Negotiating the Arctic: The Construction of an International Region (Studies in International Relations)

STUDIES IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

Edited by

CHARLES G.MACDONALD Florida International University

A ROUTLEDGE SERIES

STUDIES IN INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS CHARLES G.MACDONALD, General Editor PROMOTING WOMEN’S RIGHTS The Politics of Gender in the European Union Chrystalla A.Ellina TURKISH FOREIGN POLICY AND TURKISH IDENTITY A Constructivist Approach Yücel Bozdaglioglu ORGANIZING THE WORLD The United States and Regional Cooperation in Asia and Europe Galia Press-Barnathan HUMAN RIGHTS IN CUBA, EL SALVADOR NlCARAGUA A Sociological Perspective on Human Rights Abuse Mayra Gómez

AND

NEGOTIATING THE ARCTIC The Construction of an International Region

E.C.H.Keskitalo

ROUTLEDGE NEW YORK & LONDON

Published in 2004 by Routledge 29 West 35th Street New York, NY 10001 Published in Great Britain by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane London EC4P 4EE Copyright © 2004 by Taylor & Francis Books, Inc. Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group. This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publishers. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Keskitalo, E.C.H. (Eva Carina Helena), 1974– Negotiating the Arctic: the construction of an international region / E.C. H. Keskitalo. p. cm.—(Studies in international relations) ISBN 0-415-94712-X (hardcover: alk. paper) 1. Arctic regions—History. 2. Arctic regions—International status. 3. Arctic regions—Research—International cooperation. I. Title. II. Series: Studies in international relations (Routledge (Firm)) G606.K37 2003 998–dc21 2003007182 ISBN 0-203-50811-4 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-57760-4 (Adobe eReader Format)

Contents

List of Main Abbreviations and Glossary

xi

Acknowledgments

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Chapter 1 Region-building in “The Arctic” Region-building as a research perspective Region-building as discourse The operations of discourse: framing and hegemony Views of historicity The actor and knowledge in region-building The inherently “critical” approach of discourse analysis and a region-building perspective Methodology of the study Aims of the work

Chapter 2 Region-building and Definitions of “The Arctic” The High Arctic of exploration and comparison with the Antarctic: the establishment of a perspective Environmental and historical definitions of “the Arctic” Political and security definitions of “the Arctic” “The Arctic” as an international region: the development of a discourse on the Arctic Bases of description: the Arctic as frontier The development of state region-building: the Murmansk momentum Legitimate political actors: the official designation of an “Arctic Eight” The development of the Arctic in research-policy networks Conclusion

Chapter 3

The “Arctic” in the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy and Arctic Council: An Environmental, Indigenous, and Foreign Policy Concern

The Finnish Initiative for the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy Establishing the AEPS: an environmental initiative promoting foreign policy The Finnish foreign policy background

v

1 6 9 11 15 17 19 21

23 25 26 30 34 35 39 42 45 47 50

53 54 56 59

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Contents Designing the AEPS: the content of an Arctic approach The development of the Arctic Council: the Canadian initiative The design of the Arctic Council Responses to the proposal for an Arctic Council Conclusion

Chapter 4 Sustainable Development in the Arctic: A Conflict Between Conservation and Utilization Sustainable development The contested issues for a task force on sustainable development The development of a sustainable development agenda: the role of the ICC First meetings of the Task Force on Sustainable Development and Utilization (TFSDU) The conflicting TFSDU agenda: strategy and marine mammals Sustainable development as an overarching aim of cooperation? Establishing the Arctic Council Continued conflict The issue focus for an “Arctic”? Conclusion: an unproblematized region?

Chapter 5 The Development of a Regional University for the Arctic Introducing the idea Clientele and consultation Values and focus of an Arctic regional university: who are the northern people? Studies of rather than for the north? The final report of the UoA feasibility study An Arctic region?

Chapter 6 Views of “The Arctic” in Different States The Canadian Arctic: geography and discourse Canada’s frontier development The differences in international and domestic development of the Arctic in Canada Generalized Arctic description The Arctic in Greenland, Alaska and Russia: partial coherence with Canadian discourse The difference between Canada and the Nordic states Reactions to Arctic discourse in the Nordic countries Critique of applications of the “frontier” concept to northern Europe The conflicts in identity politicization Conclusion

62 65 69 70 73

75 76 78 80 82 83 87 89 92 94 98

103 104 108 113 117 119 121

125 127 129 133 137 140 145 147 150 151 154

Contents Chapter 7 Arctic Discourse Dominance The Canadian role in Arctic discourse Discourse characteristics and the role of indigenous actors The role of research in Arctic discourse Canadian discourse dominance The gains for other actors Arctic conflicts as results of framing: implications of the study The problem of description and representation The study of regions

vii 157 159 162 165 167 173 175 178 180

Notes

185

References

229

Appendices

257

Index

267

Figure 1. The Arctic as defined by temperature (the 10° July isotherm), marine boundary, treeline, and sun height (the Arctic Circle). The boundary of the AMAP assessment area is also indicated, as are delineations of the High Arctic and subarctic. Source: Reproduced from AMAP 2002:4.

Figure 2. Political map of the circumpolar Arctic, also indicating temperature and treeline delineations of the Arctic, the Arctic Circle and 60° northern latitude. Source: Reproduced courtesy of Arctic Climatology Project 2000.

List of Main Abbreviations and Glossary

AC The Arctic Council. Also known as the “Canadian Initiative,” the Council was set up in 1996. In effect, it includes and integrates the AEPS under a somewhat broader umbrella, as it includes a sustainable development initiative in addition to the AEPS environmental protection approach. AEPS Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy. Also known as the “Finnish Initiative” or the “Rovaniemi process,” the AEPS was set up in 1991 as an environmental protection initiative signed by representatives of the eight Arctic states. The AEPS includes four programs, the AMAP, CAFF, EPPR and PAME, which are overseen by respective working groups and in some cases secretariats. In 1996 (or, formally, by a ministerial meeting in 1997), the AEPS was subsumed under the Arctic Council. AMAP Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program. One of the four programs under the AEPS. Perhaps the main program, the AMAP has among other things produced reports on the Arctic environment (AMAP 1997, 1998). When the AEPS was subsumed under the Arctic Council, AMAP became a working group under the Council. Arctic Eight The eight states which signed the AEPS and the Arctic Council declarations, and thereby are the main actors in these. The states are the USA, Canada, Russia, Denmark-Greenland, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland. CAFF Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna. CAFF is one of the four programs under the AEPS. When the AEPS was subsumed under the Arctic Council, CAFF became a working group under the Arctic Council. CARC Canadian Arctic Resources Committee. Describing itself as a citizens’ organization incorporated under federal law in Canada, CARC has through its journal Northern Perspectives published parts of the Canadian debate on an AEPS and Arctic Council, such as early proposals for an Arctic Council. It has given prominent coverage to ICC-related authors. EPPR Emergency Prevention, Preparedness and Response. One of the four programs under the AEPS, set up in order to deal with oil spills, among other things. When the AEPS was subsumed under the Arctic Council, EPPR became a working group under the Council.

xi

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List of Main Abbreviations and Glossary

IASC International Arctic Science Committee. Arctic cooperation has been discussed since the 1960s as a counterpart to Antarctic cooperation. The IASC was formally set up in 1990 following discussions that had begun in the mid 1980s. It is significant as a cooperative body for Arctic research and also in establishing the definition of “the Arctic” that was incorporated in AEPS and Arctic Council organization. ICC Inuit Circumpolar Conference. This non-governmental organization, established in 1977, is a cooperation organ for Inuit (Eskimo) in Canada, Greenland, Alaska, and, since 1989, also Russia. It is highly significant as a political body in Arctic cooperation. IPO Indigenous Peoples Organizations in the AEPS/Arctic Council processes. They are also often designated as Permanent Participants (PPs) in the processes. In the context discussed in this book, the relevant IPO organisations are the ICC, the Saami Council and RAIPON (the association of Russian minority peoples). IPS Indigenous Peoples Secretariat. The Indigenous Peoples Secretariat was set up under the AEPS in 1993 to facilitate Indigenous Peoples Organization (IPO) participation in AEPS / Arctic Council processes. IWS The International Whaling Commission is the main international body that governs the hunting of whales. MMPA Marine Mammal Protection Act. The MMPA is domestic legislation of the USA, in force since 1972, that allows the US to set up embargoes against states that breach any agreements the US has signed, for example by hunting whales. The MMPA in effect prohibits whaling (beyond IWC allowances) among US trade partners. NF The Northern Forum is an organization of subregional governments over a broader area than the Arctic, including parts of Japan, China, and Mongolia. NGO Non-governmental organization. PAME Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment. One of the four working groups of the AEPS. When the AEPS was subsumed under the Arctic Council, PAME became a working group under the Council. PP Permanent Participants is a term used for Indigenous Peoples Organizations in the AEPS / Arctic Council process. In the context discussed in this book, the relevant organisations are the ICC, the Saami Council and RAIPON (the association of Russian minority peoples). SAO (SAAO) Senior Arctic Official (earlier called Senior Arctic Affairs Official). A state civil servant who undertakes day-to-day work (such as organization and decision-making in meetings below ministerial level) in the AEPS and Arctic Council. SCAR Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research. Established 1958, it has been one major model discussed in the establishment of Arctic research cooperation.

List of Main Abbreviations and Glossary

xiii

SD Sustainable Development. Popularized by the 1987 Brundtland Commission and a main theme of a 1992 UN conference (UNCED), sustainable development is the principle of “seeking to meet the need of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” It thus integrates the principles of environmental protection and development. Following UNCED, sustainable development became a main organizing principle for Arctic work in the AEPS and Arctic Council. TFSDU Task Force on Sustainable Development and Utilization. The TFSDU was set up as a task force under the AEPS in 1993. Centering on sustainable development, it was the first body beyond the main environmental protection initiative of the AEPS. It was later formed into a working group on a par with the programs under the AEPS. UoA University of the Arctic. An international circumpolar university developed in relation to the Arctic Council. UNCED United Nations Conference on Environment and Development. UNCED was held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and focused on the concept of sustainable development. WWF World Wide Fund for Nature / World Wildlife Fund. The WWF has been an observer under the AEPS / Arctic Council since the inception of these processes. The WWF also publishes the WWF Arctic Bulletin, a newsletter on Arctic environmental cooperation.

Acknowledgments

As any scholarly work, this book could not have been written without the support of many people. I am especially indebted to Monica Tennberg, Associate Professor of International Relations, University of Lapland, for providing me with the archival material from her own study on the Arctic Council and supporting me throughout my work. I would also like to thank the many supportive members of staff at the University of Lapland and its Arctic Centre: the places where I have spent most of the latest four years. I am particularly grateful to the Institute of Arctic Studies at Dartmouth College, USA, which accepted me as a visiting fellow. Special thanks go to Professor Oran Young at Dartmouth, who also patiently read and commented on the work. I also like to thank the Scott Polar Research Institute at Cambridge University, UK, for accepting me as a visiting scholar. Funding for my study has been graciously provided by the Academy of Finland and its FIGARE program; the University of Lapland and Norrlandsförbundets Stipendienämnd. For educational opportunities and sharing their time and resources I am grateful to the University of the Arctic working group and its secretariat, who among other things lent me their time for interviews and discussions; the Circumpolar Universities Association; the Circumpolar Arctic Social Science PhD Network; The Finnish National Graduate School for Political Science and International Relations (VAKAVA); The Finnish Environmental Social Science Network based at the University of Tampere; the International Women’s University (ifu) held in summer 2000 in Hamburg, Germany; the University of Akureyri, Iceland; and the Calotte Academy, organized by Lassi Heininen. Lassi Heininen, at the Arctic Centre, Rovaniemi, was also a patient reader for the work, as were Professor Rob Shields of Carleton University, Canada. I am thankful to both. I also like to again thank the readers who had to deal with the manuscript at a very early stage: Vilho Harle, Aini Linjakumpu, Seija Tuulentie, Tero Norjanen, Lars Andersson, and Alpo Rusi; and Richard Foley who proofread many successive “final versions.” I am grateful for the support I have received from the Barents Euro-Arctic Region Regional Council Working Group on Higher Education and from Steven Sawhill during a comparative study on the Barents region. All remaining shortcomings are of course (and regrettably) my own.

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CHAPTER 1

Region-building in “The Arctic”

It is not difficult to read an element of romanticism in the notion of area studies as a vocation. In the most banal terms, we say that one is drawn to study Japan or Thailand because one is in love with ‘it,’ whatever that ‘it’ might be at different moments in one’s life. And it is here in the realm of the romantic that sentiment and mystification become difficult to tell apart. Having fallen in love with the foreign, learning its language and reconstructing its history, one might then begin with some justification to consider oneself to be an authority who can speak for the place and its people to those at home (Rafael 1999, para. 19).

The quotation above accurately captures some of the main issues addressed in this work. Area studies are often undertaken by outsiders, those fascinated with and romanticizing a region. How can those in area studies then represent the region in a way that is recognizable and relevant to its inhabitants and their everyday life? This problem is an acute one for researchers examining any political development within area studies, and perhaps especially for those investigating the Arctic. Historically, and in Arctic studies, the Arctic has largely been conceived of as a polar region—the High Arctic where polar bears roam. Perhaps even more so, it has been conceived of as something apart from this world, an area for exploration and exploitation through which one may gain fame and fortune back home. One does not stay in the Arctic: one uses it for something, or ignores it. In short, it is for most people a romanticized and imagined area, not a naturalized place of everyday life. The northern areas of Canada, Alaska, Russia and Greenland, which for the most part are climatically Arctic and have traditionally been considered Arctic by their respective states, have, for example, largely been seen in this light. The largely indigenous population of these areas has long been ignored in favor of a focus on “the Arctic” as an uninhabited, romanticized land of outside adventurers and ice.

1

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Negotiating the Arctic

However, especially since the late 1970s and early 1980s, following the environmental and indigenous movements and increased international organization, political cooperation has significantly expanded the geographical area connoted by “the Arctic.” In recent cooperation, this area is seen as covering not only the areas climatically and historically considered Arctic but large parts of the mainland Nordic countries as well. For example, this extended geographical delineation is applied by the Canadian-initiated Arctic Council, which covers cooperation between eight states (Canada, USA, Russia, and the five Nordic countries1) and the area extending from the Pole to at least the Arctic Circle and at most 60° north latitude. This is an area of significant diversity and larger in size than any previous delineation of “the Arctic.” As such, it includes boreal forest areas and a population of close to four million people, who, to a large extent, live in town-sized settlements (AMAP 1998:142–179); in the most extensive assessments, it encompasses fifteen percent of the world’s land and a population of as many as ten million people (cf. Young 2000).2 In region-building processes in political organization and especially in the Arctic Council, such a broadly delineated Arctic is nevertheless portrayed as a region, with many common needs and characteristics and considerable similarities between populations. The principal question that this work addresses is how such a regionbuilding process has come into existence and presently defines the “Arctic.” This includes not only how the geographical delineation has been made, but which characteristics and identity are seen as “Arctic” in order to construct a region out of the wide-ranging area. The core topics for analysis are the following: (1) How has Arctic discourse developed and the region been delineated for policy purposes? (2) How is the discourse of the region framed in the focal international fora? (3) How has this discourse and delineation become prominent? and (4) How does it accommodate the variety of participating actors (i.e., non-state actors as well as states) and other descriptions of the areas?3 This study takes the concept of region-building (cf. Neumann 1999, 1996, 1992) as its starting point: it assumes that identity developments do not simply happen but require effort and a systematic selection of features that are advocated as being genuine to a region. The work draws upon an understanding of region-building as a discourse, in which different actors are seen as connected through their involvement with certain concepts and in certain areas and in which the actors’ knowledge or understandings cannot be assumed to be objective or apolitical. The work is interested in making apparent the particular selection of features and actors into Arctic discourse and then asking how the discourse thus described relates to understandings of the areas in other than “Arctic” literature and development. As the Arctic in this development has been extended beyond its climatical and historical delineations, it will be referred to in this work as “the Arctic”: it is not a given and unproblematized entity, but one that has been discussed

Region-building in “The Arctic”

3

into being, and is largely contested. The Arctic is thus here not seen as a unit, but as a focus for deconstruction and investigation. To highlight this constructedness, the term Arctic is bracketed as “Arctic.”4 The focal point is also squarely placed on the establishment of an Arctic international circumpolar region, which means that the work will not take up different meanings given to “north” as such, to which discussions of for instance other broader organization might have been relevant; rather, it proceeds from the definitions of “the Arctic” with special emphasis on the current political conception of the term. The study thus centers on developments that are seen as indicating contemporary ways of speaking about and constructing “the Arctic” as a recognizable field within policy and academia as well as on certain operational definitions of what the region and issues are and whom these issues and developments concern. In this, the focus of discussion is the Arctic Council and Council-related conceptions of the Arctic. This has to do, firstly, with the importance imputed to the Council in developing “the Arctic” as a region: it “has become a symbol of the emergence of the Arctic as a distinct region in the international society” (Young 2000, ch. 4, recommendation 2, para. 2). In short, the Arctic Council is the focal point of current Arctic discourse. The Arctic Council has defined the currently prominent conception of an eight-state Arctic which, in that it also determines the land areas, can be considered “Arctic.” The Arctic Council is also the parent organization of the largest systematic work undertaken on the circumpolar level (i.e. the AMAP 1997,1998), which is gaining prominence globally (e.g., UNEP 1997). Additionally, the Council has spurred further organization on basis of “the Arctic,” such as the Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region, the University of the Arctic, and the Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat (cf. Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region 2002; Huebert 1998:144; ch. 5). In the work, the main argument is the following. The circumpolar Arctic has emerged as a policy-relevant region, indeed as a “region” at all, over the last 20–30 years as a result of multiple factors. One principal factor in the development of the “Arctic” region has been the changing world context, which can be generally described as one of globalization. As advances in communication technology make possible instantaneous communication over a geographically wider scale than ever before, organization and coalitionbuilding takes place on a larger scale, and the world of actors to which the individual needs to relate is extended. The geographical conception of the region is likewise extended to large multinational areas, as states are pressured to cooperate on wide-ranging issues and to extend their own foreign policy scope. For “the Arctic,” the end of the Cold War in particular yielded the possibility to organize on a circumpolar basis and beyond traditional security concerns into the eight-state region discussed here. With this development, “the Arctic” has been used by certain actors, in consideration of their particularly vulnerable situations, to, amongst other things, strengthen their foreign policy roles in a changing environment.

4

Negotiating the Arctic

The two main state actors in circumpolar Arctic discourse have been Canada and Finland, the initiators of the Arctic Council and the AEPS respectively, and a comparative focus will initially be placed on these two states. What this comparison most clearly shows, however, is how well established and wide-ranging the Canadian discourse on “the Arctic” is. For Finland, the development of an “Arctic” region-building initiative was largely a result of the state’s relation to the USSR/Russia, and a direct response to Gorbachev’s 1987 Murmansk initiative for increased openness in Arctic and northern areas. Finland thus established an unprecedented focus on the Arctic when it seized the opportunity to re-define its foreign policy, which had long been constrained by its relation to its superpower neighbor. For Canada, on the other hand, the motivation for Arctic cooperation was well established: Arctic “northerness” had long been a factor whereby the state had defined itself, especially in sovereignty conflicts with the US but also domestically, and the Arctic was an area where Canada possessed a well-developed discourse and organization. In comparing the roles of actors involved in Arctic discourse, the work finds that the Canadian state context has been extensive in that it came to organize already parts of the AEPS and has defined Arctic discourse both in setting the issue foci and utilizing the domestic conception of an “Arctic.” The main argument of the work is that Canadian discourse dominance in a conceptualization of the “Arctic” that includes also social factors has largely determined the foci of discourse on the circumpolar “Arctic” internationally. In this relation, major actors beyond the Canadian state have included an indigenous non-governmental organization that is well established within Canada and researchers who deal with traditional Arctic conceptions in which Canada has played a large part. The view of the “Arctic” forwarded among these groups is, however, one largely related to frontier conceptions. These are prominent especially in the Canadian view of its Arctic areas, but prevalent also in Alaska, Greenland and Russia: states with a frontier conception applied to areas that have historically and climatically been seen as “Arctic.” This is revealed especially in the discussion of Canadian discourse on “the Arctic” (in ch. 6) that compares this view to that in other states. On the basis of this comparison, and the study of present Arctic discourse, the work concludes that the frontier conception of the Arctic is not part of the dominant understanding within all state areas, for some neither have the climatically arctic conditions that could have retained the areas as frontiers, nor have they developed directly in keeping with a frontier conception. While Arctic Canada is characterized by large, recently modernized land areas where indigenous peoples were until recently in the majority, the Finnish, Swedish and Norwegian north as well as Iceland are defined by significantly different dynamics, i.e., more mixed and integrated populations, less easily definable ethnicities, and areas which have been modernized earlier and are culturally more integrated into the national and international framework. The main argument is thus that there are significant differences across the eight-state

Region-building in “The Arctic”

5

“Arctic,” and that these are not brought out through the focus on Canadian descriptions and the major role that Canada plays in Arctic cooperation internationally; these differences can serve to explain the conflicts in cooperation. The representation, both directly political and narrative, of areas and peoples is thus inherently one question taken up in this work. The book is organized as follows: This first chapter describes the main arguments, theories and methods used in the work. The second chapter presents the historical view of “the Arctic” as an area of exploration and conflict and the early organizational developments in the 1970s that started to make a discourse of the Arctic as a region possible. Chapters 3 and 4 then take up the development of the Arctic Council out of the rather limited environmentally-focused initiative the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS), and the internal contradictions and conflicts that were faced in extending this initiative into sustainable development and a more integrated view of the area as an environmental-social region. The main differences and main discourse on the Arctic are then also seen as played out in the Councilrelated establishment on the basis of this new “region” of the University of the Arctic as a mechanism for organizing regional knowledge and education (ch. 5). This chapter especially shows the conflicts in Arctic discourse which manifest when the discourse is questioned. The discourse on “the Arctic” is subsequently traced in historical perspective in chapter 6 to provide an understanding of the “Arctic” label and how conceptions vary in the areas seen as “Arctic” in Council developments. The chapter thus examines the different national backgrounds and issues in viewing the Arctic with the aim of explaining the different issues and contexts subsumed under “the Arctic” in different states, some of which have not previously regarded their northern mainlands as primarily Arctic. In the final chapter (chapter 7), the mechanisms through which an Arctic region has been developed and the foci of its discourse are then discussed and criticized. On the whole, the study argues that the content and unitary conception of a region can be understood through a focus on the interlinkage between power and knowledge, i.e., in the way the discourse of the Arctic has evolved in certain state and knowledge contexts. The remainder of the present chapter describes the theoretical and methodological basis of the study: the concepts of region-building and discourse analysis as well as the historical perspective associated with the study. It outlines the constructed nature of region-building and how discourse is to be seen not only as language but as framing in that it deals with selecting the paradigmatic in a situation and, thereby, with creating identity. In the region-building approach, there is no clear delineation between epistemological and political actors: rather, the actors in region-building consist of those with authoritative narrative power. This is something that places a special focus on the role of representation in creating discourse.

6

Negotiating the Arctic

REGION-BUILDING AS A RESEARCH PERSPECTIVE In the development of large-scale international regions, globalization has been an important force. Globalization is often seen as entailing new ways and a new scale and awareness with which individuals and groups relate to the world, beyond existing categories of nation and state (cf. Robertson 1992). It results from and emerges through the unification of markets, increased networking of political institutions, and the creation of transnational cultural spaces through new communication technology. While these processes of extended trade, contact and travel have emerged increasingly over time (in some interpretations, over hundreds of years), the last fifty years or so represent a major increase in the orientation to a larger world. Yet many accounts of globalization identify not only these increasing, broad networks and a changing world-view but also the emergence of local, fragmentary, regional entities (Halliday 2000, Gamble and Payne 1996a, Amoore et al. 2000). While globalization does create the need for interaction on a larger scale than regional activities, it may be politically more viable to construct institutions for cooperation at the regional (rather than global) level, where there exists some commonality of culture, history, social systems and values, and political and security interests. The development of interaction may also take place on this scale in response to those effects of globalization felt most directly within particular regions and by earlier suppressed groups (Hurrell 1995, Gamble and Payne 1996b). This search for new forms of interaction has increased especially in the international turbulence following the end of the Cold War and under the impact of internationalization. In an effort to understand the nature of these multifaceted processes, regional developments have often been dichotomized as “regionalism” (assumed to proceed “top-down,” driven by national elites) or “regionalization” (seen as a “bottom-up” expression of previously subdued identity and cultural similarity; see e.g. Hurrell 1995, Käkönen and Lähteen-mäki 1995). Regionalization is thus seen as a process advanced by civil society and through the emergence of cooperation inside the region, while regionalism is seen as a state-led development that does not necessarily reflect understandings in the designated region. These two concepts imply that one should be able to clearly assign regional cooperation to either of these two categories. The view taken here, however, is that these categorizations obscure the way in which the development of a “regional entity” takes place. The way a region will develop is not a given but a selection made on specific historical and political grounds and dependent on which actors are able to access and involve themselves in initiatives; actors may include, for instance, both civil society and states, but only the specific sections of these that are able to involve themselves with the regional discourse. That a region is developed at all is also not a given, but a result of effort and the expenditure of political capital among the different actors.

