PhD defence Ulf Gustafsson

On March 21, Arctic Centre PhD Ulf Gustafsson succesfully defended his thesis, Icebound frontiers of exploitation, Networks for whaling in the Polar regions, 1904-1931.

In his research project, Ulf Ingemar Gustafsson has studied the history of natural resource exploitation in the polar regions. More specifically, he studied the history of the modern whaling industry (1904-1931) in both the Arctic and the Antarctic. Previous research has mainly focused on and explained modern whaling as just another activity to make quick profit. Gustafson shows that it was more complex than this, and that scientific, economic, political, and environmental factors dictated and determined the activities of the modern whaling industry.

This thesis is a part of the International Polar Year Project LASHIPA (Large Scale Historical Exploitation of Polar Areas), where researchers from the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, USA and Russia have studied the history of exploitation in the polar regions.

Thesis