“Warmer world, colder wars: how climate change is reshaping Great Power conflicts”

A public lecture with James Meadway

All welcome.

6.30-8pm, Thursday 20^th of March
Room M2, Grand Parade, University of Brighton
Map – https://maps.app.goo.gl/iRCoyg1tr7crhpdi9
Please register to attend https://forms.office.com/e/xhuD9Z6yhw

James Meadway hosts the new weekly economics podcast Macrodose. He was economic adviser to the shadow chancellor, and chief economist at the New Economics Foundation. He has taught economics at SOAS, Cambridge, Sussex and City Universities, and has published widely on economic policy and theory in the New Statesman, Guardian, Jacobin, Tribune, and Novara.

Abstract: From offering to purchase Greenland in his first term, to threats to invade in his second, Donald Trump’s seemingly eccentric designs on the Arctic belie a sharp geo-political awareness. Not only is the melting Arctic ice sheet reducing the cost of mining activities in the far North, from fossil fuels to increasingly important rare earth minerals, but new sea-lanes are being opened that promise to dramatically reduce the cost of east-west trade. Meanwhile, as ice-covering drops, centuries-old plans to exploit Siberia’s huge, but previously near-inaccessible natural resources are brought closer to reality. To the south of the United States, Panama has become another focus for the Trump administration, where an extended drought has dried up the Canal, exposing its critical importance to global trade.

Climate change is reshaping our world, but along well-established lines of conflict and confrontation. This paper will provide a model for understanding the geopolitical shifts taking place in the context of inter-state rivalries and the cost pressures faced by modern capitalism.