Region-building in “The Arctic”

7

To illustrate this partial, fragmented and constructed nature of the processes, the concept of region-building has been developed (cf. Neumann 1999, 1996, 1992).5 Rather than viewing regions as either top-down or bottom-up developments of any assumed “emerging” kind, region-building sees these as actively formed through region-building processes that demand effort and are undertaken among the actors who are situated to influence descriptions. The region-building approach does not assume that areas naturally form a region in the absence of continuous efforts to construct it as such. Instead, the focus is placed on the process by which region formation proceeds. The approach is thus able to question phenomena that regionalism and regionalization treat as givens and whose construction they in fact thereby support (Neumann 1992, 1999). Region-building thus focuses on the constructed, not given, nature of regions as well as of nations; the way people and geography are imagined together as forming a unit or defined by certain characteristics; and the role of knowledge in this construction. These foci will be described below. Firstly, drawing upon work on nation-building and imagined communities, the region-building approach suggests that insights to be found in the literature on nation-building hold true also for regions (Neumann 1992, 1999). Nation-building takes place as a political process of defining and redefining an area as a nation, which it describes as possessing distinct cultural and other traits. The nation is thereby imagined as a community to which its citizens should display belonging and solidarity despite the fact that no citizen will ever meet all fellow community members (Anderson 1996). To create and distribute this view of the nation, nationalism requires narratives, “stories” of the spatial unit, that create a feeling of belonging. These stories are created in policy and by other authorized knowledgeproducing actors, and conveyed through, among other means, the media and the education system. The production of knowledge to constitute and legitimize the national identity is thus a main part of the process of building an imagined community (Paasi 2000). This applies equally to regionbuilding, where the assemblage and structuring of knowledge on a regional basis is a crucial step in talking the region into being. Region-building in the meaning used here is thus not a singular process on one level, but a process largely undertaken by those placed so as to be able to influence conceptualizations. As Applegate argues, a region cannot be predefined but rather is a set of practices that are constituted through the process of definition (Applegate 1999). It is created in and through discourse, rather than being a given unit that “simply” reflects essential traits of regions and peoples. As Paasi notes, “[t]he institutionalization of regions thus refers to the process through which various territorial units are produced and manifest themselves in various social and cultural practices” (Paasi 1996:33), in a process that comes to describe regional identity. This institutionalization usually includes several factors, which pertain to territorial imagination (Paasi 1996:33–35), all of which are prevalent in the imagination and develpment

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Negotiating the Arctic

of the “Arctic” as presented here. These are: (1) the selection of the area and shape of the region through definition and development of practices; (2) the building of a symbolic shape for the region; (3) the development of institutions of administration, government and education that support and reinforce the region as a category and identity to refer to, and; (4) the establishment more broadly in the media and popularly among those who come into contact with this framework of area definition, symbols and institutions within political and administrative structures. The region thus comes to be further reproduced by people inside and outside of direct region-building developments. This largely takes place through eventual involvement with the symbols of the region, through which descriptive content is conveyed. Symbols are here: ‘keywords’ in the dominating story of a territorially based community. The most important symbol is doubtless the name of the territorial unit or region, which usually ‘gathers’ together its historical development, its important events, episodes and memories and joins the personal histories of its inhabitants to this collective heritage. Names of regions and other localities conform to the most classic definitions of symbolism (Paasi 1996:34–35).

The basic understanding is that symbols not only reflect but mold (Rotunda 1986). A region, in the perspective taken here, is thus not a natural or given, but becomes a question of identity politics, where the identity of imagined communities of peoples and regions is continuously reshaped through discourse (Hønneland 1998). Identity becomes a relation, not a possession, and is dependent on descriptive strategies. This development of an area-based identity then, secondly, lays the ground for how people and geography are imagined together in region-building. In nation-building or region-building processes, the social imagination of peoples and areas is interrelated as “the exercise of power over people necessarily involves the creation of geographies” (Johnston 1986:364, quoted in Paasi 1996:21; cf. Neumann 1999). Here, nationalism, like regionbuilding, has a homogenizing effect and makes the created identity a yardstick. It assumes the identities created through discourse to be identical with the actual—and individually differing—experiences and situations within the designated area (Paasi 2000, Heffernan 1998). This occurs despite the fact that this created identity often essentializes, i.e. assumes peoples and areas to be definable by certain inherent traits. People in the areas in question are thereby affected by the fact that region/nation-building not only provides for but demands their self-description and relation to others by reference to this created identity. Relations to this description then create new delineations and lines of conflict among actors (Neumann 1999). As it problematizes the relationship between proclaimed identity and multifaceted reality, the region-building approach is also gaining increasing application

Region-building in “The Arctic”

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in regional as well as area studies, where otherwise the dangers of analyzing the “distinctive practices of placeness” are “legion: sentimentalism, essentialism, the Heideggerian trap of vitalizing the relation between place and being” (Applegate 1999, para. 36). Thirdly, then, rather than assuming that people will be describable through the terms used in region-building, with the risk of romanticizing and assuming identity to be directly related to place, a region-building approach sees regions as expressions of a continuous struggle over symbolic capital such as the description of space and representation in different social fields. The actors that form region-building can be found in not only state but also non-state and research bodies, and potentially include any power-holding actor and organization involved in the production of spatial conceptions inside as well as outside regions. As Paasi puts it, regions are not so much historical and cultural entities as products of regionalization policies. They exist at first perhaps in the namings, strategic definitions and proclamations of politicians, foreign policy experts and researchers (Paasi 2000:8–9; cf. Neumann 1999).

Formed through processes of region-building by these actors, regions may become crucial instruments in shaping political actions on multiple levels, including the state. This implies that a region-building approach does not recognize the state as the primary or only actor but emphasizes that all actors that are placed to affect the meaning associated with space and representation may influence discourse and the way descriptions, definitions and thus practices are formed. These then are the main points of a specific region-building orientation. Yet all of these points are applications to regional development of broader conceptions within studies of nations as imagined communities. They are drawn from broader social science notions of the world as constructed, notably Foucault’s discourse analysis approach and method. This approach is integral to the development of an understanding of region-building. As Neumann suggests, “[I]nstead of postulating a given set of interests, the region-building approach investigates interests where they are formulated, i.e. in discourse” (Neumann 1992:64).6 REGION-BUILDING AS DISCOURSE As a social constructivist approach, region-building views regions not as given but constituted through discourse. In the understanding here, discourse is the way in which speaking about things (and the selection of the things that can be spoken about) is structured to make certain things relevant and to obscure others. For present purposes, a discourse (such as that of the Arctic at one point in time) can be seen as “constituted by all that was said in all statements that named it, divided it up, described it, explained it,

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traced its developments, indicated its various correlations, judged it, and possibly gave it speech by articulating its name, discourses that were taken as its own” (Foucault 1974:32). This field of legitimate expression and practice is always delimited by what it takes in and what it leaves out, as not everything can be said. The expression of anything at all entails making a selection, and it is this selection that Foucault problematizes. This method of analyzing discourse (archaeology) examines the historically and culturally given rules that determine which discourse and understandings are produced and how this takes place. Knowledge is therefore produced through a system of rules that determines its form at the time. Indeed, the parts are only made relevant by the field that identifies and selects them (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983, Lindgren 1988).7 Foucault describes his archaeological approach thus: “The question which I ask is not about codes but about events: the law of the existence of statements, that which rendered them possible—them and none other in their place: the conditions of their singular emergence; their correlation with other previous or simultaneous events, discursive or otherwise” (Foucault 1991:59). Here, we should “seek the immediate reason for what were said not in the said, nor in the men that said them, but in the system of discursivity” (Foucault 1974:129): what the groups concerned see as knowledge “is that of which one can speak in a discursive practice” (ibid: 182). This includes seeking to define the delimitations of the sayable for a given period and society: what it is possible to discuss and what everyone recognizes or disagrees with, among which individuals, groups or classes, and how these legitimize their practices historically, as well as how “struggle for control of discourses [is] conducted between classes, nations, linguistic, cultural or ethnic collectivities” (Foucault 1991:60). One would thus look for the delimiting features of discourse: what is taken up as well as what is silenced. These “silences” or cracks in discourse, as conceptions which are perhaps mentioned but not included, or on the basis of which discourse is criticized for example by external groups, serve an important role in indicating the limits of discourse. Because of this selecting role of discourse, the ability to speak in a manner and on a topic recognized in discourse is also always a delimited ability: “the property of discourse—in the sense of the right to speak, ability to understand, licit and immediate access to the corpus of already formulated statements, and the capacity to invest this discourse in decisions, institutions, or practices— is in fact confined…to a particular group of individuals” (Foucault 1974:68) and may in fact be the place for a “phantasmatic representation, an element of symbolization” (ibid.). That is, by enforcing one particular understanding of, for instance, a region, the actors who are further enabled are those who conform to and can speak on this understanding. In contrast, actors who do not embrace the relevant perspective will experience difficulty in becoming included as political actors. “The political” is therefore constituted through discourse. This understanding of discourse is thus not simply a matter of “language”

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or a study of “language” (cf. George 1994). Rather, discourse analysis is the study of the connection of language (what can be said) to what is obscured as a result of this naturalization of a manner and assumption of speaking (Ackleson 2000:6, Waever 1996:6). Rather than being about language, it is about the structure of delimitation and how this is established.8 Here, the very selection of vocabularies summarizes information and suppresses that which is inconvenient in relation to established discourse (Green 1987). Thus, to understand the “argumentative meaning” of a statement or a discourse, one should not examine merely the words, the expressions, but also examine the positions which are being criticized, or against which a justification is being mounted. Without knowing these counter-positions, the argumentative meaning will be lost (Shotter 1992:91).

This position of seeking the structure of delimitation, what is included and what is silenced, has gained broad currency in social constructivism largely through the impact of Foucault’s work. It is not restricted to Foucault, however, although he is perhaps one of the authors who has developed it most strongly. For example the concept of framing has been utilized in policy studies as one main means by which policy-making takes place (Rein and Schön 1993:145ff, Schön and Rein 1994). To forestall potential misunderstandings of what this work seeks to illustrate, the concept of framing will be introduced to show in which sense (not only language) discourse is understood to operate here. Framing indicates the way in which symbols and key elements that guide and constrain Arctic discourse may subsequently be defined. The following sections will also outline some points relevant to domination of discourse, which have been structured around the concept of hegemony, and instances in which the overarching selectivity and discourse domination some authors impute to that concept are relevant for this work. THE OPERATIONS OF DISCOURSE: FRAMING AND HEGEMONY Framing is in Rein and Schön’s use of the term, a “way of selecting, organizing, interpreting, and making sense of a complex reality to provide guideposts for knowing, argumentation, analyzing, persuading, and acting” (Rein and Schön 1993:146). An understanding of social reality can only be created through framing; to at all make sense of complex, information-rich situations demands selectivity and organization, which is what “framing” means. The frames that shape policies are usually assumed, tacit, and we argue from our tacit frames, which might not have been questioned (such as the “Arctic” as an area to be viewed predominantly in environmental terms), to our explicit policy positions (such as the “Arctic” as “vulnerable”). This is how policy

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problems are constructed: through frames that integrate facts, theories, and interests, and determine what is relevant and what is not (Schön and Rein 1994). These “[f]rames are not free-floating but are grounded in the institutions that sponsor them, and policy controversies are disputes among institutional actors who sponsor conflicting frames” (ibid.: 29). Frames are thus self-referential, but not self-interpretive, and become limited to certain actors, who explain their relevance through them. Only when a policy terrain (such as the “Arctic”) has been named does the name seem natural, but only to those who have had a part in creating it or are schooled in its discourse (Rein and Schön 1993:151). Framing thus creates policy objects—it has an impact on practices. Here, the policy story, the policy frame, is constructed from a value/feeling coherency, and the facts are assembled to bring out this value.9 Into which sort of coherency “framing” facts are assembled may depend on the situation itself, or actors’ past experiences and understanding (Tammi and Eisto 1993:111). “Framing is guided by the way in which the decision problem is initially presented and faced as well as by the norms, habits, and expectations of the decision maker” (Tversky and Kahneman 1987:73, quoted in Tammi and Eisto 1993:104); that is, it may be a result of experience or socialization, for example. This selectivity of discourse, understood as corresponding to what is targeted through the concept of framing (not only language but manifesting itself and observable in language), is what makes possible, even necessary, both the discussion of dominating, hegemonic, discourses, and the means by which discourse exercises governing power. The concept of discourse selectivity itself invites discussion of the degree to which discourse allows for other expressions and thereby for ways of arguing for or against different actions, or at all conceptually understanding or valuing practices. This is an issue Foucault disposes of by emphasizing the omnipresence of power, a perspective criticized by some authors (cf. e.g. Smart 1989, Poster 1987, Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983 for a discussion). To explicitly emphasize the extent to which discourse acts determining, others have instead attempted to apply the concept of “hegemonic discourse” to designate “a lived system of meanings and values, not simply an ideology, a sense of reality beyond which it is, for most people, difficult to move, a lived dominance and subordination, internalized” (Williams 1977:108–115, quoted in Thompson 1999, para. l).10 As the concept of hegemony has been developed within a different context than the Foucauldian, however, it is difficult to fully reconcile it with the Foucauldian framework (cf. Smart 1989, Poster 1987, Gibson 1999, Beere 2000). The concept can be used to note, with Beere, that it is arguable that, at the level of common sense, hegemony is often achieved in a community or social framework. Common-sense understandings often contribute the first conceptualization or attraction of focus that prompts a search for knowledge. What is understood on this basis may become problematized, but the underlying perspective is often retained. Despite the fractures and contradictions within common-sense

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ideologies, even the notion of “common sense” implies a degree of unity in ideas similar to that which the term “hegemony” does, even if those ideas are lived rather than necessarily problematized and analyzed (Beere 2000:50). Such dominant hegemonic elements will exist in any conceptualizations, but especially those which are naturalized and assumed rather than reflected upon.11 Beere (2000:50) notes: “Just as subjectivity is made possible by the fact that meaning can never be fully referential, what makes hegemony possible is the open and incomplete character of the social.” Thus, as the social is not fully transparent or the same to all actors, the basis for shared discourse is often derived from commonsensical factors. This is due to the lack of exact fixity of social signifiers (e.g., the “Arctic”). Discourse is here strongly constrained by its historicity, communities of interpretation, form of discussion, organization and understanding: “no social practice or set of relations floats free of the determinate effects of the concrete relations in which they have been located” (Hall 1996b: 45, quoted in Beere 2000:50–51). In this, [t]he contingent, non-logical nature of articulated groupings of different elements and social forces does not mean that all relations and connections are entirely arbitrary and equally possible; on the contrary…there are ‘lines of tendential force’ that effectively privilege the articulation of particular elements under particular historical and material circumstances, and may present powerful barriers to alternative possibilities Similarly…the taking up of subject positions within discourse is not arbitrary, or simply a matter of making a conscious choice between a range of equally possible and available subjectivities; rather, ‘lines of tendential force,’ created by discursively produced desires and by the particular material circumstances in which people are located, shape the articulation of individual identities (Beere 2000:51).

This particularity and special character of discourse as that which must be referred to for recognition is thus limited and defined by access to the discourse in terms of participation in it and the legitimacy of certain concerns or perspectives in a given issue area. Accordingly, no discourse is equally accessible to all actors, as those wishing to affect it must have descriptive power and the ability to communicate within the discourse and, in addition, be placed so that they can access and be listened to within an organization or the discourse. In practice, then, a discourse may be defined so narrowly or focus on such specific criteria that only those actors that relate most closely to discourse core or hegemonic design are able to express themselves. Stokke has discussed the domestic hegemonic situation as “marked by a highly regulated domestic decision-making arena where access criteria are strict” (Stokke 1998:138). These access criteria include openness to direct participation in the decisionmaking processes and the selection of perspectives seen as legitimate in the given issue area. Although Stokke discusses the domestic in particular, he

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emphasizes the interactions between international, transnational and subnational processes and their relation to the domestic (Stokke 1998:139–143). Indeed, one may highlight the importance of existing structures in forming emerging cooperation: international cooperation is not formulated, and certainly not implemented, in a vacuum. They [international initiatives] enter a ‘regulatory space’ already occupied by a set of problem definitions and policy strategies, as well as with constellations of supporting and opposing societal and bureaucratic forces (Hanf and Underdal 1998:161).

It is through “these sub-systems that limits are set as to what international organizations can do; and it is through them that the decisions taken in the international organizations are transmitted back to the states for implementation” (Hanf and Underdal 1998:164). Domination of a discourse, or discourse hegemony, is thus likely to be exercised through the very design of an arena in relation to available resources, such as existing networks. Accordingly, the task in analyzing discourse selectivity in international organizations is to take into account not just one single organization as a given, but the way in which this has come into being and been constructed through effort, as well as which actors have invested that effort. The way an area or policy is described may therefore change but in relation to established markers: the problems of “the Arctic” may be described as “environmental protection,” “indigenous cooperation” or “infrastructure development” largely depending on the ways in which those who have been involved in the cooperation on its specific grounds find most conducive to their self-construction and building of policy roles in the cooperation. It also indicates the historical scope of labels, which, once established, continue to influence conceptualizations and reproduce the actors involved in these. The challenge is thus to clarify how such an area or policy has been constructed, and the nature of its particularity, in other words, what it leaves out as well as what it takes in, i.e., what it directs attention to and which practices it creates. This includes how and which actors come to be involved and the characteristics of the framing on which discourse is based. It is this shape of constraint, in that what constrains discourse is also what forms it and constructs its objects and subjects, that is the focus here. It highlights the identities of the actors or decision makers, and the perspective from which description—in this case region-building regarding “the Arctic”—takes place. Region-building becomes a question of representation, with all the difficulties this entails. This is an approach that includes attention to a number of factors. The sections to follow outline the need for attention to the historical development of discourse, the awareness of the partiality of actors and of knowledge, and the inherently critical approach that discourse analysis entails.

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VIEWS OF HISTORICITY The general idea of this work is to describe how Arctic regional cooperation has developed into its present form, define the main discourse on (or framing of) this cooperation and relate these to principal actors in the development. The assumption here is that region-building is not a neutral, objective arena but a political one, where actors can be traced throughout the development and in defining it. The “Arctic” region is not simply an objective “Arctic region” (and neither the current scope of what is “Arctic” nor the thought of it as a “region” are old phenomena); rather, it is one that has been composed on particular grounds and by specific actors whose experience largely determines its expression. The region-building approach makes clear that not all actors are equally able to access the discourse area. As an idea and assumption in certain fields, “the Arctic” has some very substantial implications in the way it directs thoughts and categorization. These are not easily dismissed, and there is no way in which the discourse and connotations that have been developed of “the Arctic” can be wiped clean to the point where the concept would “simply” indicate the presently denoted area. Against this background, a region-building approach highlights the need to include historical developments. The present work is structured accordingly and proceeds from the establishment of an “international Arctic region” to the current discussion; this is a structure that shows us some of the basic delimitations and outlines the way in which “the Arctic” is discussed. The study then proceeds to problematize this seeming unity and uncover the historically developed character of the category and actors of “the Arctic.” Thus, different conceptualizations (and non-conceptualizations) of “the Arctic” are traced to developments of this view in domestic and other contexts, showing that their “unity” or “necessary development” in the way they are spoken of today is highly partial and a result of specific historic situations. This approximates a second part of the approach and methodology that has been drawn up in region-building orientations. Paasi writes: The new regional geography—which could be called interpretative geohistory—inevitably contains a historical dimension, which renders it possible to trace the social processes, actions and experiences that are constitutive for each other even if they are spread across a number of temporal scales. …the object is to analyse both conceptually and empirically various time-space-specific ‘layers’ which ultimately constitute a whole, and not separate pieces of knowledge (Paasi 1996:76).

Paasi suggests here that the concept of genealogy, used by Foucault to develop discourse analysis further, perhaps best characterizes the aim of making the “historical construction of spatiality visible and understandable” (Paasi 1996:76). Neumann, referring to Foucault, also draws upon this understanding that present-day representations draw upon the memory of previous

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representations (Neumann 1999:62). “Very few politicians and diplomats, and only the most ardent positivist scholars, would probably object to the genealogical presupposition that the way a political question has been variously discussed in the past will impinge on the political business at hand” (Neumann 1999:66). The study will thus delve somewhat deeper into Foucault’s work, to outline how discourse analysis as defined here will understand the material and draw upon a historical view to understand the specificity of present constructions. In his work on discourse, Foucault has over time developed a historical approach which centers on viewing the way understandings have been determined and defined for different reasons at different times, deciding which statements are produced and in which way. Dreyfus and Rabinow view his method of “writing the history of the present” as “interpretative analytics,” a way of lifting out the paradigmatic in a situation (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983: xxvi; cf. Lindgren 1988). Foucault’s method here emphasizes the relation of phenomena, their origination and development (in contrast to conventional history, which most often centers on their origin, identity, reason and development). It is composed of two parts. Firstly, the archaeological dimension, what has here been described as discourse analysis, makes possible the analysis of the rules of formation. “The archaeological dimension of the analysis made it possible to examine the forms themselves; its genealogical dimension enabled me to analyze the formation out of the practices and the modifications undergone by the latter” (Foucault 1985:11–12; cf. Lindgren 1988). The “effective history” or genealogy then allows for the historical study of the formation of discourse and makes possible analysis of how these have developed, taken their modus operandi and specific manifestations; it traces the processes that are constitutive of the event (Lindgren 1988; McNay 1994:89). Unlike the regular writing of history, this approach does not attempt to provide a linear, absolute description but highlights the development and constant struggle between groups, which is constitutive of the formation of understandings.12 Early on, Foucault had a conception of space or clearing in which subjects and objects emerge to constitute discourse. Through genealogy Foucault understands this field or clearing as the result of long-term practices and studies the emergence of a battle which defines and clears a space. Subjects do not first preexist and later enter into combat or harmony. In genealogy subjects emerge on a field of battle and play their roles, there and there alone (Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983:109).

Genealogy and archaeology may thus be seen as complementary, where archaeology analyzes the conditions that genealogy then allows to be traced (Dean 1997:33). “[G]enealogy is conducted in the presence of certain issues problematized by contemporary social struggles” (Dean 1997:35). In this work, such an approach would mean clarifying not only how “the

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Arctic” came to develop as an international region in this time and through which understandings and actors, but also its emergence through limited fields and on the basis of particular historic conceptions. These features are what will be traced, based on the description of salient features of the present discourse. The intention is thus not to write a full history, of, say, an area within a determined time period, but to trace the emergence of a perspective. What is required is that one looks beyond given reasons and problematize the way in which, in the present case, Arctic cooperation is formed from several different historically constituted sources and actors who pursue different needs. This of course makes the question of power and its relation to knowledge central, particularly in considering the question of whom this approach provides with an opportunity for expression. THE ACTOR AND KNOWLEDGE IN REGION-BUILDING Expanding upon what was said earlier on the role of knowledge and people in region-building leads to another key point: the understanding of the actor in region-building. As has been noted, region constructions may be used for multiple gains by multiple actors but can only be used in this way by those able to access the discourse. Rather than taking the narrow view that regionbuilding is undertaken, for instance, as a direct expression of regional identity, or only by those entitled to act on behalf of a people (i.e. states or other actors within the formal political system), actors are seen here as those who can gain access and legitimization in (and of) the region-building process. The institutionalisation of a region is always a manifestation of the spatial divisions of labour and power relations that are embedded within it. Hence some individuals, groups and classes are always more active in the production of regions, while most people tend to be reproducers (Paasi 1996:34).

Given the important role that the creation of knowledge or narrative on the region has, the actors active in region-building most clearly include those who produce knowledge. Region-building is seen here as consisting of “some people or groups (teachers, politicians, journalists etc.) who have ‘authoritative power,’ are specialized in the production of narrative accounts, which bind people together and constitute otherness in various social practices” (Paasi 1996:210). The relationship between different groups is constituted through discourse and thus cannot in practice be assumed to be directly or fully delimited by profession, or by a differentiation between a political and a knowledge role. Instead, actors in the formal political system, striving, for example, to gain a larger foreign policy role for their state (or in their bureaucracy) are seen as requiring the knowledge-building which serves to discuss a region into being and which is supplied by knowledge communities such as academia. Similarly, actors with access to the bureaucracy, such as

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pressure groups and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), can serve both as legitimizers of the process (in return for their impact upon it) and, indeed, play a necessary role in maintaining the legitimacy of the bureaucracy in certain constituencies. Rather than being distinguished as separate entities or systems, then, knowledge and the political are seen as constitutive of each other. Conceptually, from a Foucauldian viewpoint, power and knowledge are not external to each other, but mutually generative: “there is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations” (Foucault 1979:27–28, quoted in Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983:115). Rather, the networks of power-knowledge are what come to constitute the actor, and what this actor can see as knowledge.13 Instead of its acting as an objective tool for “truth,” then, Foucault views knowledge as being “that of which one can speak in a discursive practice and which is specified by that fact” (Foucault 1974:182). This mutual constitutiveness of power and knowledge is what makes criticism and historical analysis of discourse necessary, for certain perspectives become seen as objective knowledge and attain the status of “truth.” In order to lay this constructedness bare and analyze the powerknowledge relations that are part of it, “one must analyze institutions from the standpoint of power relations, rather than vice versa…the fundamental point of anchorage of the relationships, even if they are embodied and crystallized in an institution, is to be found outside the institution” (Foucault 1983:222). Thus, the development of an organization and the understanding of knowledge forwarded within it should be understood as embedded, existing in and generating discourse, rather than as analyzable apart from the larger context. This is a focus common to constructivist social science. Viewing the standards that define knowledge as community-created conventions of specific contexts highlights the fact that descriptions are actually specific community responses to certain problems, situations, particular needs, or interests (cf. Neufeld 1995:43). As Fischer and Forester put it, from a different perspective: If analysts’ ways of representing reality are necessarily selective, they seem as necessarily bound up with relations of power, agenda setting, inclusion and exclusion, selective attention, and neglect. If analysts’ ways of representing policy and planning issues must make assumptions about causality and responsibility, about legitimacy and authority, and about interests, needs, values, preferences, and obligations, then the language of policy and planning analyses not only depicts but also constructs the issues at hand (Fischer and Forester 1993:1).

