of development planning for Somalia’s fisheries sector.

Conclusion

The Somali fishermen registration programme is commendable in that it is the first cross-regional attempt to collect data on Somalia’s artisanal fishermen and fishing livelihoods since prior to the Somalia civil war. FAO will continue to support the Ministries but the expectation at this point is that the Ministries continue to register fishermen and collect basic information. Furthermore, FAO in partnership with the Ministries, will roll out additional information systems, such as the landing site and sale system, and vessel registration system.

These initiatives will add to the information gained from the Somalia fishermen’s registration program and continue to develop the knowledge of the fishing sector in Puntland, Galmudug, and Somaliland. However, it is also imperative to analyze the processes involved in these data collection projects to understand the politics of identity as they play out at various sites. These politics and local struggles play a key role in shaping the institutionalization of Somalia’s maritime identities and broader access to future fisheries development aid.

Brittany Gilmer is an assistant professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at Florida International University