29 september 2014: lezing Christoph Humrich

Talk about an emerging and likely escalating military conflict in the arctic started in 2007 when a Russian chartered submersible reached the seafloor at the geographical North Pole and planted a Russian flag there. Disputed maritime boundaries and zones, overlapping claims to the continental shelf and above all the resource riches of the Arctic seemed to fire a new conflict between Russia and the West with potential global repercussions or even a new Cold War. Seven years on, this conflict did not materialize yet and it does not seem it will. Some of the most ardent „purveyors of polar peril" revised their view. As one of them admitted „a funny thing had happened on the way to Arctic Anarchy". But has it? The core thesis of the lecture is that nothing else was to be expected. A more interesting question is now, whether the global tensions between Russia and the West will have repercussions in the Arctic - and not the other way round. While the global tensions surely will make it more difficult to cooperate in the Arctic, it seems most likely that this particular channel of communication will remain open.