While this view on questioning representation might seem quite far from current practices of analysis in international relations, it is an emerging

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perspective. Neufeld notes: “The point of reflexivity is, after all, that the study of world politics always has been informed by political agendas, and that it is time that the content of those agendas be brought out into the open and critically assessed” (Neufeld 1995:69). This is marked by, for example, an emphasis on the “importance of the ‘intersubjective meanings’ of international institutional activity,” and that such an approach “stresses the impact of human subjectivity and the embeddedness of contemporary international institutions in preexisting practices” (Keohane 1988:381 and 379, respectively, quoted in and with emphasis by Neufeld 1995:87). This of course does not, as Neufeld states, deny the patterns of behavior that have been identified by positivistic analysis; rather, these are understood not as timeless or universalized, but as a “self-limiting form of ‘instrumental rationality’ severely circumscribed in its capacity for fundamental selfreflection” (Neufeld 1995:92). This leads us to the critical approach that necessarily accompanies a view of regions as constructed through discourse. THE INHERENTLY “CRITICAL” APPROACH OF DISCOURSE ANALYSIS AND A REGION-BUILDING PERSPECTIVE The region-building approach, as well as Foucault’s method, are inherently focused on what could be called criticism, urging us to “separate out, from the contingency that has made us what we are, the possibility of no longer being, doing, or thinking what we are, do, or think” (Foucault 1984c: 46, quoted in Simons 1995:17). As Neumann notes, the existence of a region is regularly seen as given in non-region-building literature. “Making these assumptions is an inherently political act, and it must therefore be reflectively acknowledged and undertaken as such” (Neumann 1999:122). Where region-builders attempt to make the region natural and unquestionable, the role of the analyst is thus to expose the way it has been constituted in a historical scope.14 The activation of certain cultural or other traits as meaningful constitutes a political act and should be exposed by the analyst in this form (Neumann 1999:116, 140). This is also, as explained earlier, why the concept “Arctic” is bracketed in this work: to highlight its constructedness and that it is not viewed as given or even as an entity except in region-building. The question is then from which vantage point criticism should be undertaken, as all criticism will necessarily not only expose but expose in relation to some expectation of what a development fulfils and does not fulfil. Here, as Smart synthesizes, genealogy can be seen as research directed towards a resurrection of local, popular, and disqualified knowledges through the production of critical discourses. The function of such discourses is to interrupt the smooth passage of ‘regimes of truth,’ to disrupt those forms of knowledge which have assumed a self-evident quality, and to engender a state of uncertainty in those responsible for servicing

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Negotiating the Arctic the network of power-knowledge relations, for example ‘the judges of normality,’ teachers, doctors, social workers, etc Therefore, at the very heart of genealogical analysis, is the activity of critique, rather than, for example, the provision of programs, prophecies, or policies (Smart 1989:135).

Yet, what this critique should be grounded in is, according to Foucault, largely an open question and dependent on the values and norms within existing resistance. Foucault observes: Critique doesn’t have to be the premise of a deduction that concludes: this then is what needs to be done. It should be an instrument for those who fight, those who resist and refuse what is. Its use should be in processes of conflict and confrontation, essays in refusal. It doesn’t have to lay down the law for law. It isn’t a stage in a programming. It is a challenge directed to what is (Foucault 1981a: 13, quoted in Smart 1989:135–136).15

This commitment to depoliticizing his notion of critique has earned Foucault both praise, for not grounding critique in an external system of valuation, and disapproval (cf. e.g. Poster 1987, Dean 1997). Critics have regularly noted that the designation of certain sides as “resistance” is itself perspectival and the difficulty of avoiding the other pitfall, i.e. describing a development from the side of adversaries (who may be terrorists as well as “subdued groups,” cf. Neufeld 1995, Gibson 1999). The suggestion here is then that one basis for criticism is the repudiation of essentialism. Essentialization of categories, areas and peoples makes difficult the continued contestation of discourse and fundamentally tries to capture these as conserved in time, with little access to means for opposing the situation. As Barry Hindess describes it: “Essentialism…refers to a mode of analysis in which social phenomena are analyzed not in terms of their specific conditions of existence and their effects with regard to other social relations and practices but rather as the more or less adequate expression of an essence” (Hindess 1977:95, quoted in Wickham 1986:149). Foucault notes this resistance to essentialized description as a main aim of genealogy: the “deepest truth that the genealogist has to reveal is ‘the secret that [things] have not essence or that their essence was fabricated in a piecemeal fashion from alien forms’” (Foucault 1977:142, quoted within Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983:107). In its description of things in terms of unchanging forms, essentialization is thus a conservation of power and a threat to the development of “resistance.” As Beere (2000:57) concludes, on basis of her discussion of discourse, “it seems clear that representations that work to produce fixed identities based on essentialist or universalist assumptions constitute threats to the existing and future achievements of ongoing hegemonic struggles for a more socially just society.” Thus, representations that work to establish and maintain

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universalised notions, making these appear natural and establishing essential links between them, can be read as working to undermine the struggles to articulate new formations. A critique with this aim is necessarily linked not only to ways of description (for example, whether essentialist assumptions are made) but also to the need for an activity or description to be “credible to the governed as well as the governing” (Gordon 1991:48). In itself, an emphasis on power and its interlinkage with knowledge leads to a focus on how power is wielded. This is also how Foucault defines “governance”: as actions that “structure the possible field of action of others” (Foucault 1983:221).16 The question of how power is wielded must thus always be approached on the level of who are directly affected by the possession of power and the description it makes (McNay 1994). In liberal theory, this means both ensuring the responsible exercise of power and the representation of “the community” of the people: “most important, of course, is the question which remains in the background, i.e., who ‘the people’ are, in other words, the universe which requires representation and makes itself ‘present’” (Kratochwil 2000:193).17 In this work, the constant question will therefore be precisely this: who are those claimed to be represented? Which characteristics are ascribed to them? Is this something groups broader than actors in region-building can be shown to consent to? As representation necessarily attributes some kind of identity characteristics to those represented, these are inevitably relational, not essential, and should not be allowed to take a form that captures areas and peoples in a static state that limits their possibility of challenging discourse. METHODOLOGY OF THE STUDY This work will thus attempt to describe the discourse on the Arctic as it is manifested in discussions dealing with definitions of the Arctic and the recent development of Arctic region-building, Arctic Council development, cooperation and conflict on sustainable development work within the Arctic Council context, and discussions leading towards a Council-supported University of the Arctic. A historical interpretation is then made of the main lines of discourse lines constitutive of and utilized in Arctic region-building, especially in relation to differing circumstances in the states involved. The study is based primarily on policy and research texts pertaining to “the Arctic” as a region during the period of recent region-building (from the late 1970s until the present and especially the development of the Arctic Council in the 1990s). While the study is not one of “language” but of the selection of what we are even able to speak about, “text” is viewed here as the way this is manifested in an analyzable form. To make a text analysis in this sense is to study the way social reality and practice is linguistically constructed (cf. Fairclough 1992:169). “Text” is thus used here to refer to

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any product written or spoken, whereby, for example, the transcript of an interview or a conversation is regarded as a “text” (Fairclough 1992:4). These linguistic manifestations are what can be collected in the form of articles, books or interviews, which are all constrained by traditions and histories in the areas researched, the identities of participants in the discourse or who are drawn into the discourse, and continuously influenced by political and other considerations. Here, “an intertextual perspective stresses the historicity of texts: how they always constitute additions to existing ‘chains of speech communication’ [Bakhtin 1986:94], consisting of prior texts to which they respond” (Fairclough 1992:84). The analysis thus focuses not on the “past” but on material that is interpreted conceptually and critically with the intention of making visible the way categories and spatiality have been historically constructed (Paasi 2000). The selection of documents has taken place using a snowball sampling method, where references to an international Arctic political region have been followed to other references, and so on. Writings of key civil servants and well-known academics, which make up part of the theoretical and conceptual basis of Arctic region-building, have been critical in defining this discourse area. The analysis draws in particular on official documentation and public debate, in effect the narratives of and about both current developments on the Arctic Council and the wider coming into being of an “Arctic” political region (cf. Heikka 2001, Ackleson 2000). This selection follows the principle Neumann has utilized in his work: an element is major if it is already occupying a shared place and is thus part of a frame of reference which is widely shared. If one concentrates on books, journals and newspapers which have been widely reacted to in print, it is likely that one can approximate these elements. In this sense, there is such a thing as reading enough (Neumann 1996:3; emphasis in original).

Thus, in principle, the main source material of the study consists of textual material documenting the worldview of those involved in textual production related to Arctic region-building (politicians, senior civil servants, academics, etc.). Apart from the library study that has been basis for the work as a whole, chapters 3 and 4 are to some degree based upon policy documents collected by Tennberg for her studies (1998 and 2000), which have been supplemented with more recent and additional documents. This documentation carries the same biases as those noted by Tennberg (2000). As record-keeping in the AEPS and the Arctic Council has been neither continuous nor structured and there is no full open archive, the available material from meetings is not complete; in particular, documents from the Russian side of the cooperation were not always available (Tennberg 2000:11). Chapter 5, on the development of a regional university, derive from detailed field notes and in some cases recordings of meetings of the University of the Arctic feasibility study working group, held between January 1998 and April

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1999. At this time and for two months preceding the period, the researcher was an observer at the Circumpolar Universities Association secretariat for the University of the Arctic. The use of primary data on the case has been restricted to the feasibility study phase, formally ending with the approval of the University of the Arctic at the ministerial meeting of the Arctic Council in September 1998. The observational data were supplemented by informal interviews and conversations, working group and staff correspondence, media materials and document analysis. The researcher received all material sent to working group members. Furthermore, the researcher undertook interviews with those members of the feasibility study working group available between October and November 1998 in conjunction with a meeting of the group. The interviews18 were transcribed together with recordings from the April 1998 working group meeting, from which the quotations from meetings derive. As the work observes Arctic cooperation across eight states, it necessarily includes some quotes not originally in English. In general in the work, all quoted text not originally in English has been translated by this author, with the translation indicated in the reference for the quote and the original quote made available as a footnote to the citation. AIMS OF THE WORK On balance, then, the aims of this work are threefold. Firstly, it seeks to provide a critical constructivist discussion of Arctic region-building. Here, “critical” entails an approach that takes neither the meaning of “Arctic” nor the existence of such a region as given, but as a result of region-building efforts and particular understandings that need to be traced rather than assumed as general. The development of “the Arctic” as a circumpolar region is a fairly recent one and one which has been marked by internal expertise development and great excitement. Thus, as far as work concerned with the “Arctic” goes, the perspective taken in this thesis is a fairly novel one: work on “Arctic” issues can be viewed as primarily participating in regionbuilding, as can be seen from the archive researched in this study (cf. Hønneland 1995, 1998). Secondly, in focusing on a region not as a given or natural entity, the present study is also one of representation and categorization: of the close relationship between discourse and resources and how simplifications of “Arctic” and “Arctic people” result from highly unbalanced descriptive power over time. Here, the study illustrates the reliance of region-building (similarly to other large-scale descriptionary measures) upon the enforcement of descriptionary features, dependent to large extent upon their acceptance in established communities of interpretation. In this respect, it constitutes a study of how replication of models takes place through discourse rather than by a “rationality” that determines organizational development. Thirdly, in viewing the establishment of an organization (here the Arctic Council) with a very broad environment-related focus, this work is also a study of abilities to respond institutionally to the increasingly complex and

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multifactor problems associated with globalization and global environmental change. While the Arctic Council is constituted with a focus on environmental protection and sustainable development, the way in which this focus has been directed has largely been a product of the groups involved in cooperation. From a focus such as sustainable development, the range of initiatives is almost infinite and the selectivity of issues is thus defined directly in the organization. An examination of the institutional dynamics of, for example, environmental politics must thus be seen as taking in not only environmental aspects in a narrow sense but also the way we design organizations and institutions, and whether these are sensitive and adjustable to problem definitions and dynamics in the areas they concern. This organizational assessment cannot be made without attention to the broader context of the establishment of the organization, its less explicit aims and the way discourse operates to set up categories as shortcuts to thought, that is, framings that foreshadow outcomes and problem selections.

CHAPTER 2

Region-building and Definitions of “The Arctic”

The development of the present international “Arctic” region has been a typical region-building response to globalizing forces; it is international region development on a scale for which integrated cooperation would not previously have been manageable. Region-building was here a rather novel development, as previous agreements specifically for the Arctic were few and narrow in scope (such as fur seal and polar bear protection conventions). Accordingly, the selection of actors has largely been based on historical views of the Arctic as an area of exploration and conflict. Its special direction and content have been supplied by the networks that identified with the symbol of the Arctic, so to speak, an “Arctic label.” This chapter aims to survey the development of Arctic cooperation: it proceeds from a focus on the High Arctic in exploration and how this focus is retained in Arctic-Antarctic comparisons to show how the politically delineated “Arctic” was formed into a region-building arena with emerging research and policy networks that extends as far south as 60° north latitude and includes significant parts of eight states. The chapter thus pays special attention to the way “the Arctic” has been defined environmentally and physically as well as politically. While the discourse is not only confined to this geographical delimitation, it is important to understand how “the Arctic” has been bounded: in enforcing a territorial boundary for certain identity characteristics, one is also selecting an area within which people will need to relate their self-representation and categorization in terms of the chosen characteristics (assuming that the regionbuilding process is successful). An analysis of region-building should therefore problematize the correspondence between spatial delineation and conceptual understanding. To this end, the chapter introduces the problem of the limited basis of “the Arctic” as an understanding that was historically derived primarily from the more restricted, northernmost polar desert and semi-desert

25

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High Arctic but nevertheless made prominent in current geographically and issue-specific extended cooperation. It also introduces the main theme of a view of “the Arctic” guided by policy-research cooperation and related to foreign policy as a perspective that is informed by historical understandings of the historically and climatically more restricted area. To provide an understanding of the different factors that have gone into creating “the Arctic” as it is seen today, the first sections of the chapter touch upon the period of exploration and comparisons to the Antarctic, definitions and research understandings of the Arctic, and the security focus on the Arctic during the Cold War. The subsequent parts of the chapter then outline the development of the “Arctic” as an international region through, among other things, establishment of international state and research initiatives. THE HIGH ARCTIC OF EXPLORATION AND COMPARISON WITH THE ANTARCTIC: THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A PERSPECTIVE The build-up of an “Arctic” arena and creation of the image of the “Arctic” largely took place during the age of exploration.1 Arikaynen writes: “For a long time the ardent desire to know the Arctic derived inspiration from three great aims: to discover and develop the Northern Sea Route [of travel between Europe and Asia, north of Russia]; to discover and develop the Northwest Passage [between eastern and western North America, north of Canada]; and to reach the North Pole” (Arikaynen 1992:192). Here, the Arctic was, as American explorer Peary wrote, seen as a “setting in which fame and fortune could be gained” (quoted in Riffenburgh 1993:166). Even with the development of airplanes and wireless communication, the North Pole remained a difficult target and a continuous challenge to both sovereignty extension and profitable drama. The age of exploration in the Arctic thus lasted a long time, as it took until the advent of the airship and longrange flight in the 1920s to accurately map the area and the extent of claimable land and resources; the Pole was not reached until 1926 (by Roald Amundsen) (cf. Holland 1994). Throughout this time, explorations often combined geopolitical and exploratory goals; they combined practical, scientific and even commercial purposes with the pursuit of national prestige (Knoepflmacher and Tennyson 1977:95).2 The fame and fortune of polar exploration also related to going far into the unknown: what was spoken of as Arctic was here to a large extent the polar desert and semi-desert High Arctic3 (a much smaller area than that treated in international cooperation today). To a large extent, states competed for claimable land, characteristic of a broader “scramble for the globe” including both the Arctic and the Antarctic areas as well as the “new lands” of sub-Saharan Africa (Riffenburg 1993). Arctic exploration and science was thus undertaken not only by the states bordering on the Arctic Ocean (the US, Canada, USSR/Russia, Denmark-Greenland and Norway) but also by actors such as Germany, the UK, Italy and Poland.

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Land and resource conflicts, however, occurred predominantly between northern states—mainly the US, Canada and the Soviet Union/Russia. As late as in the first decades of the 1900s, there existed no statute or regulation that clearly defined the boundaries for all states in the Arctic Ocean. To be able to claim a sector of the area up to the Pole, the littoral states Canada and the Soviet Union in the 1920s argued that their coastal reach should be extended directly northwards—the same argument that was used in Antarctica by claimants to that newly explored area. The US, however, did not support the claims made by Canada and the Soviet Union (Horensma 1991). This was then the start of extended sea sovereignty conflicts in the Arctic between the US and Canada, and, to some degree, between other sea and coastal states, i.e., the USSR/Russia, Denmark-Greenland, Iceland, and Norway (which in 1920 gained a large Arctic area through Svalbard) (see Fig. 1 and 2). There have also been conflicts to this day over coastal and sea resources such as oil and fishing, notably between states such as Norway and the USSR/ Russia, and between Canada and the US (cf. e.g. Bankes 1987; Østreng 1992:35; Hitchins and Liander 1991:310, Stålvant 1982). Exploration was not, however, a matter exclusively for states, as mentioned: political, technological, and scientific developments influenced both national and personal participation in exploration, and involved large numbers of scientists, explorers and adventurers, the writing of travelogues and the holding of lectures (Riffenburg 1993). Given the recency with which we have been able to gain certain first-hand knowledge of the polar areas, the image of the Arctic conveyed to the public from these ventures was to a large extent a peculiar, dramatized one: going to exotic destinations with preconceptions based on the report of their predecessors…they [explorers] had, not surprisingly, assimilated the information that most closely confirmed their expectations, while ignoring that which seemed contradictory. This circular pattern was self-perpetuating, as most of the books published about distant lands reinforced the others (Riff-enburgh 1993:42).

Among the large public audience for travelogues, and in what soon achieved a sort of “common sense” understanding, the Arctic was up into the early 1900s mainly as the areas where explorers travelled—and in the way it had been described by exploration. The main understanding during the time of exploration was one of “the Arctic” as an environmental, largely uninhabited entity, seen as sublime and with the struggle of man against nature as its main social element. Spuffold, for example, describes “the European perception of polar travel as an activity wholly separate—in mood and technique, aims and expertise” from any every-day or naturalized understanding of these areas as places of living (Spuffold 1997:189, italics original). Against the image of the Arctic as an inhospitable wilderness, which human exploration only with the greatest expenditure of effort could reach, the Inuit

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(Eskimos) who lived in the climatically arctic areas of northernmost Canada, Greenland, Russia and Alaska both attracted attention and became described in a mythic sense; the presence of Inuits complicated “the visions of exploring bravery predicated on the idea of an empty Arctic” (ibid.). As elsewhere on the globe, the explorers judged the groups they encountered on basis of their own civilizations: to which degree they possessed technical advances, habits and cultures similar to the explorers’ own and which the explorers’ could understand. When these were not found, the view in exploration and research largely became one of the Inuit as “primitive,” as if one could in some way travel back in time by travelling north.4 Consequently, the Inuit, who became the focus of descriptions of Arctic life (as opposed to Arctic exploration), started to be seen in terms of early civilizations: as traditional peoples with a direct dependency on the environment, described in fundamentally different terms than the European civilizations were. This established one broad thread that added to the Arctic as the sublime environmental entity: a description of Arctic life from an environment-related, traditional indigenous point of view, and as fundamentally different. These views were developed not only in exploration and national competition but also in research and other fields. Because of the linkages between exploration and the extension of sovereignty, research has historically been a major actor in polar cooperation. In their mapping of these littleknown areas, research and exploration however, owing to a focus on the environment, largely came to compare the Arctic and the Antarctic as “polar areas”—despite the fact that the Antarctic, different from the Arctic, was a clearly delineated, fully polar area that totally lacked habitation. A “common polar” cooperation perspective was formalized with the creation of the International Polar Commission in 1879. In 1882–3 and 1932–3 this Commission organized International Polar Years (IPY) of intensified research efforts that pertained to both the Arctic and the Antarctic (largely with a focus on comparable characteristics, which for the Arctic primarily related to the High Arctic: i.e., the polar desert and semi-desert). In 1957–8, the International Geophysical Year (IGY) was held, built upon the precedent of the International Polar Years and organized by the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) (cf. Roots 1992). Through these developments, the tradition of a still influential polar science emerged (cf. Knoepflmacher and Tennyson 1977:110–112), to center mainly on the natural sciences, and, to a more limited extent, anthropology. For the first polar year in 1882–3, more than a dozen research stations were set up in both the northern and southern hemispheres, and research included meteorology, auroral studies, geomagnetism, geographical exploration and mapping, glaciology, sea ice studies, oceanography, and, in marginal cases for the Arctic, human geography. The last of these interests included one study of the material culture and hunting practices of the Eskimo at Point Barrow—”one of the most important and earliest studies of any Eskimo group” (Barr 1983:479)—a pioneer study of the Inuit of the Eastern Cana

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dian Arctic, research on the Canadian Labrador Inuit, and some observations on the Netsy and Evenki peoples of the Russian Arctic (Barr 1983). Similarly, during the Second Polar Year (1932–1933), it was proposed that the magnetic and meteorological research stations be extended to forty-three sites, “not only in the polar regions but everywhere on the earth where such stations were found to be lacking” (Laursen 1949:170; cf. Fleming 1932) to ensure full exploitation of resources and comparison to polar observations. Given this extension of focus, the 1957–8 event was then conceptualized as an International Geophysical Year rather than an International Polar Year (Jones 1958). The priorities in terms of scientific fields were otherwise largely retained from the First and Second Polar Years: meteorology and study of the upper atmosphere, geomagnetism, and, for instance, the snow and ice cover where applicable (ibid.). It was on this foundation of polar studies that Arctic studies and international cooperation in Arctic research leaned when it was discussed separately, such as in an article in the then newly established journal Arctic in 1948 (Washburn 1948). The article noted the importance of studies of weather, oceanography, geology, fishing, seals, whales, migratory birds, and the “problems surrounding primitive man who spread from Siberia, across Alaska to northern Canada and Greenland” (Washburn 1948:6). This conception of the Arctic, centered on the environmental from the point of view of the natural sciences and, more limitedly, anthropology, has persisted through time and is to a large extent retained in major Arctic-focused journals (see the index of studies in the journal Arctic 1948–1987, in its 1987 anniversary issue, cf. Harrison and Hodgson 1987; and the environment-related focus on indigenous peoples’ traditional styles of life, e.g., in the journal Arctic Anthropology). The habit of comparing the Arctic and Antarctic areas has also been retained. As a result of the history of comparison between the Arctic and Antarctic, and integrated research cooperation for these areas, it is even today noted that “[t]here is a topic area for Arctic cooperation which embraces all of the others and that is scientific cooperation” (Hitchins and Liander 1991:311). To some extent, then, the primary focus on the environment has been maintained but as in exploration to some degree been kept separate from a focus on the indigenous element, which anthropology has had as a principal area of interest. The importance polar history has played can further be seen in that the 1957–8 IGY event also directly came to influence, specifically, discussions of common Arctic-Antarctic research cooperation, the organization of Antarctic research cooperation and the 1959 formation of an Antarctic governance program (the Antarctic Treaty) that delineated the Antarctic as the area below 60° south latitude.5 More recently, Antarctic research has been considered on this basis as a possible model for “Arctic” cooperation with regard to its cooperation, governance program and focus on environmental protection6; the areas have been frequently compared in recent region-building initiatives, and many of the present Arctic programs under the Arctic Council have a

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focus similar to that of Antarctic cooperation. In current cooperation the Arctic region has even been extended to 60° north latitude, mirroring the Antarctic delineation of 60° south (cf. AMAP 1997, 1998). The main international understanding of the Arctic, up until recent regionbuilding, has, however, been environmental and has embraced a much more limited geographical delineation than 60° north latitude. ENVIRONMENTAL AND HISTORICAL DEFINITIONS OF “THE ARCTIC” Given that the Arctic has long been an area primarily of interest to the natural sciences, environmental and physical definitions were the only international definitions available until political definitions emerged in recent regionbuilding. The way in which the Arctic has been defined on the basis of what have been seen as relevant characteristics (mainly the environment, from a natural science perspective) is thus illustrative of what was actually seen as “Arctic” until recently. Accordingly, it is important to outline these definitions of the Arctic as part of tracing its development over time to its present, extended scope. Following the efforts at systematization and natural science description in exploration and the International Polar Years and International Geophysical Year, the Arctic was defined largely by each discipline according to its requirements. Despite being environment-based, these definitions are constructed in relation to what was becoming the established understanding of the Arctic—a barren area with prevalence of sub-zero temperatures. To understand the area above the tree line, for instance, as “Arctic” is not a given, but reflects the practice in a particular discipline, which is not necessarily related to the definition in other disciplines. The definitions are also in general highly technical and provide a gradual rather than exact area of delineation. In general, they fall significantly farther north in northern Europe, which is warmed by the North Atlantic Drift, than in North America (which is significant in later discussions of region-building).7 Environmental and physical definitions thus do not support anything like a unified latitudinal definition of “the Arctic.” The most important definitions are those based on the tree line, temperature, permafrost, marine delineations, and the sun-height definition of the Arctic Circle, which are described below. The tree line definition views the southern limit of the Arctic as defined by the area above which trees cannot grow. This roughly coincides with the area where the mean temperature in July is ten degrees Celsius, the July 10-isotherm, which some authors see as the temperature definition of the Arctic (cf. AMAP 1998:9–10; see also Figures 1 and 2 for illustration). The tree line is, however, not an actual line, but rather a broad ecological zone 50–100 km. in width (cf. Graham 1990). Any definition of “the Arctic” as quite simply the treeless area would also extend it to coastal areas that are treeless but whose climate “hardly falls within any generally accepted concept of the Arctic” (S. B. Young

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1989:14); that is, such a definition would include areas which seldom have temperatures below freezing, such as the islands off the coast of Scotland. The criterion is further complicated by the fact that alpine regions (higher elevations of mountains, wherever these may be) are physically and biologically similar to polar areas (S. B. Young 1989).8 To then make the definition of “the Arctic” comply with assumptions on what “the Arctic” should include (not only treelessness but temperatures below freezing and location above a certain latitude), these features are adjusted for in definitions. Accordingly, notions of “the Arctic” as the area above the tree boundary are often combined with those of temperature and latitude. These are also highly technical definitions. One definition of the Arctic that focuses on temperature views it as the area where the mean temperature for all months of the year is less than 10 degrees. To exclude marginal cases, such as the Outer Hebrides, it is added that at least one month of the year must have a mean temperature below freezing. As a result, the coast of Labrador, at the same latitude as Glasgow in Scotland, is Arctic according to most definitions, while more northerly Trondheim in Norway, which is warmed by the North Atlantic Drift, has a temperate, not even subarctic, climate (S. B. Young 1989). Additionally, there are several other single-factor delineations, one provided by the boundary of continuous permafrost (above which the soil remains permanently frozen year round). This varies with temperature, among other factors. Similarly, in marine environments, the boundary of the Arctic is seen as formed where cool Arctic Ocean water meets warmer, saltier water. It exhibits significant differences similar to the terrestrial variations and differs between around 63° north in Canada to about 80° above northern Europe, because of the warming effect of the North Atlantic Drift (AMAP 1997, cf. Fig. 1 and 2). If one looks at ecosystem characteristics, then, flora and fauna also vary with climate (temperature), treeline and even ecosystemic spread for each species, and cannot be used as such to generally delineate an Arctic. At successively higher latitudes, ecosystems exhibit successively lower production and slower regeneration due to the low energy availability (few hours of sunlight). With the limited sun energy and few nutritional niches available for organisms, species diversity decreases with latitude, with the result that there only exist, for example, eight different species of mammal in the northernmost, High Arctic polar desert and semi-desert (cf. Hoel 1993:7, AMAP 1998:119). As the species variation is low, ecosystems thus become more vulnerable to damage to some of the organisms (for instance by pollution or erosion). As this vulnerability is a graduated feature, it also does not allow for the delineation of an “Arctic” area: “[w]hile many have asserted that Arctic ecosystems are unusually fragile, there is no consensus on this proposition and certainly no generic index that would allow us to compare and contrast the Arctic with other regions in these terms” (O. R.Young 1999, para. 5). Given these problems and provisions in an environmental definition of the Arctic, and the large differences in which latitudes are considered Arctic

