The Ukraine crisis moves north. Is Arctic conflict spill-over driven by material interests?

Abstract

ABSTRACT. The Ukraine crisis has led to tensions between Russia and the western states and the Arctic is one of the affected regions. Regional cooperation, institutions, and international law are essential for Arctic governance, and the crisis may thus have wide-ranging consequences for high north politics. The present article develops an interest-based model of Arctic conflict spill-over and examines its strength, based on a case-study of the first 18 months of the Ukraine crisis. Three hypotheses for Arctic conflict spill-over are developed: Arctic conflict spill-over will be less severe than spill-over in other regions, the western states will be more assertive than Russia, and the smaller Arctic states will be less assertive than the larger states. A review of the crisis confirms the bulk of these hypotheses with some exceptions, thus demonstrating that an interests-based model holds some merit, while also showing that a complete understanding of Arctic conflict spill-over necessitates a broader approach. The article concludes that conflict spillover is unlikely, but not impossible, in the Arctic.

Visions of the Arctic Future: Blending Computational Text Analysis and Structured Futuring to Create Story‐Based Scenarios

“…There have been periods of peace and international cooperation, exemplified, for example, by the effectiveness of the Arctic Council (Young, 2010). Likewise, there have been profound periods of conflict (Keil, 2014; Rahbek‐Clemmensen, 2017; Young, 2011), as well as targeted violence toward Indigenous peoples (Crawford, 2014; Salusky et al., 2021).…”

The Arctic security region: misconceptions and contradictions

“…Over the past decade, scholars have produced more balanced depictions of the dynamics within the region as a whole and among the actors with stakes in the Arctic (e.g. Dodds & Nuttall, 2016;Greaves & Lackenbauer, 2016;Łuszczuk, 2016;Rahbek-Clemmensen, 2017;Tamnes & Offerdal, 2014).…”

“…Scholars have further gone on to highlight the cooperative features and the 'uniqueness' of the Arctic region's amicable cooperation, while relations between the same actors deteriorated elsewhere (Berkman & Young, 2009;Byers, 2017;Rahbek-Clemmensen, 2017). These views are still held, despite the post-2014 souring of relations with Russia (Keil & Knecht, 2016;Østhagen, 2016;Raspotnik, 2018).…”

“…In fact, ideas of the Arctic as an arena for political competition and rivalry are often juxtaposed with the view of the Arctic as a region of harmony and shared interests. Underpinning cooperation in the Arctic is a desire to ensure stable operating environments for extracting costly resources far away from their prospective markets, and the foreign ministries of the Arctic states repeatedly highlight cooperation (Heininen et al, 2020;Lavrov & Støre, 2010;Rahbek-Clemmensen, 2017). Scholars point to the different layers of Arctic cooperation and emphasize that the Artic has generally remained a zone of cooperation, even after the events in 2014 (Byers, 2017;Elgsaas, 2019;Keil & Knecht, 2016;Østhagen, 2016).…”

Introduction: the Arctic Council, Asian states and the global Arctic

“…And can the Arctic Council anticipate future problems and challenges? Arguably, Russia's intervention and annexation in Crimea/eastern Ukraine and worries about 'spill-over' effects contaminating the spirit and purpose of Arctic cooperation merely added further fuel to ongoing debates about a 'global Arctic' (Rahbek-Clemmensen, 2017).…”