Klaus Dodds is Government Dean and Professor of Geopolitics at Royal Holloway, College of London, and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences. He accomplished his PhD on the College of Bristol in 1994 and took up a place on the College of Edinburgh. Thereafter he joined Royal Holloway. He has held a Visiting Erskine Fellowship at Gateway Antarctica, College of Canterbury (2002) and been a Visiting Fellow at St Cross School, College of Oxford (2010-11) and St Johns School, College of Oxford (2017-18). In 2005 he was awarded the Philip Leverhulme Prize for Geography and a Main Analysis Fellowship by the Leverhulme Belief (2017-2020) for a challenge involved with the ‘International Arctic’. He has revealed many books and articles involved with the geopolitics and governance of the Polar Areas, in addition to the cultural politics of ice and border geopolitics. These embrace The Scramble for the Poles (2016), Ice: Nature and Tradition (2018) and Border Wars (2022). His newest e book, co-written with Mia Bennett is provisionally titled Unfrozen: The Battle for the Way forward for the Arctic (Yale College Press 2025).
The place do you see probably the most thrilling analysis/debates taking place in your subject?
A perennial problem many researchers face is having the ability to observe and hint analysis and debates not to mention establish “thrilling” themes and developments. One factor I’ve learnt from my educational profession so far is that serendipity issues. For those who had requested me 30 years in the past, “Would you count on to be fascinated about digital geopolitics or safety?”, I’d have thought “unlikely”. These days, because of skilled partnerships solid at Royal Holloway and elsewhere, I’ve had the pleasure of supervising a spread of PhD college students and consequently found extra about their fields. Supervising college students extra usually is an effective way of being uncovered to issues that may grow to be thrilling, intriguing, and thought-provoking.
As you may count on, given my long-standing pursuits, I comply with intently the evolving literature on crucial and well-liked geopolitics and revel in studying papers and books that stretch the conceptual, empirical, and policy-relevant limits of that scholarship. For instance, it is rather satisfying to learn how curiosity in humour and satire has expanded alongside curiosity in cartoons, comics and different types of performative artwork. My earliest foray into Steve Bell’s If… cartoons within the mid-Nineties was largely knowledgeable by my studying exterior political geography, Worldwide Relations, and safety research. Quick-forward three many years, one may level to a collection of research that interrogate how humour is put to work in formal, sensible, and on a regular basis political, diplomatic, and para-diplomatic contexts and pretexts.
How has the way in which you perceive the world modified over time, and what (or who) prompted probably the most vital shifts in your considering?
Contexts and occasions matter. First, educational scholarship has its developments, cycles, and preoccupations with principle issues and the way one engages with that partially is dependent upon partnerships, alternatives, and disposition to transformation. As a geographer, I embrace with nice affection interdisciplinary analysis and revel in engagement with multi-disciplinary analysis groups. My publications during the last three many years replicate a tutorial eclecticism – working with others, experimenting with approaches, and tackling subjects and points that have been comparatively new to me. An instance could be writing concerning the political materiality of frozen soils or permafrost with an anthropologist.
Second, occasions matter. I’ve researched and written a couple of suite of issues such because the conflict on terror, pandemics, and the Arctic (initially, I targeted on the Antarctic in my earliest work), all of which have been enabled and enriched by partnerships in geography, legislation, well being research, pc science, bodily and environmental sciences, anthropology, and IR/political science.
Lastly, as I famous above, who and the place you train and supervise makes a distinction. I’ve spent most of my educational profession at Royal Holloway however intentionally seized alternatives to work elsewhere in different universities. Extra importantly within the UK Parliament, UK authorities departments, NATO, EU and different third-party organizations as a specialist adviser, a marketing consultant, a challenge workforce member and so forth. All of this has helped to make sure that my work as an educator and scholar has been topic to productive challenges. An excellent instance was presenting a report I co-wrote on the EU and having to current it to MEPs reside within the European Parliament in November 2023.
How has the discourse on Arctic affairs developed/modified for the reason that Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022?
Previous to 2022, however the disruptive penalties of the Russian unlawful annexation of Crimea in 2014, there was a concerted want on the a part of the seven different Arctic states (Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and the USA), and the intergovernmental discussion board, Arctic Council to stress that the Arctic was an exception to the norm of world politics. A circumpolar area of peace and shared pursuits within the type of environmental safety and sustainable growth. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 threw all of that into the air. Shortly afterwards the ‘Arctic 7’ introduced that they might search to “pause” the work of the Arctic Council recognising that within the final two years, it has been tough to revive enterprise as regular.