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depending on area, one simple single-factor definition is often resorted to: the concept of the Arctic Circle. It is a measure of sun height, the area within which the disk of the sun is not visible above the horizon at the winter solstice (the shortest day of the year) nor sets at the summer solstice (the longest day of the year). In other words, it is the lowest line of latitude where the disk of the sun is not visible (although the horizon and sky lighten) during at least one day in mid winter, and where the sun does not totally disappear below the horizon for at least one night at mid summer. As this area is given by the tilt of the Earth’s axis relative to the Sun, it is an exact delineation that falls on the same latitude everywhere on the globe, 66° 33’ north latitude. Yet this is a negligible criterion in terms of environmental characteristics. The Arctic Circle does not serve to delineate environmental systems (the Arctic Environmental Atlas, UNEP 2001, goes as far as to call it “an imaginary line”). Fogelson notes that “climate, tree line, ice conditions, and the existence of permafrost and tundra vary widely even at the same latitude” (Fogelson 1992:1). To summarize, any definition of “the Arctic” based upon environmental features must thus acknowledge that the definition pertains to the characteristic and disciplinary conventions upon which the delineation has been made, which do not necessarily describe “the Arctic” region more generally. Many of the single-factor definitions cannot be described by latitude: a latitude that is “Arctic” in one area (as measured for example by the tree line) may not be so elsewhere. Thus, the tree line, mean temperature, and marine boundary of the “Arctic” all lie significantly farther north in northern Europe than in North America. Differences along any of these criteria are also gradual; for example, there is very little midnight sun at the Arctic Circle itself. No single clear environmental definition of “the Arctic” therefore exists, and all environmental and physical definitions, with exception of that using the Arctic Circle, exclude almost all of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland. Selected on the basis of these definitions, “the Arctic” becomes instead the barren, treeless, and largely cold-temperature areas of northern Canada, Alaska, Greenland, northern Russia, and Svalbard. However, these definitions take in an area significantly larger than that which has “true polar” conditions comparable to Antarctica (the High Arctic northernmost region of the Arctic which is a polar desert and semi-desert, cf. AMAP 1998). Far from being a polar area directly comparable to the Antarctic, then, the boundary of the Arctic is a socially constructed notion defined largely through treelessness and the setting of a climatic boundary. “The Arctic” is however extended even further in one prominent nonenvironmental definition that relies largely on a comparison with Antarctica. The domestic Canadian definition of the Arctic places the limit of the Arctic at 60° northern latitude, analogous to the Antarctic delineation of 60° southern latitude. As noted, these two areas have generally been compared in polar history despite the fact that, unlike the Arctic, “[t]he Antarctic is a unique case in international relations since its land is not the sovereign

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territory of any state and it has no permanent population” (Hitchins and Liander 1991:314; cf. Rothwell 1996, Chaturvedi 1994, 1996). Thus, while the Antarctic Treaty Area is delineated at 60 degrees south latitude, which takes in the Antarctic continent and adjacent waters, the delineation of the Arctic may not, as has been shown above, be made in such a straightforward manner. Also in Canada, which uses this 60° northern latitude definition of the Arctic, the area concerned differs markedly from the Antarctic: it is populated (historically mainly by Inuit peoples) and today comprises three developed administrative regions, or territories. The distinction has developed administratively and historically to distinguish these federally administered territories north of the line from the provinces farther south, which have larger self-governing rights within the Canadian federal system (cf. Shields 1991:168). In this sense, it is a result of Canadian political history more than any feature that can be used to generally define an “Arctic.” Dacks notes: It must be emphasised that the political relevance of this boundary says very little about its relevance for other questions. The sixtieth parallel in no way respects geographical features because it cuts across mountain ranges and river basins. It does not match any clear break in weather, vegetation, or animal habitat. (Dacks 1981:6).9

Instead of being a delineation based in characteristics or specificity of the area, this use of 60° north is then largely a result of early Canadian mapping and an understanding of the “polar regions” as similar.10 Nevertheless, this conception has become rather widely used, especially in North America, and through North American work has often been expanded to a circumpolar scale (cf. e.g. Lucas 1995, Pharand 1991). Thus, even today, some “define the extent of the polar regions…with a limit of latitudes to those beyond 60 degrees north and south” (Lucas 1995:163; Lucas takes this definition from a 1987 Canadian symposium).11 Later “Arctic” work in the AEPS/Arctic Council has similarly come to prominently utilize both the 60° north latitude and Arctic Circle delineations, which are two of the clearest but also least geographically motivated criteria: the Arctic Council program AMAP (1997, 1998) defines the Arctic as at least the areas above the Arctic Circle (for northern Europe) and at most those down to 60° north latitude (in North America). One can thus see that even the definition of the Arctic, far from being a given, has come to be defined through social processes and understandings, including the large natural science focus prevalent since exploration and exploration conceptions of the Arctic as cold and barren, as well as, in some cases, a relation to some limited social and political features. This is notable with respect to how the Arctic in political cooperation has been extended to include parts of all the eight states and to involve socio-political and administrative criteria.

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POLITICAL AND SECURITY DEFINITIONS OF “THE ARCTIC” The view of “the Arctic” as a remote natural area, defined in scientific disciplinary or domestic administrative fashion, was retained during most of the Cold War: “arctic exploration in the early twentieth century contributed significantly to the development of a global perception leading to the utilization of the Arctic as a strategic frontier after WWII” (Fogelson 1992: ix). What was added after the Second World War, with the East-West tensions this cemented, was the strategic military component. Hitchins and Liander note this typical view: “due to its remoteness and lack of significance, it [the Arctic] might serve as a laboratory for U.S.-Soviet cooperation at a time of heightened superpower tension” (Hitchins and Liander 1991:297). This conflict situation made a large imprint: while security would later take a back seat in explicit region-building discussions, security considerations shaped much of the region-building design. Notably, it was the post-war period with its technological advances that first yielded an early concept of the Arctic as something other than a periphery of interest for and defined only in terms of its interest for exploration and research. The concept employed was that of the “circumpolar north,” that is, the idea that the pole could be conceptualized as a center (cf. Fig. 1 and 2). Thus, Henrikson notes: “The most surprising geopolitical idea to emerge from the Second World War was the notion that the region surrounding the North Pole, rather than being a trackless vacancy removed from the principal courses of world history, was the potential core of a future intercontinental community: a global ‘Arctic Mediterranean’” (Henrikson 1992:107, my emphasis; cf. Wonders 1976:1–2).12 This idea of an “Arctic Mediterranean” was mainly of strategic origin, however, and suggested by researcher and explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson: “we may gain through the lessons of war a concept of the earth as round for practical purposes and of the Polar Sea as a World Mediterranean” (Stefansson 1944:264–265 quoted in Henrikson 1992:107, footnote to page, my emphasis). The concept was then developed by the political geographer George T. Renner, who proposed that Sir Halford Mackinder’s Eurasian “Heartland,” a conception that was prominent at the time, could be expanded northwards. It would come to include “the interior parts of all the land masses which form a ring around this Arctic Mediterranean— Europe, Asia, and North America” (Renner 1944:44,47, quoted in Henrikson 1992:107, footnote to page; my emphasis). Similarly, Renner imagined a triangular political “Washington-Chungking-Moscow alliance” centered across the North Pole (ibid.). Developed on the basis of this geopolitical strategising, neither the concept “Arctic Mediterranean” nor “Circumpolar North” are, therefore, very specific as to which areas should be included. Following the Second World War, it was instead the security situation that selected many of the actors that were to be prominent in later regionbuilding. As the Arctic was mainly strategically significant as the shortest

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distance between the US and the USSR, its strategic importance changed as technologies and strategies developed; at different times the Arctic was an area for potential naval conflict, early warning systems, and ballistic missile threats (Hitchins and Liander 1991). During the Cold War, all states bordering on the Arctic Ocean—the US through Alaska, Canada, the USSR, Norway, Denmark-Greenland—as well as Iceland became organized into the East-West confrontation framework. As the USSR had no warm-water ports with direct access to the world’s oceans, all naval build-up took place in the north where it occupies almost half of the littoral coast of the Arctic Ocean. The US, however, which has no Arctic Ocean access at all except via Alaska, had to largely rely on agreements with other states to build up defense. Thus, initially, due to the long-range bomber threat, the US set up Distant Early Warning (DEW) stations along lines from Alaska to Greenland. The US concluded bilateral agreements with both Canada (on whose soil three lines of stations were placed) and Denmark (to utilize land areas in Greenland), as well as a defense treaty with Iceland. Sweden and Finland, although not littoral states, became implicated in Cold War strategy by being situated between NATO countries and the USSR, and maintained a broad neutrality (in the case of Finland somewhat constrained by, among other things, a 1948 cooperation agreement with the USSR) (Hitchins and Liander 1991:300–306). On balance, eight states (the US, Canada, Russia and the Nordic countries) became involved in what at that time was a security conflict across northern areas. These were the states that would later, to naturalize the relations strained by security conflicts, be selected into “Arctic” regionbuilding cooperation. “THE ARCTIC” AS AN INTERNATIONAL REGION: THE DEVELOPMENT OF A DISCOURSE ON THE ARCTIC Exploration, research and strategic conflict thus constituted the background on which Arctic region-building first developed, following the political changes in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It represented a rather novel development. Previous agreements specifically for the Arctic had been few and restricted in scope, such as polar bear and fur seal protection conventions.13 Given this limited background, the factors that primarily came to impact the development of Arctic cooperation were events and general Western trends, not particularly Arctic-related forces. The influential factors included the rise in region-based cooperation and ethnicity movements more generally, the period of détente in the early 1970s, which brought opportunities for some cooperation between blocs, and the rise of the environmental movement. As exploitation of Arctic oil and gas in particular increased in the 1960s and 1970s, the security conflict frame was complemented by increased international cooperation, perhaps mostly in scientific research and environmental protection. “While petroleum exploration has not been the major impetus for either activity, it has provided

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a stimulus” (Archer 1992:98, emphasis original; cf. Fogelson 1992:166; Nassichuk 1987; Osherenko and Young 1989; Roots 1992). Describing the Arctic as a region for cooperation instead of an area of conflict was thus a major change, and work at the time and since typically emphasizes that the development of political cooperation on the Arctic could not have been foreseen (see e.g. Young 1998). Nevertheless, Arctic regional discussions intensified, mainly in the mid-1980s but in some instances in the late 1970s (for example, Armstrong et al. 1978); as Heininen judges it, an “Arctic Boom” started in the middle of the 1980s (Heininen 1999a: 395; cf. Heininen 1992a). At this time, authors in the field also started to frame their writings using descriptions of “the Arctic” as a region. This change was perhaps most visible in expressions such as “The Age of the Arctic,” first coined by American researcher Oran Young in publications in 1986 (cf. Young 1986; Hoel 1993:1) and the title of a work by Osherenko and Young (1989). Given the relatively recent nature of cooperation, work in the area has largely discussed which factors were considered characteristic of “the Arctic” as a unit. Authors have perhaps also tried to explain or even rationalize the bases for this development. Possibly with little surprise, taken the limited historical context, the factors seen as characteristic of the Arctic and motivating cooperation primarily related to historical connotations, however—notably those established in exploration and research traditions. Chief among these was the environment, traditionally a focus of Arctic and common polar work. Here, the foci on environmental protection and the concept of sustainable development characteristic of the 1980s came to combine with a romantic view of the Arctic derived from exploration. The image of the Arctic thus also in recent descriptions largely remained that of a pristine wilderness. What was new was that statements often posed the romantic view of Arctic nature against the threat to it. For example, K. Higuchi describes this reinterpretation, reviewing the proceedings of a 1985 Arctic air pollution symposium: The Arctic has been both romanticized and feared in poems and storybooks. It stirs both strong empathy and negative feelings in those who experience it, as well as in those who read about it. Such adjectives as hostile, frigid, barren, pure, beautiful, forbidden, cruel and isolated have been used to describe arctic environments. However, in recent years, the word ‘polluted’ has joined the list of adjectives (Higuchi 1989:175–176; cf. Karlqvist and Heintzenberg 1992:156, 168; Heininen 1990:7).14

This illustrates one description of the rationale for cooperation: “the Arctic” was now re-interpreted as an area at risk. As an otherwise pristine and natural area, it was seen as threatened by, among other things, transboundary pollution and oil accidents.

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These factors were strongly emphasized by the developing environmental movement, a concern that early on was manifested in an increase in bilateral and multilateral cooperation, such as the prohibition of dumping.15 Several formative events (Young 1998) also contributed to making the environment pivotal to “Arctic” region-building, in particular at the end of the Cold War. Among these were the Chernobyl catastrophe in April 1986, the publicizing in 1987–88 (at the height of the acid rain scare) of the scale of sulphur dioxide emissions from the smelters in Nikel and Monchegorsk on the Kola Peninsula and crossing the international frontier into Finland, and the March 1989 wreck of the supertanker Exxon Valdez off the Alaskan coast (Young 1998). Perhaps as a result of this, “[t]he Arctic was somehow an experimental example for sustainable development though it hardly existed for the [influential 1987] Brundtland commission’s report” (Käkönen 1994b: 107). In comparison to other areas, the Arctic environment is however not seen as particularly threatened—despite the main role the environment and environmental vulnerability (e.g. to pollution) were given early on as motivation for cooperation. While Roginko mentions “[t]he harsh climatic conditions which form ‘tough’ biotopes” (Roginko 1990:86), and that “[t]he results of this increasing human pressure on Arctic ecosystems, including marine ecosystems, is the gradual deterioration of environmental quality in the Arctic” (ibid.: 85), he continues: “It should be noted, however, that the Arctic Ocean, including its snow and ice cover, still remains among the least polluted of the world’s oceans” (ibid., my emphasis). This assessment was confirmed by later cooperation (AMAP 1997, Executive Summary, Conclusions, para. 1), which acknowledges that the Arctic is a region of only moderate environmental concern, for in comparison with most other areas of the world it remains a clean environment. The Arctic is also not treated as an area of environmental urgency in other cooperation; it is most often not dealt with at all. Tennberg notes that there exists “no consensus on the state of the Arctic environment and threats to it outside the AMAP [working group of the AEPS—Arctic Council]” (Tennberg 2000:55). Nevertheless, the Arctic became a focus for environmental cooperation and region-building; this is something the present work has set out to explain, and which can be seen as related to not only historical connotations or the rise in environmental awareness at the time but also to political reasoning (cf. ch. 3 and 4). Largely, the change of frame from the earlier strategic focus can be seen as motivated by a wish to de-politicize and limit security tension in the area. For example, Young and Chekasov note: “the politico-strategic issues associated with the militarization of the Arctic should be passed over at this stage in favour of efforts to co-operate in areas like scientific research and environmental protection” (Young and Chekasov 1992:22). Besides the predominant focus on the environment at this time, then, there emerged also a second main characteristic, which placed the emphasis for Arctic cooperation on the civilian sphere. This may have been related to the desire to limit conflict as well as to the increases in resource exploitation and

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indigenous movements that placed a focus on the effects of change and internationalization not only on the environment but the peoples in the areas. In some relation to exploration and research history, however, the focus in civilian cooperation was placed not more broadly but on the groups that were traditionally seen as Arctic inhabitants: the indigenous peoples, who now gained a role as non-state actors (cf. e.g. Østreng 1997, Käkönen 1992, Roots 1992). Especially, this focus related to the broader social change that was taking place in the traditionally inhabited areas, which had long been seen as “Arctic,” such as North America and Greenland. Here, a devolution of political and decision-making power to northern residents, largely through the development of indigenous movements and landclaims processes, had occurred simultaneously with a decline among major economic resource development projects in polar science. This led to a change in the character of polar science as it had previously described the areas (Roots 1992, Stenbaek 1987). “The Arctic” thus became defined as a region in contrast to earlier views of the area, where the social component had been less emphasized. Käkönen succinctly describes some of the problems that became defined for the “Arctic region” in this respect: “The whole Arctic region, not to mention small Arctic communities, do not have a political weight to make their own decisions. Arctic peoples are in minority in their respective nation states” (Käkönen 1994b: 109). In some sense, Arctic organization in both the environmental and civilian spheres can then be seen as manifesting the increased awareness of a new scale of problems, now seen as global problems, that may have effects far from their sources. Nonetheless, the prominent focus to a large extent mirrored the traditional main emphasis in Arctic literature on the environment and the traditional characteristics and life styles of inhabitants, mainly indigenous peoples who were seen as living close to nature (possibly due to the established focus on anthropology in Arctic studies). The Arctic was seen as a vast peripheral area of sparse human impact, because of both the traditional life styles that were placed in focus, and the relatively low numbers of inhabitants (cf. Robinson 1987; Osherenko and Young 1989, Young and Osherenko 1993). Additionally, in descriptions such as that of Lyck (1996a: xv), the inhabitants were described as living under poor social conditions and with high dependence on local resources; as societies in rapid social change from but still dependent upon local subsistence practices. In sum, environmental and social characteristics of the Arctic were made more integrated but were largely derived from historical foci of Arctic research. Despite this increased interest in “the Arctic,” the exact area and peoples that were targeted by the concept remained rather imprecise. Descriptions that tried to define the area in both environmental and social terms thus came to refer more to connotations of what is seen as “Arctic” than to any precise generalizable characteristics of northern populations. This connotational character and imprecise definition of exactly what area one is speaking of applies to descriptions both early and later in the region

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building period. In 1978, Armstrong et al. stated, on the Arctic as a combination of environmental and social characteristics, that [t]he most desirable solution is a flexible one: to think of the Arctic and subArctic as a group of concepts and attributes, concerned with climate, vegetation, fauna, presence of ice and snow, sparseness of human habitation, remoteness from industrial centers, and many other factors, and not having precise boundaries (Armstrong et al. 1978:1, my emphasis).

Armstrong et al. defined this area as the circumpolar north: “a convenient abbreviation for the Arctic and sub-Arctic” (Armstrong et al. 1978:1). Almost twenty years later, in 1996, Lyck wrote the following concerning the meaning of the concept “Arctic” in the social sciences: it is a relative, not an absolute concept as in other sciences in which for instance the treeline or absolute temperatures are used to define what is meant by ‘Arctic.’ Arctic in social science relates to a combination of several dimensions such as constitutional and geographical status, remoteness, socio-economic status and demographic/anthropological factors (Lyck 1996:xv).16

As the definition of “the Arctic” and the area to which connotations were applied expanded, the Arctic largely became described as an area for closer integration. The foci of these descriptions, especially social characteristics, were more closely related to some conceptions than to others, however, and the result of historically developed views. It is thus arguable to how high a degree region-building in fact re-described “the Arctic” rather than acted on the basis of historic understandings connected to more limited areas and practices. BASES OF DESCRIPTION: THE ARCTIC AS FRONTIER Highlighting the parameters of this selectivity which has made the climatic, remote, environmental and traditional indigenous primary Arctic foci, Sejersen indicates some of the differing motivations and driving metaphors behind socially based understandings of “the Arctic.” In a description worth quoting at length, he writes: To a lot of people the circumpolar region constitutes large areas of marginal or underdeveloped ‘frontiers.’ These people seldom inhabit the region themselves but consider it to be a potential for their society’s economic growth. The minerals, oil, water resources, animals etc. make up valuable resources. Even though, the circumpolar region is rich in both renewable and non-renewable resources they often describe the region and the climate as harsh and not fit for human occupation. For hundreds of years, another idea has existed alongside the ‘frontier’-ideology: the circumpolar region as

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Negotiating the Arctic ‘wild-lands.’ The environmental movement is but one which characterizes the circumpolar region as ‘untouched’ land, relatively undisturbed ‘natural’ surroundings One of the consequences of such an idea is that the human perspective is marginalized and ignored. For the indigenous peoples in the circumpolar region these lands are their ‘homelands’ (Sejersen 1999, para. 1–3, my emphasis).

This focus on the frontier, the environmental wilderness, and the homelands of the indigenous peoples as prevalent in Arctic literature17 indicates some of the historical conceptions of the area. These have not disappeared: Hitchins and Liander note that in 1981, some work still discussed the Arctic as “the last unmanaged frontier” (Bloomfield 1981, title, quoted in Hitchins and Liander 1991:297).18 That an Arctic region of the present delineation is described in these terms is however rather striking, given that only 13 percent in a population of 3.8 million people are indigenous (calculated on basis of data in AMAP 1998:142–17920), with this percentage differing strongly by area. Again, the Arctic is something defined more by history and political development than something essential or purely climatically defined. This view of the Arctic as frontier however indicates some of the differences in national views of northern areas. The idea of the frontier as that which exists between “wilderness” (seen as including the indigenous peoples) and “civilization” was originally developed to describe the colonization of North America and can be applied to the Denmark-Greenland relation and to some of Russian’s relation to its north (cf. Turner 1976, King 2000, Encyclopaedia Britannica 1999, Zaslow 1988; ch. 6).19 These are also the states which have traditionally seen their areas as “Arctic” and whose Arctic areas are inhabited. In these states, the ongoing indigenous-related social conflict related to the frontier history has come to characterize descriptions of the Arctic to a significant extent; the frontier conception and development can be related to low integration of Arctic areas into the state and an associated low integration of the area’s mainly indigenous and externally described inhabitants in national policy-making. While the severe climates of the areas most probably played a part in keeping them out of a state focus, their description thus also related to the prevalence of a frontier conceptualization in their states and to their late settlement from an outside, especially in North America, which was part of the “New World” that the European explorers encountered (as distinguished from an “Old World” Europe). This is then the main social situation which came to be seen as characteristic of “the Arctic”: largely indigenous areas that were remote enough to be retained as what the settlers from a frontier perspective described as “wilderness”—the prominent environmental description of “the Arctic.” Rather than being a given focus for cooperation on a regional scale, then, the focus on environmental subsistence and traditional indigenous groups can be seen as related to the history and conception of the Arctic as

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a frontier in certain states.21 In fact, one may identify a relatively clear distinction between the areas where the frontier concept has had a large impact on areas traditionally seen as “Arctic” (such as North America), and relatively long settled northern European areas, where neither the idea of areas as frontiers nor of parts of their own mainlands as “Arctic” has been widespread. The differences between states in this regard can be illustrated by some examples. The view of the Arctic as an environmental area which had recently taken on a social importance and a predominance due to indigenous issues can be exemplified by a report of the US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences. This committee had been mandated to support work under the 1984 U.S. Arctic Research and Policy Act, an Act that had been established through the renewed focus on the Arctic that followed the indigenous land claims settlements that brought new lobbying power to Alaska (US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences 1993: vii; Stenbaek 1987). The new focus was thus related to indigenous political organization in North America (where indigenous peoples remain a large percentage of the far northern population). The US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences report described the Arctic largely from the established outsider’s perspective, as providing testing grounds for theories and as a natural laboratory. The three substantive themes that it identified beyond the environmental focus were human/environment relations, community viability, and rapid social change. The report characterized the Arctic as a place where “hunting and gathering peoples” have survived “for centuries” (US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences 1993:4), and placed a focus on subsistence and recent modernization in the areas. In some indication that this social focus was rather recent, the Committee stated that “[i]n the past, ‘exceptionalism’—the notion that such research [in the Arctic] was outside the mainstream—pervaded the arctic social sciences. In fact, arctic social scientists themselves tended to treat the Arctic as an exception to the tenets of social science research” (US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences 1993:2). “The permanent residents of the Arctic have a legitimate stake in the design and conduct of Arctic research in the social and behavioral sciences, and…they can be expected to react vigorously to Arctic research plans they have not had a voice in formulating” (IARPC 1987:248, quoted in US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences 1989:71). Similar views were expressed in Canadian documents and later region-building (cf. e.g. Working Group on Arctic International Relations 1988, Griffiths and Young 1989) (and can be discerned in Danish and Russian discourses on their Arctic areas in Greenland and northern Russia, as further discussed in ch. 6). In contrast, northern Europe (e.g., Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland) has not evolved with a prominent conception of the frontier; nor are the northern European states in the habit of viewing their northernmost mainland areas as “Arctic” (although Iceland and Norway place a major emphasis on, e.g., Arctic fishing). That Norway has traditionally been part of Arctic cooperation is largely due to its marine interests and the fact that in 1920 it

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gained jurisdiction over the mainly uninhabited island Svalbard (Spitzbergen).22 These northern European states have primarily seen “the Arctic” as the uninhabited lands and water areas north of their mainlands; for instance, Arctic research programs in Finland, Sweden and Norway have in general taken in no areas of their own mainlands.23 This in turn is related to the fact that northern Sweden, Finland, Iceland, mainland Norway, and also to some degree the Russian Kola Peninsula are warmed by the North Atlantic Drift, a climatic fact that together with the states’ long-time settlement and internal mobility patterns undoubtedly has played a role in their relatively strong integration into the respective state systems. Despite their geopolitical inclusion in a strategic security framework, the eight states selected into “Arctic” cooperation are thus largely different and have largely different orientations to the “Arctic.” That the eight diverse states, primarily related through the security conflict over the Arctic during the Cold War, were together included in “Arctic” cooperation was then largely a result of the foreign policy initiative made by Gorbachev in a speech in 1987. THE DEVELOPMENT OF STATE REGION-BUILDING: THE MURMANSK MOMENTUM The major impetus for present Arctic cooperation and foreign policy development was created through a “regional” application of Gorbachev’s more general policy of glasnost that served to draw the states earlier involved in the security conflict together with the aim of normalizing the region. Such an initiative stood in radical contrast to earlier, security-focused and locked positions. “Departing from Moscow’s perennial opposed-forces approach to the region’s military and civil problems, the Soviet leader [in October 1987] effectively altered the calculation of what was and is possible in Arctic international relations” (Griffiths 1992: ix). The civilian, i.e. non-military, focus articulated in the Murmansk speech was not, however, an Arctic-specific regional effort, but one application of Gorbachev’s policy strategy at the time. The Arctic region initiative was preceded by a similar highly publicized initiative dealing with the Asia-Pacific region that was held in Vladivostok the previous year, and followed by one in Belgrade on the Mediterranean (Purver 1988:147; Stephan 1987:226; Vartanov et al. 1999). Given the situation of the Soviet Union at the time, much of the argument for the policy changes in the northern areas in any of these regional initiatives was economic. To develop its offshore industry in the Barents Sea, the Soviet Union required technological cooperation, and to avoid the political price this would entail, such as that extracted by the US in earlier cooperation, the Soviet Union might equally turn to the Scandinavian countries or Canada, who traditionally have a less outspoken policy towards the Soviet Union. Such

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cooperation would be less complicated politically. In fact, Mr Gorbachev’s speech contained some proposals along these lines to Canada and the Scandinavian nations (Horensma 1991:176).

