Contesting the Arctic: Politics and Imaginaries in the Circumpolar North

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As climate change makes the Arctic a region of key political interest, so questions of sovereignty are once more drawing international attention. The promise of new sources of mineral wealth and energy, and of new transportation routes, has seen countries expand their sovereignty claims. Increasingly, interested parties from both within and beyond the region, including states, indigenous groups, corporate organizations, and NGOs and are pursuing their visions for the Arctic. What form of political organization should prevail Contesting the Arctic provides a map of potential governance options for the Arctic and addresses and evaluates the ways in which Arctic stakeholders throughout the region are seeking to pursue them.

Reviews

"Contesting the Arctic is a sophisticated analysis of how contemporary discourses and performances are caught up in older colonial and Cold War legacies of knowledge production and geopolitics. It is a reminder to us all that we need to be ever vigilant in terms of how vast and complex spaces such as the 'Arctic' are constituted and reproduced in political and popular cultures. As global attention grows towards the Arctic, this book reminds us that the Arctic is also a homeland and not an 'empty space' to be scrambled over." - Klaus Dodds, Professor of Geopolitics, Royal Holloway, University of London; "Contesting the Arctic is one of the most significant recent works of Arctic scholarship...By presenting and assessing how hundreds of individuals involved in Arctic policy formulation perceive the region, the book gives readers unparalleled insight into its current state and future...The work is a must-read for those interested in the High North and international affairs generally." - Foreign Affairs;

Author Bio

Philip E. Steinberg is Professor of Political Geography at the University of Durham, UK. He was formerly Professor of Geography at Florida State University and Marie Curie Fellow at Royal Holloway, University of London. Jeremy Tasch is Assistant Professor, Department of Geography and Environmental Planning, Towson University, Baltimore, USA. His research interests include resource development in Central Asia and the Russian Far East, Arctic sovereignty claims in the context of climate change, and the social theory of global environmental issues. Hannes Gerhardt is Assistant Professor, Department of Geosciences, University of West Georgia, USA. His research interests include issues of sovereignty, territorialization, global governmentality, and the cultural dimensions of critical geopolitics. Adam Keul is Assistant Professor, Department of Geography, University of Connecticut, USA. He specializes in resource geography. Elizabeth Nyman is Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Louisiana at Lafayette, USA. She specializes in international relations. Foreword by Rob Shields, Professor of Sociology and Director of the Cities-Region Studies Centre, University of Alberta, Canada.