Three issues have modified consequently. First, Arctic discourse is extra more likely to be punctuated by phrases like “spillover” and infused with a recognition of “cross-contamination”. Lately, Ukrainian drones focused Russian property within the Russian northwest and highlighted how Arctic-based materials and personnel are being drawn right into a battle lots of of miles away to the south. Russian floor forces usually based mostly within the Arctic have endured heavy losses in Ukraine itself.
Second, we now have an Arctic area the place seven Arctic States are actually NATO members and one just isn’t i.e., Russia, but 50% of the Arctic is Russian. As a consequence, we are actually taking a look at a area break up between a Russian-Asian portion and a European-US phase. Not fairly a return to the Chilly Battle however a far cry from what was hoped when the Arctic Council was launched in 1996.
Lastly, the Arctic is turning into ever extra globalized with a collection of different actors – each state and non-state – making their presence felt. Within the Russian Arctic, for example, it will turn into much more regular to see BRICS+ nations concerned in power, delivery, and infrastructure tasks.
Put up-invasion of Ukraine, cooperation by the Arctic Council has come to a halt. To what extent does this have an effect on the essential non-military points pertaining to the area?
Below the Norwegian chair-ship of the Arctic Council (Could 2023-Could 2025), there have been tentative makes an attempt to revive some semblance of pre-2022 order. That is going to be tough given the parlous state of Arctic exceptionalism – geostrategic competitors appears an important deal extra dominant in comparison with circumpolar collaboration, which jeopardises issues that do rely on the latter akin to science, indigenous affairs, and people-to-people group engagement, particularly in border areas. There may be now inevitably a higher NATO presence within the Arctic and Russia’s geostrategic priorities for the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation haven’t altered.
A lot of the work the Arctic Council does is thru its working teams and job forces and lots of of these tasks have been paused or suspended since February 2022. Arctic science, environmental safety and conservation will all the time be simpler if these concerned together with Indigenous Peoples are capable of work throughout, with and thru Arctic ecologies and landscapes. Russia has suspended funds to the Arctic Council and positioned restrictions on entry to the Russian Arctic sector and accompanying information factors. This makes long-term monitoring of environmental change together with permafrost thaw and methane launch an important deal tougher. All of this isn’t going to alter except the Arctic 7 restore full collaboration with Russia below the auspices of the Arctic Council which formally doesn’t handle issues of navy safety.
Within the meantime, Russia will proceed to hunt partnerships with others whether or not it’s China, India, and different BRICS+ nations and has already voiced a proposal to work with the latter in Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago with its personal particular treaty regime in place. In brief, the “pause” in Arctic Council work makes it tougher to think about a return to the comparatively halcyon days of circumpolar scientific collaboration and knowledge-sharing within the Nineties and 2000s.
In what methods may China’s involvement within the Arctic enhance within the coming years?
China is a serious polar energy and it’s not unusual to listen to Chinese language officers describe the nation as tri-polar-Arctic, Antarctic, and Himalayan-Hindu-Kush area. A few of this has sensible penalties akin to China being a serious generator of data about permafrost (largely due to its occupation of the Tibetan plateau). China describes itself as a “near-Arctic state” and has been an Arctic Council observer since 2013. Furthermore, it maintains the Yellow River station in Svalbard and makes use of its icebreakers to conduct summer season voyages in locations just like the Central Arctic Ocean.
China engages with the Arctic as a result of it’s framed as an area for financial alternative and at one stage there have been smaller Arctic states akin to Iceland, Finland, Norway, and the Authorities of Greenland fascinated about forging nearer relationships. Typically that created tensions with nationwide capitals additional south. Anecdotally, I can report loads of experiences the place lodge house owners within the Nordic Arctic have expressed gratitude for visiting Chinese language vacationers wanting to see the Northern Lights. Commercially, China is fascinated about utilising Arctic Sea routes together with the Northern Sea Route and extra speculatively the trans-polar route sooner or later in addition to the Arctic useful resource potential, each onshore and offshore.
China is a reputable stakeholder whether or not it’s in Svalbard, Central Arctic Ocean (together with industrial fisheries potential) and as a proper observer to the Arctic Council. Lastly, there are many Chinese language colleagues who will make the purpose if requested that China can even be affected by local weather breakdown within the polar areas – low-lying cities akin to Shanghai are susceptible to sea stage change.
Has the conflict in Ukraine modified the established order over Antarctica in any means?
