Arctic Frontiers 2020
Tromsø, Norway - January 2020
January 2020 - Greetings from Tromsø, a beautiful place where the mountains touch the sky and the city shines in the night. I recently flew from Nuuk to Tromsø to attend Arctic Frontiers, a conference attempting to address both science and governance. The topic of this year’s conference is “The Power of Knowledge,” which is an interesting direction for this conference which usually prefers to focus on science and it’s application in policy rather than the human dimensions of the sciences. I have three points of thought from what I’ve seen so far.
One, the US is continuing to provide diplomacy with no substance or clear answers on almost every topic. During a plenary session on the direction of Arctic policy across the north, and US representative refused to speak productively when asked about the increase in military interest in the Arctic, including Greenland, the increase in interest to pursue offshore oil drilling in the Arctic, and the deterioration of Alaskan salmon fisheries. This last bit has me worries, as US officials appear to uphold the front that commercial fisheries stocks in Alaska are managed quite sustainably and at appropriate levels. When prompted by the head of the Gwich’in Council to explain this conclusion in relation to massively declining salmon stocks in Alaskan rivers, the US official confessed to knowing nothing about it. Empty words by a lot of people who don’t know the first thing about the regions they’re representing.
Second, there was an interesting moment in another panel about offshore oil drilling and natural resource extraction where the moderator from BCC declared Norway a ‘drug dealer’ of Arctic offshore-derived fuels resulting in some commotion from the audience and the panel members. Norway is known for it’s ‘green’ image, as a country greatly interested in the development of in-country renewable energy sources such as hydropower, solar, and wind, but as a country it also has a dark side. Norway itself has gotten wealthy in large part due to its global export of Arctic offshore-derived fuels, so while Norway may be green at home, it uses it’s green image to shirk responsibility for contributions to global carbon emissions. Oil drilling and oil money continues to be a contentious issue in Norway among it’s citizens.
Third, I attended a panel discussion by the six Indigenous permanent participants of the Arctic Council about their role in shaping research, knowledge, and governance in the Arctic. It was a very impressive display of Indigenous leadership and scholarship and was well attended, but the success of this panel was marred by one thing: we continue to confine Inuit and other Indigenous representatives to cramped, back rooms instead of giving them space to speak openly during plenary sessions like other officials and representatives. This was a major source of disappointment for me, as the conference advertisement really emphasizes the importance of Indigenous peoples in shaping the Arctic and the entire topic of this year’s conference. Other empty words, but I am happy that this panel was allowed to convene and that the contributions and discussions were so meaningful. I am continually impressed by Indigenous peoples’ willingness to engage in a system that isn’t entirely welcoming.
On an entirely other note, like at most conferences I attend, I ran into a distant relative and the neighbor of my great Aunt in Kotzeubue. It’s a very small world and Indigenous peoples are everywhere. So far the conference has been very informative and I’ve learned much in such a short amount of time. Certainly glad that I have made the trip from Greenland!
Look forward to hearing about the ARCTOS workshop, which I’ll be joining shortly for our weeklong field trip to the Lofoten Islands to discuss the intersections of the natural and social sciences in marine resource management!
“The Arctic Wetlands and Indigenous Peoples Study: lessons informing participation and knowledge production”
Arctic Frontiers 2020