Gorbachev’s Arctic speech was notable, however, in providing momentum for and defining a new “Arctic” both in content and delineation. The Soviet Union had earlier insisted that “Arctic” cooperation should be seen as taking place only among states bordering upon the Arctic Ocean, thereby excluding Sweden, Finland and Iceland, which had been implicated by Cold War conflict, as well as the more southern states with polar research programs based on earlier exploration interests. Now, in contrast, Gorbachev made general a much broader view: The Arctic is not only the Arctic Ocean, but also the northern tips of three continents: Europe, Asia and America. It is the place where the Eurasian, North American and Asian Pacific regions meet, where the frontiers come close to one another and the interests of states belonging to mutually opposed military blocs and non-aligned ones cross (Gorbachev 1987, para. 20).

The speech was thus a clear invitation to collaboration across earlier Cold War lines. In the speech, Gorbachev laid out a six-part program including both military and civilian features, among these several that would come to the fore in forthcoming cooperation. The main points were proposals on a nuclear-free zone in Northern Europe, restrictions on naval activities in the North, peaceful cooperation in developing the Arctic’s natural resources, collaboration in scientific research on polar matters, joint efforts to ensure environmental protection in the region, and opening the North Sea Route to international shipping (cf. Gorbachev 1987). Particularly, Gorbachev’s speech gave an impetus to Finland, which had long been constrained by Soviet policy more generally, to take the initiative further. Addressing proposals earlier emphasized especially by Finland, Gorbachev finally conceded to the long-standing proposal for a Nordic Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone in northern Europe and suggested measures for naval arms control in the seas of northern Europe. This clearly showed the emergence of a new policy realm and an unprecedented scope for Finnish action; a Soviet commentator even noted that “[t]he Murmansk initiatives are new political thinking applied to the problem of Nordic security and cooperation” (Deryabin 1988, no page given, quoted in Horensma 1991:175). In response, only one day after the speech, Finnish president Mauno Koivisto welcomed it as “significant” and “one which showed a farreaching spirit of cooperation with regard to security and cooperation questions in the northern regions,” that “opens up new prospects for closer contacts in the northern regions which are so important for us” (Purver

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1988:150; Heininen 1998c). In the forthcoming Finnish Initiative on Arctic Environmental Protection (AEPS), Finland would especially pick up on one of Gorbachev’s six suggestions, that centered on “protecting the natural environment of the North [and]…establishing a system to monitor the state of the natural environment and radiation safety in the region…[especially] tundra, forest tundra, and the northern forest areas” (Gorbachev 1987, para. 47). The initial Finnish focus in the AEPS was, as will be discussed in the following chapter, on exactly these points: environmental monitoring, forest resources and radiation. Not taking up any of the contentious security matters, this focus on the environment supplied an agreeable and attractive opening for Finland to expand its foreign policy with the USSR’s blessing. While the comments from other actors in response to Gorbachev’s speech were more cautious, it is possible to also in these trace indications of who the future main state actors in an “Arctic” region would be. After somewhat skeptical direct responses from the US and Canada to Gorbachev’s policy turnaround, in December 1987 Reagan and Gorbachev “expressed support for the development of bilateral and regional co-operation among the arctic countries on these matters, including coordination of scientific research and protection of the region’s environment” (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988:49). Domestic actors in Canada used the introduction of the Finnish initiative, the US-USSR agreement and the progress of domestic initiatives as fuel to help Canada seize this opportunity to extend its long-term northern policy focus. The Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations wrote: In the light of these developments, and Canada’s strong interest in promoting lasting international contacts and co-operation in the circumpolar Arctic, the Working Group urges the government to give careful consideration to Canada taking the initiative in proposing a continuing council—possibly an ‘Arctic Basin Council’—for international discussion of arctic questions (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988:49–50).24

The Canadian approach was thus first suggested about the same time as the Finnish environmental approach; eventually, it would eclipse this. However, these governance initiatives, which will be treated in more detail in later chapters, were greatly influenced not only by the Gorbachev momentum but by science-policy developments. It was these especially that finally determined the scope of the actors and the area that could be made relevant for “the Arctic” (extended in accordance with Gorbachev’s influential suggestions). Especially important in this context was the establishment of the dominant actors in the area, i.e., the “Arctic Eight,” which took place on the basis of the actors who had earlier become involved in the security conflict in the areas.

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LEGITIMATE POLITICAL ACTORS: THE OFFICIAL DESIGNATION OF AN “ARCTIC EIGHT” The Soviet Union’s relaxing of its view on legitimate “Arctic” cooperatives and the implications it had for the security framework were among the factors that made “the Arctic” move south. However, Gorbachev only very generally broadened the focus: he did not specify a special selection of countries (although he mentioned Finland, for example, which had earlier been discussed in relation to international conflict more generally than in an “Arctic” context). Politically, the question of which states could be seen as Arctic actors had long been contested. In discussions on a 1973 polar bear protection agreement, one controversial issue had been the standing in the organization of representatives from non-Arctic states that nevertheless had strong Arctic research programs. The long-standing Soviet position was that Arctic affairs should be dealt with by Arctic rim states alone (that is, Canada, Russia, the US, Denmark-Greenland, and Norway, which are also the countries in whose areas of jurisdiction polar bears roam), and not include other states with Arctic research interests. For the 1973 polar bear agreement, the Soviet Union had insisted upon such a fivestate demarcation (Stokke 1990b, Archer 1992). One of the main factors that contributed to the final identification of eight states as “Arctic” was the development of the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC).25 This initiative had been discussed already before Gorbachev’s speech and largely drew on the history of polar exploration; it was directly promoted through the comparison of the Arctic and the Antarctic. One impetus for IASC was that for the Antarctic, a body called the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) had already existed since 1958.26 As Roots sees it: The most common question raised in discussions on the feasibility of establishing a comprehensive and multinational circumpolar arrangement for improving scientific co-operation is: ‘Why cannot we establish an Arctic equivalent to SCAR?’ In my own experience, such a suggestion has been put forward at about five-year intervals since 1960 (Roots 1992:151, my emphasis).

At that time, the geopolitical situation of the East and West blocs and a lack of research support had hindered the establishment of an international Arctic committee patterned on SCAR (Roots 1992). The idea then re-surfaced in the mid-1980s “when science budgets were in comparatively good shape,” to encourage collaboration between North American and Russian scientists working on Arctic topics (Young 1992:41, draft). However, the implied focus was the (North American and Russian) areas already seen as Arctic and viewed from a (largely governmental) science perspective. The planned focus for

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IASC, articulated at a meeting in Leningrad in 1988, also largely corresponded to the Arctic studies tradition, including, for instance, research on the atmosphere, Arctic ecosystems, ocean-atmosphere heat exchange, geology, environmental protection, and, more limitedly, socio-economic and cultural questions (Horensma 1991:178). In 1986, during the SCAR meeting in San Diego, an informal meeting was convened by the then chairman of both SCAR and the US Arctic Research Commission to reconsider the formation of an “Arctic SCAR” (Roots 1992:151). A subsequent meeting, held in February 1987, was the “first time that senior people from all countries with territories north of the Arctic Circle had come together expressly to discuss co-operation in science” (Roots 1992:154). While the idea of extending the Arctic in cooperation on the area thus already existed, it had not as yet been endorsed by the Soviet Union (Horensma 1991). In his Murmansk speech, Gorbachev then stated: We propose holding in 1988 a conference of sub-Arctic states on coordinating research in the Arctic. The conference could consider the possibility of setting up a joint Arctic Research Council (Gorbachev 1987, para. 44),27

This meeting was subsequently held in Leningrad, with quite some impetus from the political process: “[w]hile IASC is a non-governmental organization, representatives of national governments played a central role in its creation” (Young 1992:40–41, draft).28 This was when the Soviet Union, in keeping with the new Murmansk initiative, now also allowed the inclusion of the non-rim states Finland, Iceland and Sweden—venturing beyond its earlier insistence on five states as Arctic actors (Stokke 1990b: 63). Such a compromise of including all Nordic states probably related to the fact that, throughout the Cold War, these small-states had strived to be seen as one unit in order to gain a stronger influence in their precarious positions on the battleline of USSoviet tension, as described earlier.29 The cost of Soviet acceptance of all the Nordic states was, however, exclusion of all other states than the thereby designated eight (Archer 1992). At a pre-meeting to the Leningrad convention, the joint proposal for an International Arctic Scientific Committee (IASC) suggested that the Committee be ruled by a “Polar Board” restricted to these eight countries. Other countries could join as members of the committee but not become members of the board (Horensma 1991:177). This was resisted by states such as the UK, France, the Netherlands and Germany, which all had sizeable polar programs.30 When in 1990 the IASC funding meeting was held, establishing the Arctic Eight as “Arctic” states, the establishing document of IASC thus emphasized that scientific communities from other countries were eligible to take part. Nevertheless, the definition of eight states as “Arctic” would come to be the prominent one,31 probably related to the importance IASC had to the developing region-building process. Following the inception of the IASC

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process in the mid-1980s and its increased momentum in 1987, several countries even adapted their Arctic institutions to suit the needs of the new Polar Board. In August 1988, Canada announced its plans to organize a Canadian Polar Research Committee. In June of that same year, the Soviet Union had instituted a State Committee for Arctic Affairs. Denmark’s Danish Polar Center came into being in January 1989; it took over part of the Greenland administration but its main task was as a body of international cooperation (Horensma 1991:177–178, cf. Adams et al 1987, US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences 1993, England et al. 1998). IASC also prompted further organization as the International Arctic Social Science Committee (IASSA) organized as a separate international body in disagreement with the IASC focus on natural science (Young 1993, draft).32 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ARCTIC IN RESEARCH-POLICY NETWORKS Thus, Arctic organization, like earlier Arctic exploration, resonated through both research and state policy development and by linking these together: in research work promoted by states such as in the US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences, Gorbachev’s suggestions for increasing environmental and research cooperation, and the development of IASC (and IASSA). Further development of Arctic region-building would also to a large extent take place in research and research-policy boundary work. In 1987, the MacArthur Foundation agreed to fund two large significant multi-year projects directly targeting “the Arctic” as a region: they were “designed to improve our ability to deal creatively with the emerging political agenda of the Arctic treated as a distinctive region in international society” (Young 1996:6, my emphasis). One of the projects provided support for the creation and operation of the Working Group on Arctic International Relations, cochaired by professors Franklyn Griffiths and Oran Young, a Canadian and an American, respectively; the other was based in a community of researchers at the Tampere Peace Research Institute (TAPRI) in Finland (Young 1993, draft; Young 1996). Both of these projects were important in defining continuous Arctic approaches in their states. The differences in views of the Arctic and level of established traditions of Arctic research were also visible in these two examples, however. To compare, the Finnish research initiative was rather limited, and largely derived from a focus on the Arctic as a maritime area and the strategic conflict involved. What at this time made the establishment of the project between Finnish, Canadian and American Arctic researchers at all feasible was largely a common interest in Arctic waters and security. This was a historical situation to which Gorbachev had referred in his 1987 speech in relation to an earlier proposal by Koivisto (cf. Gorbachev 1987).33 The background is that Finland had access to the Arctic Ocean via Pechenga in 1920–1944 but lost this area to the USSR at the end of the Second World War (cf. Heininen 2000:6). From

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this interest in Arctic Ocean matters, an interest was retained in Arctic shipping and the Northern Sea Route north of Russia. This was also a question of trade: the Soviet Union was a large customer of the Finnish metal and especially shipping and shipbuilding industries needed for the Murmansk fleet; for instance, the research director of Wärtsilä Oy, with interests in oil and drilling in the Barents sea, was a regular participant in research seminars (cf. Heininen 1988, 1989). “The Arctic” as such was, however, an area of very limited interest in Finland, and the TAPRI community was only a small contingent of the Arctic knowledge community; in fact, much of the writing on the Arctic of the time and into the 1990s derives from the group (notably participants Jyrki Käkönen, Lassi Heininen and Pertti Joenniemi).34 The approach of the TAPRI project was extended by its participants to another venue in which they were involved, the Kuhmo summer academy (cf. eg. Heininen 1987, 1988, 1989, 1992b, 1994,1996). At the outset (that is, before Gorbachev’s speech), the approaches in both of these fora however largely centered on security policy in relation to the Soviet Union (cf. Heininen and Käkonen 1996). For North America, on the other hand, where there already existed an established approach to the Arctic, the US-Canadian-chaired Working Group on Arctic International Relations took on a broad and rather decisive regionbuilding character with implications internationally. The group met regularly from 1988 to 1990, and its first session focused on the character of the Arctic as a distinctive international region and how to develop regional policy for an area with an emerging “political dynamic of its own” (Young 1993:7, draft; Griffiths and Young 1988, 1989). Subsequent meetings then centered on the themes of “Sustainable Development and the Arctic,” “Protecting the Arctic’s Environment,” and “Managing the Arctic’s Resources” (Young 1996; cf. also the titles of Griffiths and Young 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991). The Working Group thus served as one mechanism for creating an awareness of “the Arctic” as a region. The group was also rather interlinked to broader Arctic organizational development. On the 1990 session on protection of the Arctic environment, a letter from United States Department of States stated: “Within a month after the meeting, the key drafters of IASC Founding Articles where able to resolve their differences rather quickly” (Arnaudo 1990:17). Also, in 1988, Griffiths—involved in the Working Group on Arctic International Relations among other bodies—was one of the first to examine the cooperation in the area in theoretical terms as political regionalization (Griffiths 1988). As Arctic organization proceeded, the question for whom this cooperation was developing however became debatable. Griffiths noted that “[a]s to the likelihood of the Arctic acquiring the status of an integration region, it may be noted that some awareness of shared identity, and indeed of community, already exists among those directly occupied with Arctic affairs in the various regional countries” (Griffiths 1988:6, my emphasis). The other co-chair of the Working Group on Arctic International Relations, Oran Young, on the

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other hand, noted that while there may be a shared understanding among Arctic professionals, The concept of the Arctic or the Circumpolar North as a region does not resonate with those who are preoccupied with local or subregional issues, like the management of caribou herds or the maintenance of subsistencebased local economies. If anything, they are leery of the intervention of national governments claiming authority over issues involving the Arctic as a whole on the grounds that national policymakers and administrators often show little knowledge of, much less interest in, the concerns of local or subregional constituencies (Young 1992:21, draft).

Besides arguing the point that an “Arctic region” is not seen as a “region” locally, Young also noted that the issues on the basis of which the “Arctic region” is discussed are often not best influenced within the region: a number of important issues on the Arctic agenda today transcend the boundaries of the region Some of the most important environmental concerns in the Arctic, like the problems of ozone depletion, Arctic haze, and radioactive fallout, arise, in part at least, from the actions of parties not included in the Arctic eight (Young 1992:21, draft).

Thus, while Griffiths noted that a community exists among those involved with Arctic affairs, Young concluded that Arctic discourse was limited and top-down in nature: What this suggests is that the idea of the Arctic as a suitable region for launching cooperative initiatives is attractive primarily from the perspective of constituencies located in the national capitals of the Arctic Eight and, in particular, of policymakers who approach these issues from the vantage point of Ottawa, Helsinki and Moscow (Young 1992:21–22, draft).

The broader regional appeal of the extended and developing Arctic approach was thus an issue both within states and between states. Despite the explosion of development on an “Arctic region” in policy and research, no directly citizen-oriented or sub-regional body for an Arctic region materialized. The development closest to a citizen-related body or governance on any lower representative level than the state, was the Northern Forum, which was established in the same year as IASC and IASSA to organise a broad array of subgovernmental (county) administrations. The Forum was the late reawakening of an initiative originally made in Hokkaido, Japan in 1974, and re-energized through a conference in Canada in 1989–fifteen years later, possibly not unrelated to the new international Arctic perspective Canada had started to pursue (Hickel 1996; Young 1992, draft). The selection of members in the Northern Forum relates broadly to a northern periphery, however, not only the “Arctic,” and came to include parts of Japan, China

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and Mongolia.35 The question of Arctic representation on a subgovernmental level—as the Forum would not become included in Arctic cooperation—and “whose region the Arctic is” would however remain significant, and undecided, throughout developments. CONCLUSION Through these initiatives and developments of an “Arctic Boom” in research and policy, the diverse conceptualizations and definitions of “the Arctic” came to be generalized and expanded into discussions of a region. On the basis of more limited environment-focused research and exploration understandings of the Arctic, largely compared to the Antarctic, a first conception of the Arctic as something other than a periphery was derived from strategic conflict and the metaphor of an Arctic Mediterranean: a circumpolar area with the pole as its center. Arctic discourse then developed largely in relation to events and general Western trends, such as increased environmental awareness and the need for normalization of an earlier strategic conflict area. The primarily environmental and civilian focus on the Arctic acted to redescribe the area as a scene of cooperation rather than conflict. The broad political momentum for the development of the Arctic as a political region, however, derived from Gorbachev’s Murmansk initiative, a regional application of a broader glasnost policy that extended “the Arctic” in a general but undetermined scope. This gave extra impetus to the development of an international Arctic research body, IASC, through which the eight-state conception of the Arctic was first instituted. One may thus see the first manifestations of a selection of area and shape for the region, that draw upon polar history, security and topical discourses in developing a symbolic shape for the region. In research projects dealing with the Arctic as a region, these conceptions were then generalized as well as promoted to wider audiences, and came to some extent to be interlinked with broader policy processes. Already here, also the different histories and traditions of the array of actors become apparent, as interpretations of the civil sphere largely drew on a frontier conception that is not prominent in all states. There were disagreements on whom this region was being developed for; these placed some emphasis on the question of regional representation. The basis for Arctic discourse largely derived from established contexts, however in keeping with what Paasi (1996:34) calls a “dominating story of a territorially based community.” Just as Paasi emphasizes the name of the region as its key symbol (Paasi 1996:34–35), “the Arctic” came to be described also in recent region-building in relation to its historical development: the historical context of the name chosen for the regional cooperation. It is in accordance with this name and history that the people were then imagined: the Arctic is seen in terms of the indigenous minorities and especially their relations to the environment. Thus, the major actors remained those historically selected: prominently, states, polar research, and from the more

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limited social focus, indigenous peoples. These different types of agents related to each other in developing the discourse of the region, as, for example, in the cases of Arctic research promoted by states and separate research projects that supported the development of the staterelated initiatives. As a regionbuilding approach would argue, states are not the only actors; rather they require a knowledge-related, authoritative descriptionary actor, as one may see in these examples of early international Arctic region-building. The contexts and political considerations among actors, as well as their relation to “the Arctic” as a concept differed significantly, however, as has been indicated for the eight states that were ultimately included in development. These differences would come to account for many of the problems of defining any unitary regional identity for the areas. This is illustrated in the following chapters, where the further institutionalization of an Arctic region into an Arctic Council and associated bodies will be followed.

CHAPTER 3

The “Arctic” in the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy and Arctic Council An Environmental, Indigenous, and Foreign Policy Concern

This chapter illustrates how an “Arctic” approach, given momentum by Gorbachev’s Murmansk speech and subsequently taken up by Finland as the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS), was developed and reframed into the broader Arctic Council (AC) governance initiative by Canada. This governance initiative was first suggested in the Canadian context about the same time as the Finnish initiative was put forward (following Gorbachev’s speech). The development of the Arctic Council thus took place parallel to and subsequently overtook the more limited environment-oriented AEPS. The emergence of the Arctic Council has in itself been seen as a manifestation of “the Arctic” as a “region”: the council’s most important role is probably generative in nature. Through its very existence, the council has become a symbol of the emergence of the Arctic as a distinct region in international society (Young 2000, chapter 4, recommendation 2, paragraph 2).

The present chapter shows how “Arctic” cooperation came together as a result of a multiplicity of factors, which were largely related to a window for development in foreign policy. It also attempts to contextualize the Finnish and Canadian roles and motivations in forwarding their respective initiatives. Together with the following two chapters, it illustrates some of the differing content and form given to “the Arctic” as a concept as well as the problems of a limited discourse. In particular, the chapter shows the large Canadian role both in the development of the AEPS and as the driving force behind initiating the Arctic Council at all, and the underlying motivations that might have promoted these developments. It also indicates the large role Arctic historical categories (such as the Arctic—Antarctic comparison and environmental and indigenous foci) played throughout, highlighting the problem of developing region-specific organization on such a limited basis.

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THE FINNISH INITIATIVE FOR THE ARCTIC ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION STRATEGY The Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS)1 was an early initiative by Finland to deal with the change in the world order that resulted from the diminished power of the Soviet Union. In contrast to the proposal for an Arctic Council, treated below, the AEPS was also a rather narrow initiative. It was less targeted towards explicit region-building than towards environmental protection as a matter for state actors. Indeed, Finland, like its Nordic neighbors, was not in the habit of viewing its northern areas as “Arctic,” but put forward the initiative on basis of the label Gorbachev had suggested and in one direction he had indicated. In his speech, Gorbachev had stated: The Soviet Union proposes drawing up jointly an integrated comprehensive plan for protecting the natural environment of the North. The North European countries could set an example to others by reaching an agreement on establishing a system to monitor the state of the natural environment and radiation safety in the region. We must hurry to protect the nature of the tundra, forest tundra, and the northern forest areas (Gorbachev 1987, para. 47, my emphasis).

This paragraph encompasses three foci that were to become characteristic of the Finnish initiative: environmental protection, developing a monitoring system, which would become the main program of the AEPS, and attending to radiation safety and the forests. As will be described below, the AEPS proposal was made in a context of perceived environmental crisis. At the time, environmental deterioration was easily visible in “lake death” and “tree death” from eutrophication and acidification, to which transboundary pollution was a contributing factor. These problems were prominent in public discussions and manifested themselves in the rise of environmental awareness and the formation of a Green Party in Finland, as in many other countries. There are, however, indications that other than environmental priorities played a large role in the establishment of the AEPS. While transboundary pollution and acidification were heavily emphasized as a motivation for the Strategy, they were not included in the AEPS as an independent set of issues. As the initiative developed, the focus on the Arctic was also criticized for excluding the more southern areas, where most of the pollution is released into the atmosphere. The Arctic and the Antarctic were also extensively compared in AEPS discussions, which may suggest that the initiative was driven less by a region-based analysis than by more general considerations. The AEPS development was initiated in October 1988, a year after Gorbachev’s speech, when the Finnish government started consultations with “the other seven Arctic countries in order to identify the possibilities for common

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action” (Rajakoski 1989:56).2 The principal Finnish actor in developing the initiative was Esko Rajakoski, Finland’s consultative ambassador for environmental, Arctic and Antarctic affairs. In line with his professional focus on common polar issues and the environment, Rajakoski maintained a very broad orientation to “the Arctic” (cf. Young 1998, Heininen 1998c). Attending a hearing on Arctic issues in Canada, he was asked: “What prospects do you see for some parallel proposal that would address security considerations in the Arctic among the eight Arctic nations?” His answer was: I think it’s prudent to start from that very urgent point, the protection of the environment. We think, from our analysis, that putting in any other elements that would have a political connotation or would deal with the differences—disputes actually—that exist in the area could only hamper this very important initiative. What we are aiming at here, to state it very briefly, is to start a kind of cooperation in which the eight Arctic governments could make a political commitment to do something about the Arctic. To have the right regime and have the right decisions locally, it is basic that you need to know what is going on; you need to have the scientific research data (Question session with Berger, Merritt, Rajakoski, Simon and Weick, in The True North Strong and Free Inquiry Society 1989:74–75; my emphasis).

Rajakoski thus did not identify a clear and specific need; rather, he proposed the establishment of broad but environmentally oriented cooperation. “[Rajakoski] was less concerned about the shape or content of the AEPS than about moving forward with some sort of environmental initiative for the Arctic” (Young 1998:73). It also seems that the delineation of the area seen as “Arctic” remained unproblematized in this development. Although the Arctic and Antarctic differ enormously in political and demographic terms, these areas were continuously compared in preparatory work. The Finnish conception, as well as broader views at this time, was that work in the Arctic should, as in the Antarctic, result in a treaty for environmental protection (Tennberg 2000). As one of the preparatory meetings for the AEPS stated: It is an absolutely justified effort to organize action that will protect the Arctic environment and cover the region, because there is no such comprehensive, international and multilateral treaty/treaty system or regime concerning the Arctic like that for the Antarctic. Neither does any of the previous environmental agreements deal with the special qualities of the Arctic (Consultative Meeting on the Protection of the Arctic Environment 1989:2, quoted in Heininen 1990:17, my emphasis).