The battle in Ukraine has soured Antarctic Treaty Consultative Conferences (ACTMs) – 2022 and 2023. Governance by the Antarctic Treaty is carried out through consensus so unsurprisingly there have been factors of rigidity because the Russian delegation has been affronted by the way in which by which “Ukraine” intrudes into the issues of the Treaty. The bubble surrounding Antarctic exceptionalism like its Arctic counterpart has burst. The 2024 assembly in India witnessed for the third 12 months in a row, measures to acknowledge the Emperor Penguin as a specifically protected species being blocked by Russia and China to make a non-consensual level. It underscored the dangerous development of the political weaponization of scientific analysis to the detriment of endangered species.
It additionally revealed a failure to search out consensus over whether or not to increase consultative celebration (CP) standing to each Belarus and Canada. CP standing represents a proper recognition by present CPs {that a} candidate has demonstrated “substantial scientific analysis exercise”. CP standing additionally affords voting rights in future ATCMs. Belarus is a principal Russian ally and Canada would appeal to robust help from NATO member states and others.
The 2024 ATCM revealed tentative indicators that BRICS+ nations akin to India, Brazil, and South Africa may be members to look at by way of working with China and Russia in disrupting Antarctic governance. Saudi Arabia has joined as an acceding celebration very lately. My fairly educated guess is that the BRICS+ coalition may very nicely begin introducing bargains and trade-offs regarding the creation of future Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) or wildlife safety measures in trade for concessions in Antarctic useful resource governance or elsewhere. Such a scenario would primarily take good regional governance hostage and dim the spirit of consensus.
Russian state-owned geological holding firm RosGeo’s claims of potential hydrocarbon reserves in Antarctica have sparked a dialogue on Russian pursuits within the area. How have the Antarctic Treaty events and the worldwide group responded to this?
The “RosGeo” was an attention-grabbing instance of misinformation and I discovered myself being quoted liberally as an authoritative supply for a few of this. For me, it was a textbook instance of how educational contributions will be framed and reframed in mainstream and social media, in ways in which guarantee all nuance is misplaced. I took the chance to write down a weblog for the British journal Spectator about all of this and corrected profound misunderstandings.
Antarctic Treaty events have been content material to take Russia at its phrase and assume that the nation doesn’t actively look to undermine the everlasting ban on mining that’s half and parcel of the Protocol on Environmental Safety. The story broke on the identical time of the assembly in India and I think the events have sufficient difficulties with Russia with out creating extra rigidity. A South African newspaper referred to as the Each day Maverick has been on the forefront of fastidiously reporting on this story and in essence the Russian vessel involved has been concerned in a long-term geophysical survey of assorted elements of the Antarctic shoreline and surrounding seas. Regardless of the goal of those surveys, Russian engagement within the Antarctic is awkward – it’s a nation that reserves the suitable to make a territorial declare sooner or later; it seems to be with concern at makes an attempt to stop fishing within the title of ocean conservation; it’s fascinated about Antarctica’s mineral potential; it really works with China however is on the identical time anxious about China’s rising presence in Antarctica; and it deeply resents Antarctic Treaty issues being “corrupted” by Ukraine.
In parallel, Russian diplomats will probably be keenly conscious that apartheid South Africa was allowed to be a full member of the Antarctic Treaty with out anybody publicly naming and shaming the nation in Antarctic Treaty conferences. The analogy with an invasion of Ukraine is much from excellent however there may be this abiding sense that the ATCMs ought to preoccupy themselves with Antarctic issues solely.
However as I’ve written lately with a Russian specialist, RosGeo’s surveying and tectonic seismic analysis is one factor, however Moscow’s longer-term agenda is one other. Russia desires to make sure a industrial presence even long-term dominance, and think about a future the place its ‘rights’ are revered by others. In contrast to the UK, Russia just isn’t at present a claimant state (and for the sake of peace and cooperation all territorial claims are thought-about to be suspended by the Treaty).
How would you clarify the centrality of melting ice in society’s future?
Melting ice is crucial for billions of individuals and different residing beings as each spring/summer season meltwater feeds vitamins into lakes, rivers, and oceans. Glaciers have been rightly described as frozen water towers however as soon as they flip into liquid, they find yourself supporting a collection of meals chains. Ice stupas (synthetic glaciers) are important in lots of elements of the world and act as a vital supply of water in the summertime months.
In case of overwhelmed melting, there will be disastrous flooding, whereas underwhelming melting has the spectre of drought. Extreme melting in Greenland and Antarctica will in all probability contribute to profound sea stage change (SLC) sooner or later, the results of which won’t be felt evenly all over the world.
