Change We Can Fight For? The Role of the Military in Addressing Climate-Related Security Risks in Peace Operations
art by Ed Oner (Morocco)
Dr. Louise van Schaik (Clingendael Institute); Dr. Beatrice Mosello (adelphi); Dr. Maria-Gabriela Manea (Center for Security Sector Governance, DCAF)
Integrating “climate-security practices” into multilateral peace operations can galvanize exceptional action in this area, despite mounting controversy regarding the role of the military in addressing climate- related security risks.
Context
Climate change is one of the defining challenges of the 21st century, straining the natural environment with far-reaching implications for sustainable development, peace, and security. Climate change can affect livelihoods, socio-political dynamics, and community resilience, exacerbating security risks or contributing to new security challenges that require political action beyond the environmental and climate sectors.[i] Many countries that are highly vulnerable to climate change are also affected by violence and instability; most UN peace missions take place in countries and regions beset by a warming climate, environmental degradation, and scarcity of vital natural resources, such as water.[ii]
In the last two decades, militaries have begun considering the impact of climate change on their own activities and, in some cases, taking steps to limit their ecological footprint. However, it is only recently that climate-related security risks have made it into the strategic planning of multilateral organizations involved in peacebuilding operations. In 2018, the UN Assistance Mission in Somalia (UNSOM) was among one of the first UN peacebuilding missions mandated to report on climate-related security risks and deploy appropriate risk management strategies.[iii] With the support of the German Federal Foreign Office, UNSOM is also hosting the first UN climate and security expert within the framework of a UN peace mission.[iv]
Climate change will aggravate the complex and highly political field of conflict prevention and peacebuilding. But framing climate change as a security issue could galvanize exceptional action in this area, creating opportunities for cooperation on environmental and climate-resilient activities on the ground. This joint contribution responds to such new policy needs by proposing relevant climate-security practices,[v] through which military forces deployed in peace operations may foster environmental peacebuilding.
What’s been done
As awareness of climate-related security risks increases, so do initiatives to address them as part of conflict prevention and sustaining peace efforts. At the multilateral level, the UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs established a Climate Security Mechanism together with UNDP and UNEP in 2018 “to address climate-related security risks more systematically.”[vi] The EU’s “Climate Change and Defense Roadmap” placed climate and environmental considerations under the mandate of the EU’s Common Security and Defense Policy.[vii] Equally, NATO has recently adopted a climate change security strategy to increase its understanding and ability to adapt and mitigate climate-related security risks.[viii]
Further initiatives to create synergies between climate change and security interventions to promote environmental peacebuilding exist at state, intergovernmental, and non-state levels, as documented by the Planetary Security Initiative on Climate Security Practices.[ix] Practices associated with the good governance of local security sectors[x] were found conducive to conflict prevention and sustainable peace,[xi] and security sector reform[xii] has become a central part of the UN peacebuilding architecture.[xiii] Therefore, Security Sector Governance and Reform (SSG/R) can also provide a framework for integrating climate-related security risks in security strategies and policies in a democratic and accountable way, ensuring the ownership of local actors and preventing the securitization of climate change. If security sector institutions fail to meet local security needs and lack legitimacy in the community, they most likely won’t be able to mitigate climate-related security risks. To be inclusive, people-centred, and context-specific in their climate-related security actions, local security sectors and military missions must be aware of local customs and practices; they must also engage in multi-stakeholder dialogues. To counter the risks of securitizing climate change, there is also a need to develop appropriate “climate-security practices” in dialogue with local actors and other policy communities.
Looking ahead
Multilateral organizations and states (sending and hosting peace operations) can take the following steps to further integrate climate-security practices into multilateral peace operations:
· Integrate climate-sensitive conflict analysis in all phases of peace operations and related policy frameworks and share this—especially the entry points for environmental peacebuilding—with colleagues from humanitarian, development, and climate sectors.
· Prepare and commit deployed militaries (and their sending states) to deal with these challenges and contribute to their mitigation through specific peacebuilding activities tailored for each local context.
· Allocate resources for climate-related activities.
· Ensure that deployed militaries operate under a framework of good SSG and are under firm democratic control when dealing with climate-related security risks, to avoid the risk of securitizing climate change responses.[xiv]
Deployed militaries should:
· Be informed about context-specific climate-related security risks.
· Have the professional skills, equipment, training, and management capacity to fulfil their missions without aggravating local climate-related security risks.[xv]
· Not exacerbate environmental degradation.
· Strengthen both capacity and democratic governance of local security sectors in general, and in regard to climate-related security risks.
· Increase the resilience of affected communities to climate and environmental pressure beyond the duration of the peacebuilding intervention.
· Follow an integrated approach that jointly focuses on building peace and climate resilience.
Both should:
· Work in close collaboration with host governments, civil society, and the humanitarian, development, security, and climate communities to ensure risks and needs are adequately identified and addressed, and that there is no duplication of work and better knowledge transfer.