Similarly, one of the Finnish participants stated that “[w]e have had an interest in research activities in both polar regions” (Finnish participant Bärlund 1989:2, quoted in Tennberg 2000:121). The focus thus seemed to be on the

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polar regions and an application of this perspective to the Arctic: “participation of non-Arctic states in Arctic cooperation has been based on their interest in polar regions” (Tennberg 2000:121). The primary focus thus seemed to derive from historical understandings of the Arctic and a political opportunity for advances in foreign policy: “Finnish policymakers saw in this initiative a way to deal constructively with Mikhail Gorbachev’s October 1987 Murmansk speech and, in the process, to carve out a unique role for Finland” (Young 1998:58). On January 12, 1989, the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS) was launched by Finland, signed by Finland’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of the Environment and sent to the Ministers for Foreign Affairs of the “seven other Arctic countries” (Rajakoski 1989:56). Details of the proposal were then made public in February 1989 at a meeting in Paris organized by the French Arctic Studies Center, “where Finland’s ambassador to European treaty organizations, E.Rajakoski, urged the eight governments to formulate a treaty by June 1989“ (Roginko 1990:93). The first preparatory meeting on environmental protection in the Arctic was held in Rovaniemi, Finland, from 20 to 26 September 1989 (Young 1998:54). Following negotiations, the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy was eventually agreed upon among the Arctic Eight as a non-binding “strategy” in June 1991. The process by which this took place has been described in detail in, e.g., Young (1998) and Tennberg (2000). What will be problematized here is the focus selected in the AEPS—the way “the Arctic” was seen and, indeed, conceptualized and created within the Strategy and for which actors it was made a matter of relevance. While the AEPS was clearly a more limited and environment-focused initiative, it would come to provide the organizational basis for broader region-building in the Arctic Council. It also selected actors and features that continued into the Arctic Council with a broad and continued focus on foreign policy. As Finland lacked clear content and direction for an “Arctic” focus, however, Canada was instrumental in both supporting and drafting the AEPS and, at the same time, suggesting that it be included as part of the Arctic Council. ESTABLISHING THE AEPS: AN ENVIRONMENTAL INITIATIVE PROMOTING FOREIGN POLICY The late 1980s were a time of considerable awareness-raising on the environment in almost all spheres—popularly, domestically and in foreign policy and international cooperation. In Finland, as logging operations were approaching the last major old growth forests, recognition of the importance of forest wilderness areas as a finite resource expanded beyond being a concern of conservationists to become a topic of public debate (Pietikäinen 1995:181,183). Green parties formed in many European countries, and the effects of transboundary pollution were given political attention. Following the Chernobyl accident in 1986, the long-range effects of radioactive fallout

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had been made clear (cf. Kettlewell 1995), and in southern Finland and Sweden lakes were acidifying under the impact of transnational pollution from, among other sources, smelters in the UK. The pollution-related tree death in Germany (Waldsterben) further alarmed the Finnish and Scandinavian forest industry and public; concern was high especially in Finland where forest products—largely from state forests in the north and north-east of the country—in 1988 still represented some 36 percent of the country’s exports (OECD 1988:78, 61). In its initial phases, the Finnish initiative on the Arctic thus placed an emphasis on acidification, mentioning the risk for forest areas as a main motivation for the effort. In a welcoming address at the First Ministerial Meeting in Rovaniemi in June 1991, Govenor of Lapland Asko Oinas explained: clear effects of pollution damage have been found in the nature of Lapland. Acidification of waters and damages in forests can be assumed to have resulted from etnissions outside our borders, long-distance air pollution. Our most urgent task is to find out true causes and set forth action together with our neighbours to eliminate the causes of damage (Oinas 1991, welcome address, quoted in Kettlewell 1995:15).

In the preparatory process, Finland was the leading country for the surveys Acidification in the Arctic Countries and Radioactivity in the Arctic Region: “two areas of particular concern to Finland” (Protecting the Arctic Environment 1990:238; these were also the two areas that perhaps most closely approximated the brief suggestion in Gorbachev’s speech). With reference to the study on acidification: tentative results of this research suggest that wide intergovernmental cooperation will be needed to deal with this phenomenon. The Arctic environment receives airborne pollutants causing acidification from a number of industrial centers in Europe, Asia and North America (Protecting the Arctic Environment 1990:238).

The 1990 consultative meeting on the establishment of the AEPS also noted that Russia and Finland “are envisaging cooperation also in research and environmental impact assessment particularly with respect to boreal northern ecosystems” (Protecting the Arctic Environment 1990:237). However, when the task force of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP), the key program of the Finnish Initiative on Arctic Environmental Protection, met for the first time in TromsØ, Norway, in December 1991, a “striking feature of this [its] set of priorities [was] the absence from the list of acidification—the problem that operated as an important stimulus to the original Finnish Initiative launched in 1988– 89” (Young 1998:134).3 This conspicuous shortcoming, and the quick launch of the AEPS, have been noted by several observers to the effect

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that Finland’s main motives in the development of the AEPS were other than direct environmental ones. “That there had been almost no consultation with other Nordic governments prior to its launch led to the suspicion that the Initiative’s main purpose was to revive Finland’s foreign policy profile which was declining in the wake of the thaw in East-West relations” (Scrivener 1996:4, my emphasis). “[T]he Finnish Initiative should be understood, at least in part, as an expression of Finland’s familiar post-war role as a conduit for western ideas to enter Soviet thinking and for Soviet concerns to make their way to western audiences” (Young 1998:72). Similarly, “the Arctic and Arctic environmental policy has been a new kind of activity in Finland’s foreign policy since Finland reacted positively to the proposals of President Mikhail Gorbachev (1987) in Murmansk” (Heininen 1998b:31). Furthermore, the selection of “the Arctic” as the area for an environmental protection and pollution monitoring initiative, as well as the design of the initiative, prompted speculation that the initiative was not fully thought-out. “[S]ome Norwegian officials apparently feared that one of the motives behind the Finnish Initiative was to gain influence over Norwegian resources policy in the Barents Sea” (Scrivener 1996:3–4). They pointed out that for an environment-centred approach, “[i]t would make more sense to seek progress in forums such as the UN Economic Commission for Europe (ECE) or global environmentally-relevant regimes” if this were what was sought, rather than developing an Arctic-specific initiative (Scrivener 1996:4). Here, the question was why one should focus on pollutant monitoring in a relatively clean area, the Arctic, where few of the pollutants were produced, rather than target (or at least include) the areas where pollutants originated (Young 1998). The initiative seemed “poorly thought-out in this respect” (Scrivener 1996:4). One observer even noted that “Protection of the Arctic environment” both provided an active theme for international discussion and an opportunity for the Finnish Government (primarily the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of the Environment) to play an “active role …for which it gained much recognition” (Kettlewell 1995:19). The design of the initiative, then, rather than originating in a direct areaspecific focus, seems to have been modelled on an approach in areas Finland wished to embrace. In effect, large parts of the AEPS were modelled on the UN-ECE-sponsored, Europe-oriented 1979 framework treaty for transboundary air pollution, the Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP); this was the same initiative that some critics suggested the AEPS should have proceeded within in the first place. The core of the LRTAP is the Environmental Monitoring and Evaluation Programme (EMEP, established in 1984). EMEP was a model for the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme AMAP of the AEPS (cf. Young 1998). As Young (1998) notes, much of the Arctic cooperation on Finland’s part was deduced from the LRTAP, almost like an application of the model, despite the fact

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that European and Arctic pollution patterns differ significantly. The LRTAP seems to have served as an example which directed thinking about the AEPS, “though it is by no means clear that anyone made a conscious effort to make this happen or that this conceptualization of the problem was particularly favorable to the interests of one or another of the participants” (Young 1998:8). Indeed, Young sees the approach on “the Arctic” as related to Finland’s history of cooperation: Recalling the earlier role of environmental initiatives within the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) process—the effort that lead to the 1979 Geneva Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP) began in response to a proposal Leonid Brezhnev articulated in the context of CSCE activities—a number of policymakers in other northern governments saw in the Finnish Initiative an opportunity to initiate a similar multilateral process in the Arctic (Young 1998:58; cf. eg. Heininen 1987, 2000).

In this regard, the AEPS was established not only as an initiative with connections to Russia but also one addressing Europe and North America— by definition a “pole apart” from the Soviet Union. Finnish involvement in Arctic cooperation is shaped by its domestic and international anxieties; it must be seen in light of the fact that it was the Soviet Union that articulated the possibilities for Arctic cooperation (through Gorbachev’s 1987 Murmansk speech), and of Finland’s need to develop relations with the West without disturbing the East. THE FINNISH FOREIGN POLICY BACKGROUND Finland’s motivation, that here came to manifest itself “towards the north,” is not difficult to understand. The Finnish-Russian history has had a prominent effect on the direction of Finnish foreign policy through time, affecting also Arctic development. “The territorial and national identity of Finland is often described as being ‘intermediate,’ ‘borderline’ and ‘peripheral’” (Hentilä 1999:86), and Finland is one of a chain of eleven countries running through the Baltics and down across eastern Central Europe that is sometimes called Zwischeneuropa, “Europe Between” (Hentilä 1999:86). Sharing a border with Russia, Finland had only gained its independence in 1917 and suffered through two bloody wars with the Soviet Union to retain it. Losing a tenth of its area, Finland had been compelled to sign a cooperation pact—The Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance—with the Soviet Union in 1948. This largely constrained Finnish foreign policy in the postwar years and even up until the fall of the Soviet Union. It also prohibited Finland from joining the Nordic Council when this was founded in 1952 as a deliberative parliamentary body for Nordic small-power cooperation in the shadow of the Cold War (Fitzmaurice 1987:53, Simoulin

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Lereps 2000). When Finland was able to join the Nordic Council and the United Nations in 1955, the Finnish government, in order to not disturb the Soviet Union, agreed that foreign policy should not be on the Council’s agenda. From that time, neutrality became an explicit Finnish aim (Fitzmaurice 1987:53, Stålvant 1982).4 President Kekkonen (who held office 1956–1982) gradually and pragmatically expanded Finland’s margin for international action. The country pursued developments sanctioned by the Soviet Union but from time to time was warned against overstepping its bounds. Finland’s initiatives included membership of the European Free Trade Association, initial participation in the discussions for Nordic economic cooperation, participation in UN peace-keeping forces in Cyprus and the Sinai, proposals for a nuclear-free zone in Northern Europe, and holding the SALT and CSCE security conferences in Helsinki. Finland also concentrated its air force and infantry in Lapland, officially to counter a NATO attack on the Kola Peninsula and Murmansk, but most probably to deter any risk of a Soviet invasion (Fitzmaurice 1987:49–51). Thus, the relationship with the Soviet Union was not just one among other issues in Finland, as security policy concerns in the other Nordic states were; rather, it constituted a crucial focus in Finnish politics (Fitzmaurice 1987). This meant that Finnish policies differed from those of other neutral states such as Sweden or Switzerland, which do “not have a major common border with a superpower or a historically complicated relationship with it” (Wahlbäck 1982:23). Throughout the postwar period—at least until the 1970s—debate about foreign policy in Finland was very restricted and remained a concern up into glasnost.5 This made the signals of openness from the Soviet Union in the late 1980s especially significant. It is notable that one of the prominent initiatives in Finnish foreign policy in addition to the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe held in Helsinki (CSCE, to which the LRTAP initiative was related), was the proposal for a Nordic Nuclear Free Zone. This proposal had been raised in the Nordic Council by a Finnish delegate in 1961 and was emphasized by Finnish President Koivisto as late as in the 1980s (Fitzmaurice 1987:165–167). But it was not until Gorbachev’s Murmansk speech in 1987—which, among other things, endorsed the Nordic Nuclear Free Zone—that progress could have been made. In itself, this was a potent signal, and the 1987 speech strongly indicated a change in Soviet policy. As late as 1987, Fitzmaurice wrote: More recently, especially since the election of Mauno Koivisto to the Presidency in 1982… Finland has been perceived as having more freedom of movement in its foreign policy and of acting in a spirit of more genuine independence and non-alignment and at the same time authorizing a somewhat more lively debate about security and defence policy issues at home (Fitzmaurice 1987:162).6

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At the end of the Cold War, Finland’s scope of action thus broadened significantly, and Finland moved towards the West and new allegiances. In 1989, Finland was a non-aligned country with close relations to the Soviet Union; in 1995, six years later, Finland had joined the EU (Raunio and Wiberg 2000). During these changes, the AEPS, which had developed in response to changed Soviet/Russian policy first lost some of its attraction as Finnish agency increased: The years 1992 and 1993 the interest for the northern in Finland decreased, at the same time as international cooperation was extended further in northern areas. This might have been a mirage, but it seemed that the northern questions had been forgotten in foreign policy and also in the dialogue with the EC, after the acceptance of the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (Heininen 1999b: 31, my translation).7

In Finland’s efforts to develop a new foreign policy within this window of opportunity, “the Arctic” as such can thus not be seen as a continuous policy aim even at the time of the AEPS. Instead, Finnish efforts seemed to concentrate on developing foreign policy towards nearing itself to the West. In this, a potential EC/EU dimension to northern issues came to the fore, something that might already have been an integral consideration already at the time of the AEPS initiative.8 In 1988, as the AEPS was being elaborated, an early discussion of northern policy in Finland took place in the rather informal forum the Kuhmo Summer Academy. The thought was that a northern dimension could become a first Finnish imprint on EU politics, a possibility which would, however, require that Finland have a strategic northern policy (Heininen 1998a). This also to some extent became the road the Finnish government took when, in 1994, the term “Northern Dimension,” developed for Finnish use in relation to the EU, was coined as what was to be the start of an EU-directed foreign policy program.9 It thus seems that it was within this sort of movement away from Russia and towards the EU that first the “Arctic” and then the “northern” attained its strong emphasis. The target area was less a focus than policy itself, however; the emphasis on the Arctic and the AEPS lessened, and the Northern Dimension soon came to diverge from an Arctic focus to one centring on the Baltic region instead, with notably different descriptions of the areas.10 The possibilities of foreign policy development opened up by Gorbachev’s Murmansk speech were thus exploited: not only in the AEPS but to define Finland as a country relevant to larger powers and, perhaps, less generally “northern” than northern European, with a concomitant focus on the EU. Finland defined this role starting from the formative processes in Arctic work that Gorbachev had invited and progressing towards a greater leeway in foreign policy.

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DESIGNING THE AEPS: THE CONTENT OF AN ARCTIC APPROACH The more precise content and even selection of area for a particularly Arctic approach in Finland thus largely remained undeveloped, and also largely unproblematized with the exception of the focus placed on the environment. It was perhaps on that background that, already at this early point, the longstanding Canadian interest in the “Arctic” became dominant in designing the AEPS. “Despite the fact that the AEPS is known as the Finnish Initiative, Finland played a surprisingly low-key role in operationalizing…the Rovaniemi Declaration” (Young 1998:155). A factor that is often overlooked is the key role that Canada played in the drafting of the Strategy [AEPS]. Garth Bangay, an official from the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs, was one of the main Canadian negotiators. While Rajakoski was the initiator of the Strategy, Bangay was the main drafter of the actual Strategy (Soroos 1993:206, in Huebert 1997:48).

From the outset, Canada had also suggested that the Strategy should center on sustainable development and be called the “Arctic Sustainable Development Strategy,” to indicate a broader focus than the environment. This was ultimately rejected (although Canada would take it up again in its Arctic Council initiative) (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings, p. 98). Highlighting this extensive Canadian role, Huebert noted that: It is not surprising to discover that in the Strategy, almost every example of pollution is Canadian in nature. The Strategy was approved by all eight countries but the fact remains that the AEPS strongly reflects Canadian thinking (Huebert 1997:48).

In the AEPS instituted in 1991, at least one of the four main programs of the Strategy, the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF), came directly from Canadian involvement. CAFF was initiated when the Canadian Wildlife Service of Environment Canada suggested that External Affairs include a flora and fauna conservation element in the proposed strategy. Canada put this suggestion forward officially at a 1990 preparatory meeting for establishing the AEPS, held in Yellowknife, Canada (Huebert 1997:49). Canada also provided the secretariat for CAFF, which later came to include a focus on indigenous peoples’ traditional ecological knowledge and “pushed hard to expand the attention devoted to the concerns of indigenous peoples under the AEPS” (Young 1998:158). There were also indications of a continued Arctic—Antarctic comparative approach practically in the development of the AEPS. Besides

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CAFF, there are three other programs in the AEPS, also covered by working groups, which subsequently included organizations of their own and, in some cases, secretariats. These are, besides CAFF, the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP, through which efforts to define and describe the baseline of the Arctic region were later forwarded), the Protection of Arctic Marine Environment (PAME, mainly dealing with the effects of pollution on marine life), and Emergency Prevention, Preparedness and Response (EPPR, to respond to oil spills and other emergencies). Both the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF) and Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment (PAME) largely mirror the Antarctic approach (the 1978 Agreed Measures for the Conservation of the Antarctic Fauna and Flora, and the 1982 Convention for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources CCAMLR). Given the numerous comparisons with the Antarctic in the establishment of the AEPS as well (cf. e.g. Tennberg 2000:121), one must acknowledge the persistent importance of other than directly regionally specific and areabased approaches in the establishment and programmatic design of cooperation (particularly in maintaining the Arctic—Antarctic comparison). This external influence in the design of the Arctic approach is also visible in that AMAP was to some extent modelled on LRTAP, the Europe-focused long-range transboundary air pollution initiative. This more externally than region-derived focus was also manifested in the organization of the AEPS. Leaving “no doubt about the identity of the participants” (Young 1998:36), the Rovaniemi Declaration opens “We, the Representatives of the Governments” of the eight Arctic states. Accordingly, in practical organization, the highest forum of the AEPS is the biannual meeting on foreign affairs at the ministerial level, which is prepared by meetings of civil servants called Senior Arctic Officials (SAOs; at one stage in cooperation also called Senior Arctic Affairs Officials, SAAOs) who handle day-to-day cooperation. In keeping with the Arctic-Antarctic parallels, a number of Observers were also included, primarily the “non-Arctic” states with Arctic/polar research interests and international organizations concerned with environmental protection (the World Wide Fund for Nature WWF has been prominent). As a “region“-oriented development, the cooperation also included representatives of main indigenous nongovernmental organizations in the area (so called Permanent Participants). Indigenous peoples’ organizations were thus awarded a special standing which, while not on a par with that of state representatives, granted the right to participate and speak (although not to vote) at meetings. While this arrangement was not formally instituted until the Arctic Council was established, indigenous participants in practice had already gained participatory rights in the AEPS and its working groups (Young 1998, Tennberg 2000, Bloom 1999). This special standing for a non-state group of participants is a feature that sets the AEPS-Arctic Council apart from many other international

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organizations. The development of a Permanent Participant grouping was pursued by Canada in particular (cf. Reimer 1993). Indeed, Huebert (1998) largely attributes the fact that the aboriginal groups achieved participatory status at all in the AEPS, and subsequently Permanent Participant status in the Arctic Council, to the close relationship between the indigenous NGO the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC) and the Canadian delegation. Canada had, for example, already developed a domestic policy of indigenous participation (in for instance its Northern Contaminants Programme NCP, the principal Canadian program on transboundary pollution in the north). This is to say that the ICC has quite a bit of political power within Canada: When the ICC successfully marshalled support for inclusion, the five states not represented by ICC wanted to ensure representation for their northern Indigenous peoples. Thus the Saami Council and the Association of Indigenous Minorities of the North, Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation were added as participants (Huebert 1998:149).11

These “added participants” were the indigenous NGOs which had been active in Arctic meetings earlier, most notably the Arctic Leaders’ Summit arranged in 1989 (cf. Huebert 1998). Thus, what had been primarily an environmental focus—in line with a Finnish Arctic understanding quickly extrapolated south on the strength of Gorbachev’s speech—largely came to by Canadian action include perspectives on “the Arctic” as a region and the related Canadian indigenous focus. This added to the tension of a more externally than region-derived focus that could be seen in the state-centered and Antarctic-inspired design. Such a split between a focus on the environment and a focus on the indigenous groups as a priority for Arctic cooperation was visible also in the declaration establishing the AEPS. As a rationale for cooperation in the Arctic, the 1991 Declaration on the Protection of the Arctic Environment states a concern for the “threatened and fragile Arctic environment” and also recognizes “the special relationship of the indigenous peoples and local populations to the Arctic and their unique contribution to the protection of the Arctic environment” (Rovaniemi Declaration 1991). However, “the primary focus of the strategy is a set of specific pollutants thought to constitute serious threats to Arctic ecosystems” (Young 1998:36). On balance, the AEPS contains elements of a Finnish foreign policy focus on transboundary pollution to some degree modelled on the LRTAP (a focus also found in Gorbachev’s Murmansk speech), a Canadian emphasis on peoples with a traditional relationship to the environment, as well as the Arctic-Antarctic comparison. The AEPS is therefore more of a compromise between the Finnish environment-centred approach and Canadian understandings of “the Arctic” than the result of a coherent and systematic design. Consequently, while the AEPS was quickly institutionalized,

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disagreements among states led to its not being formalized in a legally binding agreement but as a “strategy” without legally binding implications on its signatories. In the development of the Arctic Council on this basis, eventually coming to subsume the AEPS, these contradictions between environmental, ArcticAntarctic, and indigenous foci would become even more marked as the Canadian role grew. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ARCTIC COUNCIL: THE CANADIAN INITIATIVE In their work on Canada and polar science, Adams et al. note: “[t]here exists in Canada a large number of public and private institutions involved wholly or to some degree in the fields of northern science, northern research and the developments of polar technologies” (1987: iv). That Canada took a prominent role in development of “the Arctic” as an international region may thus not be surprising. Rather than a relatively novel concern (as “the Arctic” was to Finland), “the Arctic” was a well developed and institutionalized, although conflicting and contradictory, domestic discourse in Canada (cf. Nord 1991:129). However, “the Arctic” or “the North,” two concepts used interchangeable domestically in Canada, is less developed and integrated physically into the Canadian state system than it is as an idea or ideological focus in Canadian frontier mythology. That it was now becoming a priority was largely a result of the indigenous conflicts and land claims that had commanded Canadian state attention. To some degree, then, a comparatively recent indigenous focus was what prompted the development of an Arctic Council. As Young states: The growing voice of the indigenous peoples of the Canadian North during the 1980s and 1990s has served to focus attention in Canada on northern issues. Above all, the government of Canada treated the AEPS as a stepping stone on the route to creating the Arctic Council, an idea… that became known in Arctic circles as the Canadian initiative (Young 1998:158).

The idea of some sort of international cooperation along northern lines was, however, not new as either an idea or a motivation for Canada. It is the closest geographical cooperation open to Canada, which to its south only borders on the US superpower—a fact that was also noted at the time of the development. On the motivation for an Arctic Council, Pharand suggests that the Canadian fear of American pressure is of long standing and was probably the main reason for Prime Minister Louis S.St. Laurent and secretary of state Lester B. Pearson to state, as far back as 1946, that Canada wished to work ‘not only with the USA but with the other Arctic countries, Denmark,

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Of note here is that “the Arctic” is seen as the five Arctic Rim or Arctic Basin states (those bordering on the Arctic Ocean),12 which, as discussed earlier, was the common view throughout the Cold War. When the suggestion of a sort of council for the area was first made in Canada in 1970, it thus pertained to these five states. The proposal was made in the context of the emerging Law of the Sea shortly after Canada’s adoption of the Arctic Waters Pollution Act in 1970, in turn a response to US transgressions of Canadian Arctic waters. Here, a professor Maxwell Cohen not only suggested that Canada cooperate with all other Arctic States but that this cooperation be formalized in a treaty. He wrote: the most urgent objective of Canadian policy…is the development of a body of Arctic basin consensus, perhaps an Arctic Basin Treaty Canadian Arctic policy…offers a superb opportunity for Canadian leadership in the development of an Arctic basin systems approach having relevance to the polar area as a whole and to the Canadian archipelago and its waters in particular (Cohen 1970:81, quoted in and with emphasis by Pharand 1992:166).

Prompted by the new international policy environment in 1987, a working group of the National Capital Branch of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs, including Professor Cohen, discussed further the development of an Arctic Basin Council (Pharand 1992). But while in 1970 “the Arctic” had been seen as the Arctic Basin of relevance to states bordering the Arctic Ocean, in the late 1980s the view of the Arctic was extended as a consequence of amongst other things, Gorbachev’s speech. Evaluating these developments, Pharand in 1991 wrote: The expression ‘Arctic Region’ was chosen instead of ‘Arctic Basin’ because the latter would normally exclude Iceland, Finland and Sweden, which should be included. Of the numerous ways to define the ‘Arctic Region,’ the 60th parallel of latitude appears to be the most appropriate. It includes all the areas covered by the tundra or continuous permafrost, except for parts of northern Quebec and of Labrador; hence, the qualified definition. More specifically, the area north of 60° includes virtually all of the relevant regions of the eight Arctic States (Pharand 1991, para. 14, my emphasis).

Pharand thus defined the Arctic largely on basis of the Canadian domestic definition of 60° north latitude, and for the eight states that had recently become seen as “Arctic.” More exactly, the areas which Pharand proposed as parts of an “Arctic” region were, in Canada, the Yukon, the Northwest

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Territories, most of northern Quebec and the tip of Labrador; in Denmark, all of Greenland; all of Finland and lceland; in Norway, all of Svalbard and most of mainland Norway north of Oslo; in Sweden, most of the territory north of Stockholm; in the USSR, “roughly the northern half (counting the archipelagos) of the territory, including the numerous rivers emptying in the Arctic Ocean”; and in the US “virtually all of Alaska” (ibid., para 15–22).13 “The Arctic” of such a scope was thus a much-extended region, derived from Canadian conceptualizations as well as the extension of “the Arctic” from a five- to an eight-state area. It did not, however, so much take into account the differing climatic and administrative delineations of other states or the extent to which these areas might not exhibit what were seen as “Arctic” characteristics in Canada. Nevertheless, one may assume that Pharand’s understanding of the Arctic was forwarded when he suggested the establishment of an Arctic Council to a Canadian and Norwegian-sponsored seminar in Tromsø in December 1987. Encouraged by the feedback, the policy-oriented Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations recommended the establishment of an Arctic Council in its 1988 report (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988; Pharand 1992). The recommendation was well received by the Canadian government, and started a succession of intra-Canadian developments. In November 1989, Canadian Prime minister Brian Mulroney visited the Soviet Union to conclude Arcticrelated bilateral agreements. Towards the end of his address at the Arctic and Antarctic Institute in Leningrad, he asked, “[a]nd why not a council of Arctic Countries eventually coming into existence to coordinate and promote cooperation among them?” (Mulroney 1989:6, quoted in Pharand 1992:167; see also Pharand 1991, para. 70). Quick to pick up on this momentum, an Arctic Council Panel sponsored by the Canadian Arctic Resources Committee CARC, the indigenous NGO the Inuit Circumpolar Conference ICC and the Canadian Arms Control Center, was established; the panel was to be co-chaired by researcher Franklyn Griffiths14 and Rosemary Kuptana, the 1986–1989 Canadian vice president of the ICC. Suggesting the establishment of an Arctic Council, the Arctic Council Panel submitted its preliminary report already in March 1990 (four months after Mulroney’s address). By November of the same year, the Arctic Council initiative had been accepted in principle by the Canadian government. Speaking in Ottawa in November 1990, Joe Clark, Secretary of State for External Affairs, stated: The Government believes that now is the time to move forward to establish that Arctic Council We will raise the proposal at a ministerial meeting in Finland next spring on environmental co-operation. Canada is willing to host a small secretariat for this Council and contribute to sustaining it from the outset (Clark 1990, quoted in Pharand 1991, para. 71).