Ice is crucial to planetary well-being, particularly while you issue within the contribution of ice to the earth’s albedo. Much less ice means extra photo voltaic radiation is absorbed by ocean and land with knock-on penalties for planetary warming. The lack of ice is being felt first-hand by Indigenous Peoples within the Arctic and different “chilly locations”. One instance could be how the long-term lack of sea ice has meant that coastal communities are actually extra uncovered to violent seas and winter storms. In some instances, communities have needed to relocate. In different instances, thinner sea ice has meant that travelling is now extra precarious even lethal. Moreover, permafrost thawing has additionally performed an element in perpetuating damaging fires throughout the northern latitudes.
In recent times, I’ve been very within the emergence of a subject that I’d time period ‘ice humanities’, however I feel there may be scope to boost this work into the social sciences as nicely. With ice now not being reliably stable in increased latitudes and an everyday characteristic of winter, there are a number of challenges to confront starting from the transformation of ice-covered waters into open water; the terra-forming penalties of extreme flooding; ice-loss in mountainous areas with penalties for border delimitation; the influence of ice loss on Indigenous communities and the values positioned on ice by state and non-state actors in search of aggressive benefit in a warming world.
By which path ought to polar researchers focus to deal with the rising governance challenges of the polar areas?
I’d proceed to encourage interdisciplinary scholarship on the whole because the governance challenges going through the polar areas require each educational and Indigenous Peoples’ data and views. Within the Antarctic, there may be rising proof of some respectful data partnerships between New Zealand Māori and scientific and political communities. This could sit alongside a concerted effort within the Arctic to hear and be taught from indigenous communities who’re bearing the brunt of local weather breakdown together with drought, hearth, and sea ice loss.
Second, we’d like additional analysis into how world geopolitical or strategic competitors is difficult regional governance, in addition to issue into the equation, necessary world developments (e.g. BBNJ treaty) that can carry their very own challenges and alternatives to regional boards and treaty-based organisations. However to be clear there is no such thing as a scarcity of “polar governance” per se.
Each polar areas are going to expertise profound state-change. We all know what the drivers of that state-change are starting from the bodily and environmental to the geopolitical and technological. However do we now have the collective knowledge and restraint to make sure that these areas are ruled responsibly, safely, and securely? How will we coordinate governance when there are much more events, conventions, and frameworks to acknowledge? Furthermore, can we safe the mandatory settlement and help for governance that anticipates the probably environmental and geophysical transformation of each the Arctic and Antarctic?
What’s an important recommendation you can give to younger students of Worldwide Relations?
My beginning place is that there’s a nice deal to be taught from early profession students together with PhD college students. As I famous above, I’ve ended up studying about digital safety, cybersecurity coverage, planetary well being, and China’s function as a polar energy. I hesitate to supply recommendation as a result of my profession has had and continues to have its personal intersectional qualities and quirks. However there are some issues I’ve learnt alongside the way in which.
First, be humble while you get pleasure from unearned privileges. I’ve the nice fortune to be a local English speaker working in a world which favours Anglophone scholarship. As a journal editor – most lately Editor in Chief of Territory Politics Governance – I used to be grateful to be surrounded by multi-lingual co-editors based mostly all over the world. English is a worldwide language, and we have to be respectful that scholarly English will fluctuate as nicely and that’s to be celebrated not policed.
Second, please don’t evaluate different folks’s work in case you are drained, hungry, or frazzled. Peer evaluate is so necessary, and we now have an obligation to our scholar communities to do it in good religion. Third, having a community of allies and significant mates is so necessary – I can consider one distinguished political geographer who invited me to remain at their home in Canada in the summertime of 1994. It was life-changing and helped me transition right into a post-doctoral scholar and college lecturer/assistant professor.
Fourth, seize alternatives the place and when you may. Through the years, I took the chance to write down a month-to-month column on geopolitics for {a magazine}, work for the UK Parliament as a specialist adviser, be a visiting fellow, and edit two journals. The alternatives will in fact fluctuate as will the power to grab them. In every case, it helped me to develop professionally and intellectually.
Lastly, after 30 years and counting, educational life nonetheless provides me an excessive amount of pleasure and I feel that comes from each training and analysis. After I began on the College of Edinburgh in 1994, I’d by no means have imagined I’d be an Government Dean. Such a trajectory just isn’t for everybody, however it has allowed me to replicate additional on educational management, academic and analysis cultures, and partnership-building.
Additional Studying on E-Worldwide Relations