· Undertake climate security risk assessments of both immediate and longer-term climate change impacts that are reflective of the perspectives of different groups and individuals.[xvi]
· Support local actors’ efforts to prevent and address climate-related security risks by providing a safer operating environment.[xvii]
[i] Mosello, B., König, C., Day, A. and Nagarajan, C. (2021) Addressing Climate-related Security Risks: Towards a Programme for Action adelphi: Berlin. (https://www.adelphi.de/en/publication/addressing-climate-related-security-risks-towards-programme-action)
[ii] UNDPPA, UNDP and UNEP (2020) Thematic paper on climate security – SG`s report on sustaining peace, The United Nations System: New York & Nairobi. (https://www.un.org/peacebuilding/sites/www.un.org.peacebuilding/files/200326_thematic_paper_on_climate_security_v2_4.pdf)
[iii] Eklöw, K. and F. Krampe (2019) ‘Climate-related security risks and peacebuilding in Somalia’, SIPRI Policy Paper No. 53, SIPRI: Stockholm. (https://www.sipri.org/sites/default/files/2019-10/sipripp53_2.pdf)
[iv] Romita, P. et al. (2021) ‘The UN Security Council and Climate Change’, Research Report, No. 2, The Security Council Report (SCR): New York. (https://www.securitycouncilreport.org/atf/cf/%7B65BFCF9B-6D27-4E9C-8CD3-CF6E4FF96FF9%7D/climate_security_2021.pdf)
[v] Lossow, v. T., Schrijver, A., Kroon, v.d.M., Schaik, v.L. and Meester, J. (2021) Towards a better understanding of climate security practices, Planetary Security Initiative, Clingendael Institute: The Hague. (https://www.planetarysecurityinitiative.org/sites/default/files/2021-04/PSI-2021_Climate-Security-Practices_final.pdf) Accordingly, climate-security practices are defined as tangible actions implemented by a (local or central) government, organization, community, private actor or individual to help prevent, reduce, mitigate or adapt (to) security risks and threats related to impacts of climate change and related environmental degradation, as well as subsequent policies. They operationalize climate security objectives, from either institutional or non-governmental standpoint and are activities implemented on the ground.
[vi] UNDPPA, UNDP & UNEP (2020) ‘Climate Security Mechanism Toolbox’, Briefing Note, The United Nations System: New York & Nairobi
[vii] EEAS (2020) Climate Change and Defence Roadmap, European External Action Service: Brussels. (https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-12741-2020-INIT/en/pdf)
[viii] Sikorsky, E. and Goodman, S. (2021) A Climate Security Plan for NATO: Collective Defence for the 21st Century. UNDRR: Geneva. (https://www.preventionweb.net/news/climate-security-plan-nato-collective-defence-21st-century)
[ix] See the website of the Planetary Security Initiative on Climate Security Practices. (https://www.planetarysecurityinitiative.org/climate-security-practices)
[x] DCAF (2015) ‘Security Sector Governance’, SSR Backgrounder Series, DCAF-Geneva Center for Security Sector Governance: Geneva. (https://www.dcaf.ch/sites/default/files/publications/documents/DCAF_BG_1_Security%20Sector%20Governance_0.pdf)
Accordingly, good SSG is a normative standard of security provision, based on accountability and democratic oversight, and principles of transparency, respect for human rights norms, participation and inclusiveness.
[xi] UNSSRU (2012) ‘Sustainable Peace Through Justice and Security’, UNSSR Perspective, The United Nations Security Sector Reform Unit: New York. (https://peacekeeping.un.org/sites/default/files/ssr_perspective_2012.pdf#:~:text=SSR%20is%20not%20palliative%20or%20short-term.%20It%20is,the%20foundations%20of%20long-term%20peace%20and%20development.%20)
[xii] DCAF (2015) ‘Security Sector Reform’, SSR Backgrounder Series, DCAF – Geneva Center for Security Sector Governance: Geneva. (https://www.dcaf.ch/sites/default/files/publications/documents/DCAF_BG_2_Security%20Sector%20Reform_1.pdf)
Accordingly, SSR is the political and technical process of improving state and human security by applying the principles of good governance to the security sector.
[xiii] The United Nations Security Council`s Resolutions 2553/2020 (https://undocs.org/S/RES/2553(2020)) & 2151/2014 (https://undocs.org/en/S/RES/2151(2014)); and UNPSO (2012) Thematic Review of Security Sector Reform (SSR) to Peacebuilding and the Role of the Peacebuilding Fund, United Nations Peacebuilding Support Office: New York. https://www.un.org/peacebuilding/sites/www.un.org.peacebuilding/files/documents/ssr2_web.pdf
[xiv] Manea, M.G. (2021) ‘The Security Sector and Climate Change’, Geneva Global Policy Briefs, No. 2, Centre D`Ètudes Juridiques Européennes (CEJE) - University of Geneva: Geneva (https://www.ceje.ch/files/5116/1960/0577/University_of_Geneva_-_GGPB_N2-2021_-_M.-G._Manea.pdf).
[xv]DCAF (2015) ‘The Armed Forces’, SSR Backgrounder Series, DCAF-Geneva Center for Security Sector Governance: Geneva (https://www.dcaf.ch/sites/default/files/publications/documents/DCAF_BG_10_The%20Armed%20Forces.pdf)
[xvi] Mosello, B., König, C., Day, A. and Nagarajan, C. (2021) Addressing Climate-related Security Risks: Towards a Programme for Action, adelphi: Berlin. (https://www.adelphi.de/en/publication/addressing-climate-related-security-risks-towards-programme-action)
[xvii] Lossow, v. T., Schrijver, A., Kroon, v.d.M., Schaik, v.L. and Meester, J. (2021) Towards a better understanding of climate security practices, Planetary Security Initiative, Clingendael Institute: The Hague. (https://www.planetarysecurityinitiative.org/sites/default/files/2021-04/PSI-2021_Climate-Security-Practices_final.pdf)