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The Arctic Council Panel then produced a second, more comprehensive Framework Report in January 1991, which was discussed at a roundtable in Ottawa. The report proposed inclusion of indigenous and non-state actors as well as consideration of both civilian and military issues. Two months later, another working group of the National Capital Branch of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs (CIIA, where long-term advocacy for a northern foreign policy of Canada had taken place) published a report urging the Canadian government to establish an Arctic Region Council. One of the appendices to the report (CARC 1991) was a “Draft Arctic Treaty: An Arctic Regional Council” prepared by Donat Pharand. The Arctic Council Panel then published another Framework Report in May (The Arctic Council Panel 1991b; also appearing in shorter version as The Arctic Council Panel 1991a). Produced with notable speed, this study was published only four months after the earlier report and two months after the CIIA report (Pharand 1991, 1992). As is apparent from the time line, all this took place at the same time as the introductory stages of the Finnish Initiative and prior to the first ministerial meeting on the Protection of the Arctic Environment that resulted in the formal institutionalization of the AEPS. On balance, as rapid policy developments that drew upon a range of established Canadian Arctic-related organizations and bodies, the proposals were broadly similar in their reasons for advocating an Arctic Council, with the Arctic Council Panel’s suggestions attracting the most attention (Scrivener 1996). Individual researchers active at the policy-research interface, such as Griffiths and Pharand, played large roles, and so did also other groups than the state itself. These include not only policy institutes but also interest groups and NGOs. A party particularly integral to the Arctic Council development was the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, an international nongovernmental organization for the cooperation of Inuit peoples in Canada, Greenland, Alaska and, since 1989, also Chukotka in northeast Russia. ICC involvement was not only exercised through the fact that the co-chair of the Arctic Council Panel was the vice president of ICC Canada (1986–1989). The ICC had early in Arctic Council talks expressed its support for the initiative on condition that it include “the direct and meaningful participation of aboriginal peoples” (Reimer 1993, para. 33). Both the ICC and the Arctic Council Panel provided input to Canada’s Draft Declaration of the Establishment of an Arctic Council. The ICC also participated with the Department of External Affairs in bilateral talks with Scandinavian Countries and with the US prior to the second Arctic Council talks, in May 1993 (Reimer 1993, Simon 1992:23),15 and in later Arctic Council talks pressed for the inclusion of indigenous peoples on the Council (Young 1998:76, Reimer 1993). The Canadian Initiative, a result of this cooperation between numerous domestic bodies, indigenous organization and the Canadian state, was then

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launched at the Rovaniemi Ministerial Meeting in June 1991 (Scrivener 1996:11). Canada thus embarked on the path that Canada’s Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Tom Siddon had described thus, at a meeting of northern aboriginal leaders in Copenhagen: Achieving a permanent arctic council among a group of nations with widely differing geographic, economic, cultural, and strategic interests will not be a simple task. But we believe it is a goal worth pursuing (quoted in AKS 1991, para. 7).

THE DESIGN OF THE ARCTIC COUNCIL In its initial design, the Arctic Council differed sharply from the AEPS. In scope, the Council was clearly a region-building rather than a single-issue regime or environmental initiative. The broad aim of the Council was apparent in the Arctic Council Panel suggestion of summer 1991 that an Arctic Council should share certain attributes of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE), centralize international discussion of regional issues and the identification of projects for joint action, decentralize implementation, and be an “instrument for consensual learning, public diplomacy, and mutual suasion among parties with much business to transact” (Arctic Council Panel 1991a, para. 20). The direction of work suggested was very broad, both external and internal to “the Arctic”; it amounted to nothing less than a governance body. For example, it was suggested that the Arctic Council would provide for exchange on domestic problems common to the Arctic countries, the establishment of circumpolar transboundary issue standards, a pooling of effort and resources to counter the region’s dependence on external forces, and coordination of Arctic matters.16 The Arctic Council Panel wrote: “all indications suggest that Rovaniemi II [the continuation of the AEPS] will be so weakly institutionalized that environmental issues would be better subsumed into the agenda of an Arctic Council which may, in turn, serve to energize the Rovaniemi process [the AEPS] on specific issues” (Arctic Council Panel 1991a, para. 64). Suggestions for the Council also included a broader array of actors, in line with a more region-centred focus. “[B]orn into a post-Cold War environment,” the Arctic Council should bring together “not only the circumpolar states but arctic aboriginal peoples, territorial governments, regional and community representatives, and also non-arctic actors into a circumpolar forum that enables all concerned with the region’s affairs to work together” (Arctic Council Panel 1991a, para. 21). Aboriginal and territorial participation were also to be built directly into the Council, to address both problems that arise within the region and that affect it from outside. Specifically, “problems selected for action by the Working Groups will be chosen to meet the aspirations of aboriginal peoples and other northerners as they define them” (Arctic Council Panel 1991a, para. 69,

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my emphasis). The proposal of the Arctic Council, at this point, thus explicitly targeted a bottom-up perspective and placed the focus on broad governance issues. To create this forum for broad and cross-level deliberation and problem identification, different structures were suggested. These, however, placed less of an emphasis on broad democratic participation. The suggested structures were a) a “plenary” of Arctic states, indigenous peoples and “other”; b) a “bicameral” body of states and non-state actors; c) a “tripartite delegation” with national delegations comprising state, indigenous and subnational government representatives; and d), the panel’s preferred option, a “compact” of eight state delegations, one indigenous delegation and a tenth delegation, represented by the Northern Forum (an organization of subnational governments over a broader area than that of the proposed Council). The Northern Forum was thus here considered to represent the territorial governments of the “Arctic.” It was further suggested that aboriginal home rule governments would be able to choose their form of representation; nonArctic states (“for example, Germany, Japan, Poland, and the United Kingdom,” all with sizeable Arctic research programs) could also be invited individually to attend as observers with the right to speak in Council, as in the AEPS (Arctic Council Panel, 1991a). Thus, the approach, despite an explicit “bottom-up” orientation, retained in practice a focus on state actors. While it emphasized the indigenous component, it did not give a definite recommendation as to how to ensure subregional representation, and the discussion of this representation as “other” indicates that this issue was not much problematized. RESPONSES TO THE PROPOSAL FOR AN ARCTIC COUNCIL Just as Finland had done in the case of the AEPS, Canada then officially invited governments by letter to join the cooperation (as Young 1998 points out, they were perhaps otherwise reluctant but now bound to respond).17 Responses to the proposal in the policy and research communities, however, largely criticized the Council as being based on Canadian domestic and foreign policy problems and situations and representing a rather haphazard selection of issues for its “Arctic” scope. Critics saw the Arctic Council as a directly Canada-based more than an internationally applicable initiative: More generally, Arctic issues were less prominent in the domestic politics of the other Arctic states, compared with the Canadian case. In some ways, the whole Arctic Council idea could be seen as an external projection of the internal political processes related to indigenous peoples of the Canadian north (Scrivener 1996:13; cf. Heininen and Käkonen 1998:9).18

On a governmental level, many officials outside Canada were skeptical because they had little experience of what was meant by “the Arctic” (Scrivener 1996).

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This was both because the Arctic as an approach of this scope was a novelty, and domestic approaches to the Arctic were often both divergent and rather limited. Some of the aims stated for the cooperation were also not perceived by all the states as primarily involving “the Arctic”: “therefore circumpolar cooperation should not be pushed for its own sake, in competition with other cooperative frameworks involving states outside “the Arctic” (Scrivener 1996:12). In particular, it was argued that military issues “were more appropriately addressed in fora like NATO or the Helsinki Process (CSCE)” (ibid.). It was also noted that as an array of recently developed “Arctic”oriented bodies existed, already largely underfunded, “many polar officials shared a certain resistance to additional layers of circumpolar interaction” (Scrivener 1996:12). In response to this criticism, “[t]he Arctic Council Panel, with which the Canadian government continued to liaise, saw its scheme being almost inexorably watered down in several respects” (Scrivener 1996:13). In 1991, the Arctic Council Panel commented: “states are unanimous in tacit opposition to negotiations among arctic states on military matters…aboriginal peoples, territorial governments are likely to wish these issues to be treated” (Arctic Council Panel 1991, para. 64; cf. Scrivener 1996). Accordingly, in a March 1992 Draft for an International Arctic Council, there is no reference made to the inclusion of military matters, peace and security (Ministry of External Affairs Canada 1992). At a further round of consultations between Arctic governments, in 1992–1993, the internationally favorable responses concerned the very general issues: e.g., the sharing of ideas and strategies to promote balanced and environmentally sound economic development, the promotion of initiatives relating to transboundary pollution consistent with the AEPS, a review of issues of regional interest and cooperation programs, and coordination of information and ideas from other international Arcticbased organizations and networks (Scrivener 1996, Kettlewell 1995). There was thus quite some disagreement internationally on the use and purpose of an Arctic Council. As Finland had earlier done in the AEPS, Canada nevertheless extended the use of its Arctic initiative into more general “northern” identity-building, especially in connection with foreign policy. For example, in 1991 the recently established Canadian Polar Commission began its work. Reporting to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, the Commission was nationally responsible for fostering the development of knowledge about the polar regions, i.e., both the Arctic and the Antarctic. In 1993, Canada also appointed a Canadian Arctic Circumpolar Ambassador to report to both domestic and internationally oriented branches of the government. The first holder of the post was former ICC Executive Council Member Mary Simon, who also was made the first chair of the Arctic Council (England et al. 1998). As Simon herself, noted, “[a]s a component of Canada’s foreign policy review, new attention was been given to the Northern Dimension of Canada’s Foreign Policy Agenda” (Simon 1995:48).19

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Traditional Arctic-Antarctic comparative approaches were also retained, and not only as indicated by the suggested inclusion of states with Arctic research programs in the Arctic Council. For instance, the Antarctic Treaty continued to be talked about broadly as a model for Arctic work (Roots 1992, Pharand 1992). This was especially the case in the states that had not traditionally conceived of their northern lands as Arctic. Thus, in 1992–1994, the Nordic Council twice recommended that the Nordic governments take initiatives to develop comprehensive Arctic intergovernmental cooperation on resource, environmental and security issues and to promote the establishment of an Arctic regime similar to the Antarctic Treaty System (Scrivener 1996). In discussions between all parties, it was only in 1993 that the model of the Antarctic Treaty System was finally rejected, and then on sovereignty grounds rather than as distinguishing of Arctic issues from Antarctic: the five Arctic Rim states—Canada, US, Russia, DenmarkGreenland and Norway—made it clear that they would not consent to any agreement that would surrender sovereignty over their maritime zones to international authority (Scrivener 1996). Throughout this time, some confusion thus persisted as to the aim of an Arctic Council, even if its development was largely allowed to progress. The Nordic states, to quite some extent viewing the Arctic development as comparative to the Antarctic, had also been rather ambivalent about the development of an Arctic Council overall. It was finally, in 1993 at a meeting delineating the issues to be dealt with by the Arctic Council, that “the scepticism of the Nordic states [was]…overcome” sufficiently for a declaration to be issued with tentative agreement on the overall purpose of an Arctic Council (Scrivener 1996:13). The one state that at this point did not consent even to issuing a preliminary Declaration was the US. This largely related to the established US—Canadian conflicts in Arctic issues, some of the same ones that had motivated Canada to develop the Council. Kuptana, the co-chair of the Arctic Council Panel, highlights both who the active developers of the Arctic Council were and the US resistance to Council development: The Arctic Council Panel—a small, non-governmental group of aboriginal and southern Canadians…has succeeded in convincing the Canadian government to advocate our position regarding the citation of an international Arctic council The United States stood alone in opposing its creation, and also questioned the requirement for strong aboriginal representation (Kuptana 1992:41, my emphasis).

The fact was, however, that US opposition was connected to its opposition to the Canadian focus on indigenous issues. With a strong environmental conservation lobby, the US clearly placed the primacy for Arctic matters on the environment, and saw certain proposals related to indigenous rights as a“hunting license” for attacking US marine mammal legislation (cf.

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Young 1998:64). There were also certain established issues of conflict where Canada had earlier insisted on Canadian sovereignty over icecovered waters where Canadian Inuit were hunting and where the US wished to establish shipping routes. Consequently, “in the face of continuing US uneasiness,” intergovernmental discussions on the Arctic Council “almost petered out from mid-1993 to late 1994” (Scrivener 1996:13). Like the internally contradictory foci on the environment and indigenous matters and the continual comparisons with the Antarctic, such US opposition would become a consistent feature of Arctic cooperation. CONCLUSION In this continuation and extension of the establishment of the Arctic as a region, the process thus came to center even more closely on the categories and issues traditionally related to the label. This was a development that took place almost incrementally and through a certain self-selection of parties in these early states of institutionalization. The ICC, a body the Finnish initiative had not consulted with as such at the outset, developed through largely Canadian support into one of the most formative actors—even with a category established for it that was highly unusual in international stateled cooperation. The changes largely unfolded as Canada became a driving force in Arctic cooperation, aiming to extend and supersede the AEPS, and with a domestically well-developed issue basis. Region-building also continued to be a premise of the established Arctic actors, including state, research (such as in the development of the Arctic Council approach in Canada) and indigenous groups that to a large extent were included through state actions. Those that became involved in these categories of actors were, however, a particular selection: for instance not all states were equally invested (for example, Canada quickly took on a much larger role than Finland). In this state of development, then, a region-building approach saw involvement of diverse actors, particularly of those who held an affinity to “the Arctic” as a label, name or established discourse, and to the environmental and indigenousity foci. Considerable “silences” also developed in the regional discussions, however, mainly appearing as representation that was discussed but never included in cooperation and that can be seen as indicating limitations on discourse. Thus, while the ICC included itself into cooperation among states through its involvement in an Arctic issues network and links into the Canadian state, the regional governments or “other” northern people than indigenous (as they were referred to e.g., in Arctic Council Panel suggestions) were not included, and no bodies to represent them were ultimately invited despite that fact that the Northern Forum had been designated by the Arctic Council Panel. The history of polar cooperation and comparison between the Arctic

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and Antarctica also retained a central role, which then assigned a primacy to the environment more so than to the region or to peoples or citizens of the region as the focus of cooperation. Given the explicit people-focused aims of the Arctic Council, these continued connotations and omissions in inclusion are particularly significant. What they indicate is a discourse that is very specific in constraining what and who can be seen as an “Arctic” issue and actor. The discussions on the aims and use of the Council, and comments on that many officials had little experience of what was meant by “the Arctic,” also indicate that Arctic issues were of limited interest, little problematized, or poorly defined to some of the actors selected into Arctic work. On this conflicting basis, the Arctic Council would not be established until 1996, nor become fully operational until 1998. Its extension past the AEPS would also focus on a rather particular and conflict-ridden segment of issues, such as those strongly politicized by the US—Canadian animosity over the environmental—indigenous foci. This conflict in defining a broader “Arctic” approach, and how it came to center on the concept of sustainable development, is the topic of the following chapter.

CHAPTER 4

Sustainable Development in the Arctic A Conflict Between Conservation and Utilization

Following the launch of the Arctic Council initiative, much of the conflict in the period up until the Council’s institutionalization in 1996 and the final agreement on rules of procedure in 1998 centered around the contradiction between some interpretations of the main environmental and indigenous themes. These conflicts were largely played out under the theme of “sustainable development,” which became the main extension to the Arctic Council in comparison with the environment-centered AEPS. While earlier plans, for example in the Arctic Council Panel, had been more extensive, this label of “sustainable development”—something that Canada had promoted already as a theme for the AEPS—thus seemed to provide a sufficiently environmentrelated focus for agreement among actors on developing the Arctic Council. As the AEPS was now being integrated under the emerging Arctic Council, however, the established AEPS focus on environmental conservation and the Arctic Council inclusion of indigenous traditional rights in sustainable utilization were set to clash. The suggestion in this chapter is that the conflict came to center upon these issues by the very use of the Arctic concept and symbol, which implied that themes related to the environment and groups conceived as living close to the environment would be principal foci in cooperation. The sustainable development discussion, under which these themes were played out, can thus be read as a conflict over the relevant focus of “Arctic” work. While the key actors involved themselves in the developments on these themes, the “silences” on other issues persisted, however: while for example the lack of broader democratic involvement was criticized, subregional representation was never invited. Instead, the environment-indigenous nexus largely became the argumentative position in which “Arctic” discourse and developments of a broader orientation in the Arctic Council were locked, and would also be what worked to select new actors (either conservation or utilization focused). In the process, other issues and the question of how to decide what an “Arctic” regional issue was became obscured, and developments were strongly politicized.

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SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Sustainable development, as the label under which the environmental— indigenous conflict was waged, largely became imported into “Arctic” cooperation through its salience internationally. In 1992, the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) was held in Rio de Janeiro, reinforcing the momentum for sustainable development that the UN World Commission on Environment and Development (the Brundtland Commission), among other bodies, had created. In 1987, the Commission report Our Common Future had popularized the notion of sustainable development as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (WCED 1987:43). This understanding of sustainable development, as a concept including human and environmental dimensions, had been developed to highlight the need for economic development that did not deplete the environmental resource base. It was also to some degree a response to the conflict over environmental protection that did not allow economic development in communities dependent on the resources. As the Brundtland report states: Environment and development are not separate challenges: they are inexorably linked. Development cannot subsist on a deteriorating environmental base; the environment cannot be protected when growth leaves out of account the costs of environmental protection (WCED 1987:40).

The integration of environmental, economic and social development was thus crucial to the concept of sustainable development. The UN Conference on Environment and Development was extensively publicized and resulted in, among other things, the Agenda 21 document, which suggests a global agenda for the 21st century. Agenda 21 highlights in its social aspects especially the inclusion of affected groups in decision-making and the necessity of integrating environmental, social and economical assessments (UNCED 1992). This UN process, with its major impact on the environmental movement in general, came to influence strongly the emerging Arctic development. Following the 1992 UNCED, in the preparatory process leading to the AEPS ministerial meeting in 1993, it was noted that “the AEPS presently projects a very protectionist posture concerning the Arctic despite the many references within the Strategy to sustainable development” (Protecting the Arctic Environment 1992:5, quoted in Tennberg 1998:165). With a notable change from the 1991 ministerial meeting that established the AEPS through the “Declaration on the Protection of the Arctic Environment” this 1993 ministerial meeting resulted in the Nuuk “Declaration on the Environment and Development in the Arctic,” as Tennberg notes (Tennberg 1998:165). This largely reflected “the ministers’ desire to link their work with UNCED”

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(Huebert 1998:144). In addition, in 1993, both an ICC report and a document from Arctic parliamentarians stated the need for Arctic sustainable development in accordance with the formulations in UNCED (TFSDU, April 24, 1995). To a large degree, this focus on sustainable development was an approach Canada had tried to develop already earlier. As the US stated on one occasion: Those of us who worked on it at the regional meeting to review it in Yellowknife will recall that the original title of the AEPS was the ‘Arctic Sustainable Development Strategy,’ as initially drafted by Canada, because I think their desire was to emphasize that component; and as it became to emphasize more the environmental protection side of it, we changed the title (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meeting, p. 98).

Canada was however not the only actor driving a sustainable development focus. Indigenous NGOs, especially ICC, proposals played a large role in developing the Arctic Council proposals over all. The ICC here acted both in cooperation with Canada, and as a body in its own right in the cooperation. In Reimer’s description, it was partly in response to the recommendations of the ICC report on integration of indigenous knowledge and indigenous participation into the AEPS that “they [ministers] agreed to establish a task force on sustainable development with a special focus on indigenous economies” (Reimer 1993, para. 6). Similarly, ministers committed themselves to reviving the PAME working group. This group had been dormant since the Rovaniemi meeting because of the fear that its focus on the Arctic marine environment might rekindle the conflict between marine mammals hunting and conservation (Reimer 1993). This discussion of sustainable development thus led to some changes in the organization of the AEPS/Arctic Council, notably the establishment of a new group to discuss and develop the concept in an Arctic context. The discussions in this sustainable development group, which will here be followed to the establishment of sustainable development as a major aim for the Arctic Council, provide an illustrative example of the development of an approach centered on region-building, including social and identity characteristics, out of a more limited environment-centered issue focus. It extended the scope of issues that could be treated as “Arctic” beyond the environmental features by which the Arctic had so far largely been defined in the AEPS. The issue agenda was also extended to socially and politically controversial questions, but remained within the range of historically established Arctic conflicts, including that between conservation and utilization: those that had been excluded from the process thus far (marine living resources had largely been stricken from the agenda of both the CAFF and PAME working groups apart from the question of the effects of pollution on mammals and PAME only

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had its first formal session in May 1994, following the 1993 revival of this group; cf. Scrivener 1996, Young 1998:126). Sustainable development thus represented a move into broader issues of governance and utilization of “the Arctic,” but at the same time required that these issues relate to the environment. Within the Canadian context, this focus was largely placed on indigenous peoples, and the increase in indigenous involvement was a large part of the change from the AEPS to the Arctic Council. Indeed, the extension of indigenous involvement in general in the Council and the expansion into sustainable development can be seen as related issues, and they substantially influenced the way in which conflict was shaped in the Council development. THE CONTESTED ISSUES FOR A TASK FORCE ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT The task force on sustainable development, significant as the first programmatic extension to an environmental protection approach came to serve as a battleground for established “Arctic” conflicts, notably that between Canada and the ICC, on one side, and the US, on the other, over whaling and sealing as an issue of traditional hunting rights vs. conservation. This is a traditional Arctic issue that relates to the management of Arctic sea resources. As Inuit have traditionally whaled and hunted seal and there are also certain Norwegian and Icelandic interests in whaling and seal hunting, a viable grouping exists among “Arctic” states on this issue. Among the coastal states, sea resource issues are highly significant: Arctic fisheries (utilized by Norway, Russia, Iceland, Greenland, Canada and Alaska among others) produce as much as 5–10 percent of the world’s catch of some 85 million tons. In the early 1990s, fish exports accounted for about 80 percent of Iceland and Greenland’s export income (Hoel 1993:5, 17–18). Whaling, of course, could add to consumption domestically in these countries and possibly somewhat to export income. One should note, however, that this was primarily an interest of the Arctic rim states and Iceland—a matter directly connected to Arctic sea resources and not pertaining especially to the newly defined eight-state region. By focusing on this contested issue, the broad question of the applicability of a general “Arctic” region and sustainable development in other fields were obscured and limited to what had long been seen as “Arctic” among established conflicting parties. Secondly, Arctic discourse was trapped in an argument built on a “wilderness conservation” focus, which was only open to criticism through arguments on “indigenous” and “traditional” utilization, again overshadowing any wider discussions of common regional priorities for “the Arctic.” The major issue in this conservation-utilization debate over whaling1 is constructed exactly along the lines of wilderness conservation vs. traditional indigenous utilization. The root of the conflict is that all commercial whaling, a formerly highly exploited market for which industry substitutes have been

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found, is currently banned by the international regulatory body, the International Whaling Commission (IWC). While the IWC bars commercial whaling, it allows some hunting under its aboriginal subsistence whaling category (restricting, for instance, the export of meat and other products from marine mammals).2 As international sale or commercial use of whale products is largely out of the question, hunting interests presently argue for their rights from a footing in the only whaling allowed (besides scientific): traditional indigenous. Whaling interests have thus largely had to be phrased as a demand for extension of indigenous or traditional rights and have been argued for in this form, for example, by the ICC as an indigenous organization, as well as in areas where whaling has traditionally been practiced (such as Norway and Iceland). Showing how contentious this category is, for example, at a conference on whaling, Greenland Home Rule Prime Minister Lars Emil Johansen emphasized that Some have the perception that this category [of aboriginal subsistence whaling in the IWC, where Greenlandic whaling is placed] is a living whaling museum. We do not! We do not export the whale meat, but use our whale resources internally in Greenland as we use our fish resources The income is used to cover the cost of modern and efficient killing-methods (Johansen 1997b: 15–16).

The degree to which the argumentation nevertheless needs to draw on traditional elements is notable (and also not particular to the indigenous interests) and probably related to traditional conceptions of wilderness as well as the fact that broader commercial whaling has been ruled out following the over-hunting and subsequent adoption of the whale as an important symbol for the environmental movement and in public opinion (cf. Andresen 1997, Lynge 1993).3 What has exacerbated this conflict into a foreign policy problem are then largely the states’ different policies and differing abilities to enforce policies. The IWC Convention allows any nation to regulate its own whaling more strictly than provided for in the Convention. Only one country—the United States—has done so, and this is a main factor behind US-Canadian animosity on this issue. While the ICC has within and outside Canada been active in striving for stronger Inuit rights to use marine mammals products (cf. e.g. Mitchell 1998), the US, a largely continental nation where Alaskan interests are those of only one among 50 states, is strongly conservation-oriented. According to the US Marine Mammal Protection Act (1972), a state lessening the effectiveness of the IWC Convention may have its fishery quota in US waters reduced and an embargo placed on its fishery products (Freeman et al. 1998:101ff, Gambell 1993). Due to whaling activities of their citizens, Canada, Iceland, Japan, Norway and Russia have all been threatened with economic sanctions, causing serious diplomatic disputes and influencing broader political cooperation between the states (Gray 1999).4

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Conflicts also exist with respect to seal hunting, which like whaling has become an environmental issue of great symbolic significance. These conflicts have largely affected both Arctic Canada and, for instance, Greenlanders, who are predominantly Inuit and involved in whaling and sealing. When in 1983 the EC banned the import of white coat fur pelts, this decision was part in effecting the collapse of the industry, which influenced the Inuit despite the fact that their harvest was not the target and was even exempted from the import ban (Rayner 1996). This change has been emphasized by those dealing with issues of the sealskin market. The President of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, speaking at a Nordic Council of Ministers conference in Copenhagen in January 1996, observed: “Sale of sealskins was once the main source of cash income for many Inuit families. The loss of this source of revenue has been catastrophic” (Kuptana 1996, quoted in Stokke 1992:157). There are thus fairly large established conflicts between states and also large established interests in these issues. In a comment clearly indicating the main state delineations, Andresen writes on whether Canada will join NAMMCO, a fairly recent and alternative body to the IWC: “It may well be that Canada, a significant builder of international institutions in the North, would enjoy belonging to an organization dealing with northern affairs, that did not have the US as a member” (Andresen 1997:82).5 The issue of whaling, however, also divides the Nordic countries, with Norway and Iceland not averse to commercial whaling, Denmark having to balance its interests with the pro-whaling policies of Greenland and the Faroe Islands, and Sweden and Finland, as non-Arctic Basin states, largely unconcerned with the issue and thus leaning toward international opinion (protection / conservation) (Andresen 1997:76–77). THE DEVELOPMENT OF A SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AGENDA: THE ROLE OF THE ICC On this background, the development of a sustainable development approach was largely related to a simultaneous extension of the indigenous focus. In 1993, full rights to participate in all meetings were extended to the three major indigenous organizations, which had earlier been given the right to participate in the proceedings of the four AEPS working groups but not in all the senior governmental discussions (Huebert 1998:144). In response to an ICC recommendation, Denmark also at this time offered to fund a secretariat to aid the participation of indigenous peoples (Reimer 1993). The Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat (IPS) was thus created within the AEPS (Young 1998:108–109).6 Formally, in endorsing the AEPS, the ministers then stated their commitment to “reaffirming the commitment to sustainable development, including the sustainable use of renewable resources by indigenous peoples, and to that end agreeing to establish a Task Force for this purpose”: the Task Force on Sustainable Development

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and Utilization (TFSDU) (The Nuuk Declaration 1993:4; cf. Huebert 1998:144). The establishment of this body was a large change in the AEPS and emerging Arctic Council Structure. As Scrivener viewed it, “[f]ocusing initially on aboriginal concerns, the TFSD is expected to become the most important AEPS Working Group, much more ‘political’ in orientation than the other WGs” (Scrivener 1995:2, quoted in Kettlewell 1995:10); it both represented the formal inclusion of organization on sustainable development into the environmental protection approach of the AEPS and was significant in its special focus on indigenous groups. Sustainable development, including questions of resource access and utilization, was then developed in the Task Force and subsequent sustainable development groupings into a principal aim of the Arctic Council. Here in particular, as the Canadian Arctic focus was already placed on indigenous actors (the ICC), the ICC was able to increase its role in developing the Arctic issue agenda and resource access questions through the sustainable development approach and broader indigenous support. Huebert notes: the ICC has limited resources, but it was this group and not any arctic government that was responsible for introducing the principles of sustainable development into the circumpolar forum. Considerations of the arctic regions were conspicuously absent in UNCED documents, and there is little evidence that any of the arctic states were willing to make an effort to push for the recognition (Huebert 1998:147).

The ICC’s influence on the Arctic Council process has, however, largely derived from its domestic role in Canada, the state that initiated the Arctic Council: Ottawa was receptive to persistent pressure from the ICC, the Inuit Taprissat of Canada and the Arctic Council Panel (in which major roles were played by CARC and Mary Simon, appointed as Canada’s first Ambassador for Arctic Affairs in Autumn 1994) to achieve the maximum possible status for international IPOs [Indigenous Peoples’ Organizations] in the proposed Council The new Liberal administration in Ottawa in 1993 came under pressure from CARC and the Arctic Council Panel to make good on its campaign promise to revive attention to the Canadian North A renewed effort to realise the Arctic Council initiative was partly the response (Scrivener 1996:13).

The issues the ICC would pursue in these processes, however, largely related to the conservation-utilization question. The ICC 7—founded as a nongovernmental organization in 1977 to represent the Inuit of Canada, Alaska and Greenland (as of 1989, also the Inuit of the now former Soviet Union)—has since its inception maintained a focus on “sustainable

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harvesting and trade” (cf. Simon 1992:24). It has also worked towards broader indigenous cooperation in Arctic and international bodies.8 In the clear recognition, climatically and historically, of their areas as Arctic, much of the work by the Inuit has focused on challenging the exploration-related assumptions of the Arctic as a primarily environmental, not social and contemporary, area, often on the argument that “notions like the ‘Arctic wilderness’ or ‘Arctic frontier’ violate fundamental territorial and cultural rights and aspirations of indigenous peoples” (Dahl 1993, page not given, quoted in Magga 1995:28). The way confrontation takes place is often through a focus on the traditional right to the land that evokes spiritual dimensions. Or as the President of ICC Canada and Vice-President of ICC stated in 1998, The process of hunting and fishing, followed by the sharing of food, the communal partaking of one animal, is the time-honored ritual which links us to our ancestors and each other. The power of this connection holds us together as a people, gives us the spiritual strength and physical energy to survive the challenges we face, and cannot for one second be underestimated We are the land and the land is us (Watt-Cloutier 1998, para. 4–5, 10; cf. Kuptana 1995).

The ICC, and Inuit themselves are, however, a diverse and increasingly stratified group. Dimensions broader than the “traditional” and the way in which any traditional components exist within a contemporary modernized context are significant: “[t]raditional ways of making a living can and should be preserved as an element of local economies, but they alone simply cannot generally provide a good standard of living that many people would like” (Watt-Cloutier 1999, para. 7). In argumentation in “the Arctic” arena, however, tradition is heavily drawn upon, related to the requirements of the “Arctic” environmental focus. One may thus say that even in opposing the constraints of Arctic discourse, tradition-based argumentation is supporting it, as it is arguing for its inclusion on a directly environmentrelated basis. FIRST MEETINGS OF THE TASK FORCE ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND UTILIZATION (TFSDU) The importance of an initially fairly small task force was thus defined by this conflicting background. Its political importance can also be seen in the fact that the SAOs have most often led the discussion in the Task Force (Scrivener 1996, Young 1998). The Task Force was developed such that in 1993, following its establishment, Canada, “its foremost proponent” (Scrivener 1996:9) offered to chair the body. Conflict became apparent already in formulating the Task Force’s Terms of Reference, however, as drafters tried not to transgress upon the mandate of CAFF and thereby institutionalize the

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tension between utilization and conservation of living resources (Scrivener 1996, Young 1998). The objectives of the group were also restricted to reporting and making recommendations to ministers at the upcoming third ministerial conference on the Arctic environment on for instance sustainable development goals, principles, and application, indigenous peoples economies, and ways of facilitating and sharing communication (SAAO work plan, May 12, 1994, in TFSDU, April 24, 1995). In the work plan, the broad goals of the Task Force were specified to include, among other things, sustainable use of renewable resources by indigenous peoples and that management, planning and development activities should provide for conservation, sustainable use and protection of Arctic flora and fauna “for benefit and enjoyment of present and future generations, including local populations and indigenous peoples” (TFDSU, April 24, 1995). The task force thus received a mandate to work on issues in the realm of conservation and utilization and with an emphasis on indigenous issues, the original impetus for the group’s establishment (Scrivener 1996, Young 1998). The work plan however also mentioned “local populations”—a group often seen as distinct from the indigenous in statements and often mentioned, but not represented; it can be seen to constitute one of these cracks or “silences” that indicate identified but not problematized or represented interests. Such an ambiguous approach to the “local” or “regional” would be maintained throughout the development of sustainable development into a main aim for the Council. Before the inauguration of the Arctic Council in 1996, the group was able to hold three main meetings.9 Projects dealt with could from the start be seen as falling under main themes (see Appendix 1). The principal conflicts centered on the established marine mammals issue and the contested conservation— utilization relationship. Issues concerning marine mammals and the development of a strategy for the sustainable development group were the most controversial, and are taken up in detail below. That these issues were the most contentious is connected: in adopting a strategy for project selection rather than maintaining an ad hoc selection of projects, it would be difficult to steer protects related to marine mammals away from work under a sustainable development label—and that such projects would be taken up had been made clear already in proposals for a strategy. In other words, with the adoption of a strategy to guide project choice, the possibility of any one state to veto project implementation within the group (such as a project dealing with whaling and sealing) would be eliminated or at least strongly restricted by the wording and interpretation of the strategy. THE CONFLICTING TFSDU AGENDA: STRATEGY AND MARINE MAMMALS The development of a strategy for sustainable development—later suggested as the basis for a broader Arctic Council approach—was advanced especially

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in two project suggestions by Canada, one of these drawing directly upon ICC documents. Both included reference to the marine mammals issue. The first of these was the draft outline for A Strategy for Communication and Education on Arctic Sustainable Development that Canada presented at the second meeting. On the basis that communication and education are part of the principles underpinning Agenda 21, the document suggested, among other things, the issue of barriers to trade in Arctic animal products, particularly attitudinal barriers, be addressed (TFSDU Summary, March 13–14, 1995). The latest development of this strategy document was then presented at the third task force meeting. It focused on three areas: increasing public awareness, education through informal and formal systems, and mechanisms for transferring messages and information. It took its mandate from the UN Rio Declaration, Agenda 21, the AEPS Ministerial in Rovaniemi 1991, as well as the AEPS seminar on indigenous peoples’ knowledge held in Reykjavik in September 1994. The document of the last forum states, among other things, that misinformation campaigns about the use of wildlife resources have negative impacts on the sustainable use of living resources by indigenous peoples. The communication and education document suggests: Collective efforts are needed by governments and indigenous peoples to counteract campaigns such as the status of the 13 fur-bearing species affected by the EU’s fur import ban. Arctic governments should support indigenous peoples by attempting to resolve conflicts of attitudes between Arctic indigenous peoples and powerful interests in the dominant societies in the south with regard to the very concept of wildlife harvest. Indigenous peoples have already suffered much inequality on this account and, by the repeated anti-whaling, anti-sealing and anti-fur campaigns, are now threatened in their basic role as active stewards of Arctic wildlife (TFSDU 1995 Communication and Education, section 2.4, my emphasis).

Based on such an environment-connected, traditional argumentation, the communication objectives in the Communication and Education document included that efforts should be made to enhance the sharing and use of information on sustainable development and sustainable use practices, provide Arctic residents with a basis for informed decisions regarding the consumption of traditional country food such as fish and game, build an understanding of the link between culture and sustainable development, promote recognition of the value of traditional knowledge and practice in sustainable use, and reduce barriers to trade in products managed in a sustainable manner. Later in the document, communication barriers to messages about sustainable development in the Arctic are seen as including “differences in cultures and values between Arctic and non-Arctic regions and between rural and urban communities”; “gaps between the philosophy and practice of sustainable use, as exemplified by those who fail to see a

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contradiction between advocating sustainability or indigenous rights and opposing use of living resources like fur,” “active opposition from animal rights groups or other activist organizations,” and “insufficient high-quality data to make convincing arguments” (TFSDU 1995 Communication and Education, section 3.5). The document also notes that the “profound difference in underlying perceptions represents a major communication challenge” (section 3.3). To this end, the document suggests that messages need to be developed that are targeted to specific focal groups. Suggestions of messages for non-Arctic audiences include: “the economic health of Arctic communities depends on broader markets for sustainably-produced products, such as fur,” “actions of southern populations are having a devastating impact on the health of circumpolar peoples and their economies,” “recognition of cultural characteristics of Arctic populations can reduce barriers to sustainable development” (TFSDU 1995 Communication and Education, section 3.4). The last chapter contains recommendations that Arctic countries should prepare a common set of general and targeted messages on sustainable development strategies in the Arctic as well as dissemination strategies that take into account the cultural characteristics of the intended recipients. Arctic countries also should identify and share planning processes and implementation programs to integrate sustainable development knowledge, skills and values in formal and informal education systems and make use of all available mechanisms for sharing information and materials about model programs to promote circumpolar sustainable development (TFSDU 1995 Communication and Education). The document thus makes a strong connection between the development of a strategy and the partial aim of that strategy of focusing on the contentious marine mammal issues. Despite the fact that there is an emphasis on economic development intended to maintain indigenous communities, arguments explicitly refer to the relation to the environment and tradition. The focus is also rather clearly placed on the indigenous communities. The second opportunity for incorporating a strategy, a document entitled Regional Application of A21 in the Arctic, showed a rather similar focus. Such an application of the UN Agenda 21 document from the 1992 UN Rio Conference on Environment and Development had been discussed since the first TFSDU meeting, for the focus of the UN Agenda 21 was “international, not regional; and the Arctic is not addressed” (Draft Summary. Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic, SDU Toronto 1995, “Introduction’). In that context, the ICC in 1994 prepared a draft Analysis of Agenda 21 in the Context of Sustainable Development as it related to indigenous peoples. In the following year, Canada suggested that a regional application of Agenda 21 for the Arctic be developed, to be built upon this ICC document. This regional application was to be an action plan for circumpolar cooperation on sustainable development that would take the roles and needs of indigenous peoples into account. It was to provide a strategic focus: to put the existing

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AEPS activities into an overall framework, provide a focus for future activities, and encourage cooperation across the Arctic within the AEPS and beyond (TFSDU Summary, March 13–14,1995). The agenda would carry six areas of emphasis: circumpolar cooperation, combating poverty, integrating environment and development in decision-making, conservation of biological diversity, protection of the Arctic Ocean and all Arctic seas, and contaminants management. Cross-cutting themes for the work would be the principles of empowerment of indigenous peoples in their communities, the involvement of women, youth and children, and the promotion of education, public awareness and training (TFSDU, April 24, 1995). Among the controversial issues was that the first theme, Circumpolar Cooperation, echoed many of the suggestions under the Strategy for Communication and Education. It took a highly trade-centered approach, focusing on, among other things, the need to make international trade and environment policies mutually supportive, and to increase the exchange of information and knowledge including traditional knowledge about Arctic products. Recommendations under the theme included an analysis of restrictions hindering trade in Arctic products; preparation of a common set of general and targeted messages on achieving sustainable development in the Arctic; and development of strategies for their dissemination that would take into account cultural characteristics of the intended recipients. Recommendations also included the promotion of international trade in renewable resources (TFSDU Draft No 3, November 9, 1995, Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic). The second theme, Combating Poverty, had as one of its objectives to provide all persons in the Arctic with the opportunity to earn a sustainable livelihood, which was seen as limited by current policy on marine mammal utilization, and to empower local and community groups (TFSDU Draft No 3, November 9,1995, Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic). The theme Protection of The Arctic Ocean and All Arctic Seas, then, viewed the Arctic as consisting of fragile ecosystems, particularly exposed to global environmental threats. Here, the “cultural heritage gives a vast reserve of knowledge about how man can co-exist with nature, including a perspective on the quality of life.” “Perhaps, most importantly, the inclusion of the indigenous people and local communities in the decision-making process will enhance the legitimacy of the decisions made and will facilitate compliance.” Objectives included the need to protect the environment, incorporate traditional (a drafter added, “indigenous”) knowledge, interest of local communities, small-scale fisheries, and indigenous people in development and management programs (TFSDU Draft No 3, November 9, 1995, Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic, “Protection of The Arctic Ocean and All Arctic Seas”).10 The document, controversial like the Education and Communication document in its targeting the marine mammals conflict, thus exhibits a combined focus on the “fragile” environment and indigenous development,

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especially participation (implying that this might not have been overly wide spread in the context spoken from). Indigenous knowledge is similarly emphasized, and in the context of the traditional for example, where it is suggested that “indigenous” be added to “traditional,” making probable that there was some conflict over this issue of definition and that attempts were being made to exclude other traditional knowledge. The focus was thus placed on indigenous traditional groups, to degrees excluding “other” or possibly “local” groups that may claim inclusion on basis of traditional knowledge or a relation to the environment: these constituted discussed but not represented, “silent” groups in discourse. In a similar vein, marine mammals were then more explicitly discussed also in the project Trade Policies, Opportunities and Barriers Related to Sea Mammals, which, among other things, suggested three alternative ways to overcome trade barriers on marine mammal (seal and whale) products. These included the presentation of a “balanced report on the issues with specific reference to MMPA” (the US Marine Mammals Protection Act which, among other things, prohibits trade partners on threat of sanction from hunting marine mammals); exploration of other international markets, “assuming that attitudes in urban Europe and North America would not change”; and “education in order to change attitudes and create more demand for Arctic marine mammal products.” Here, the trade barriers on marine mammals that were to be overcome included legislative barriers such as the Marine Mammals Protection Act and regulations of the European Union, psychosocial and “cultural lifestyle” barriers on the part of consumers, socioeconomic barriers, international and national barriers between different jurisdictions, and peoples’ attitudes. The project was suggested by DenmarkGreenland at the first meeting and redrafted by Canada, Denmark-Greenland, the ICC and the US; this indicates to some degree which states were most involved in the issue (TFSDU Summary, March 13–14, 1995). All in all, marine mammal issues were explicitly mentioned in over a third of the project suggestions put forward in the sustainable development task force in this period (cf. Appendix 1). The argumentation can be seen to center around the traditional indigenous claim to environmental resources, confronting the environmental conservation agenda. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AS AN OVERARCHING AIM OF COOPERATION? Given this approach to sustainable development, discussions of an Arctic Council where the sustainable development concept was increasingly central became intensely conflictive. As mentioned earlier, “[t]he intergovernmental discussions almost petered out from mid-1993 to late 1994 in the face of continuing US uneasiness” (Scrivener 1996:13). The fact that discussions on the Arctic Council at that time continued at all is attributable to several political events. Shortly after coming into office in 1993, the Clinton

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administration ordered an inter-agency review of Arctic policy. The new policy was announced at the CAFF working group meeting in Reykjavik in September 1994 (Young 1998:162). Strongly downgrading national security and defense considerations, the Arctic Policy Review placed a primacy on environmental protection and conservation of biological resources in the new US policy on the Arctic (Scrivener 1996). It contained language far more favorable to the AEPS than prior US Arctic policy, and stated “protecting the Arctic environment and conserving its biological resources” as a policy principle while calling for expansion of “cooperation under the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy” (US Department of State 1994, quoted in Young 1998:162). During the February 1995 Clinton-Chretien Summit, the US then finally signalled high-level approval for negotiations on the Arctic Council and responded with a US position paper on the Canadian Draft Charter issued in May (Scrivener 1996). As the establishment of the Arctic Council drew closer, the question of what its overarching principle should be became more urgent, however. One proposal was a suggestion was however made that sustainable development should be seen as separate from environmental protection (cf. Scrivener 1996, WWF Arctic Bulletin 1995b). The emerging sustainable development group or direction should accordingly be seen as taking on a parallel, not a directory, role with regard to the AEPS. This was not a suggestion only from the US, but one reflecting broader uneasiness on what Arctic sustainable development should really be interpreted as.11 The main conflict was, nevertheless, USCanadian. For instance, when in the Sustainable Development Task Force, at the same time, Canada made another attempt to develop a strategic approach to sustainable development (with the conflicted focus discussed above), the US halted its ongoing work in the Task Force. A very clear statement was made on November 8, 1995, in a discussion paper. Here the US argued that as “the initiative has lost sight of any real connection with the AEPS,” the Task Force must not be placed in a position of determining the other (directly environment-oriented) AEPS working group agendas. The US coordinating agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), stated that “It is our understanding that the proposed initiative is being primarily driven by Canada.” “We envision an initiative which would be considerably less extensive than the existing AEPS structure” (US sustainable development discussion paper, November 8, 1995). At the 27–28 November 1995 TFSDU meeting in Toronto, Canada, the US then proposed as one option that all work on Arctic sustainable development be stopped until the Arctic Council was formed (TFSDU Toronto meeting 27–28 November 1995 participants, agenda and content paper). This US reaction provoked a strong response especially from Canadian and indigenous representatives. Canada emphasized that the collapse of the seal skin market was correlated with suicide attempts from loss of income and role (TFSDU Toronto meeting 27–28 November 1995 participants, agenda and content paper). In response to the risk of halting task force work,

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representatives of the ICC and the Saami Council, in a statement read at the meeting strongly stated that the Task Force had to continue its work up to and beyond the Ministerial Conference in Inuvik (TFSDU November 30, 1995). Norway, Iceland, Denmark-Greenland, and Sweden also stated that they accepted the contested Communication and Education draft as it stood (TFSDU Toronto meeting 27–28 November 1995 participants, agenda and content paper). Ultimately, Canada and the US agreed that projects would be forwarded to ministers for approval and support for continuation and that the plan of establishing a working group on sustainable development may proceed (TFSDU Toronto meeting 27–28 November 1995 participants, agenda and content paper). This did not diminish the underlying conflict, however. ESTABLISHING THE ARCTIC COUNCIL Only a month and a half later, the AEPS Third Ministerial Conference on the Protection of the Arctic Environment was held. Emphasizing the “importance of integrating the AEPS principles with Arctic economics and social initiatives to uphold the principles of sustainable development,” the conference established the Working Group on Sustainable Development and Utilization (SDU). Pending the creation of the Arctic Council, the Working Group was to operate with the existing terms of reference of the Task Force, and specific direction from the Senior Arctic Officials (SAOs). Most importantly, however, the SAOs were to develop not only revised Terms of Reference for the group but an initial work plan to guide the Arctic Council’s sustainable development work once that forum was established (Inuvik Declaration on Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development in the Arctic 1996). Sustainable development and utilization was thereby instituted on the working group level on a par with environmental protection, and expressed as an aim for the Arctic Council. There was little consensus, however, on how the Working Group should operate or with what focus, or, indeed, on which basis issues of “Arctic” relevance would be chosen for the Arctic Council’s sustainable development work. “It is still unclear what role the working group may have within the Arctic Council, a decision which must be solved before the Arctic Council is established” (Hege 1996:6). Among the disagreements even at this stage were who the actors within the Council would be and especially the extent of the involvement of the indigenous non-governmental organizations (given the conflictive agenda put forward by the ICC in particular, with the strong support of Canada), and, relatedly, what the range of issues in “Arctic” cooperation should be, i.e., the use and nature of an Arctic Council.12 Following a June 1996 SAO meeting, one month before the Council was originally to have been established, a group of authors with ICC involvement, Watt-Cloutier et al. (1996), noted that the new US head of delegation sent to the meeting sought changes which

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Negotiating the Arctic focused in particular on the status of aboriginal peoples in the Council… In negotiations over the summer, the American view, supported to varying degrees by other states, was incorporated in the final version of the declaration (Watt-Cloutier et al 1996:8).

Originally planned by Canada for July, the establishment of the Council was thus postponed when SAOs were unable to agree on a final Declaration for the Council at their June meeting (WWF Arctic Bulletin 1996). As WattCloutier et al. noted, the final version of the declaration omitted aboriginal peoples’ organizations as constituent and founding elements of the Council; disinvited aboriginal peoples’ organizations from signing the declaration; left out the preambular on environmental security, economic equity, and an aboriginal perspective on sustainable development; and avoided use of the plural term “indigenous peoples,” which is binding under international law (Watt-Cloutier et al. 1996). This use of the term “people” was significant, as the use of it, rather than “peoples,” legally implies individual rights, while the concept of indigenous peoples legally recognizes their claims as sovereign nations with rights of self-determination (as highlighted by Tennberg 1998, 2000; cf. e.g. Chatterjee and Finger 1994). Arguments appealing to indigenous concerns were also increasingly becoming the norm. For example, since at this time, the US suggested including a fourth, largely Alaska-based, permanent participant group (presumably to counteract the ICC-Canada dominance). This was resisted at the time by Canada, the ICC, Denmark-Greenland and Russia, on the argument among others that the present three groups included the majority of natives (Scrivener 1996; SAO Meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). 13 The indigenous terms of argumentation were thus a focus in the Council development, to the degree that extension to the Council among conflicting parties centered on including groups with the ability to argue on these terms. Other groups, however, largely remained undefined, as in the final Declaration on the establishment of the Council. On September 19, 1996, in Ottawa, Canada, when the Arctic Council was finally established as a formal governance forum for the Arctic, the Ottawa founding declaration describes the Council as a “high level forum” to promote cooperation among Arctic states, involving indigenous and “other” Arctic inhabitants, on issues relating to sustainable development and environmental protection in particular (not issues of military security) (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996). Its contested scope was apparent in the broad but largely vague and non-binding focus. The establishment as a “forum,” for instance, is a special aspect of the Council and to a large degree reminiscent of the institutionalization of the AEPS as a “strategy.” As it is not an international organization, as this term is understood under international law, the role of the Council remains limited to consensus among its members (and on voluntary funding by these), as the US specifically

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had requested (Bloom 1999). The exact scope of “the Arctic,” also remained undefined as generally in founding documents, although the Ottawa Declaration establishing the Council speaks about “the commitment to sustainable development in the Arctic region” and “maintenance of biodiversity in the Arctic region” (different from for example the 1991 Rovaniemi Declaration establishing the AEPS initiative which only speaks of the “Arctic environment”) (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council 1996, Rovaniemi Declaration 1991).14 Given this regional focus, and the democratic aims initially forwarded for the Council, it is also notable how much of the more limited environmental and state-focused approach of the AEPS was simply continued. Thus, the role of the Council, according to the Ottawa Declaration, is to oversee and coordinate programs established under the AEPS and to adopt terms of reference for, oversee and coordinate a sustainable development program as well as to disseminate information, encourage education and promote interest in “Arctic-related” issues (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996). As for the AEPS, the Council was to operate through biannual ministerial meetings with its day-to-day work coordinated by civil servants (the Senior Arctic Officials). The Council instituted a rotating chairmanship, where its initiator, Canada, acted as the chair for the first two years. The Permanent Participants (at this time still the three indigenous organizations involved in the AEPS) continued to participate in Council meetings and activities alongside Ministers and SAOs and like states with the right to present proposals, but, unlike these not vote when a vote was taken15 (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996; cf. Bloom 1999). Reflecting the conflicts over indigenous involvement, the Ottawa Declaration also provides for admission of new Permanent Participants but requires that at any time the number of Permanent Participants must be less than the number of Arctic states (that is, at most seven). It thus allows for expansion of the indigenous representation (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996; cf. Bloom 1999).16 It therefore seems that the Arctic Council, like the AEPS, but more surprisingly so for a development that explicitly focuses on participation, gives priority to states and thereafter the (at the time three) indigenous non-governmental organizations. As the possibility for expansion of the permanent participant category was made available and a largely indigenousrelated sustainable development focus expanded, the Council also developed in practice towards having more of a focus on indigenous issues. However, neither the issue of what a regional project or focus was nor the principles for actor and issue selection—including how to evaluate or choose between any forthcoming applications for Permanent Participant status—were explicitly discussed. Especially has the Arctic Council been criticized for its lack of broader regional representation. The Director of the Northern Forum (NF) organization for cooperation between regional governments

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commented on the developments (previous to Arctic Council institutionalization) thus: The Arctic Council must represent the interests and priorities of northerners as well as the southern majorities and decision-makers of the Arctic countries. In contrast to the Northern Forum whose members are the democraticallyelected leaders from the regions, the Arctic Council will be represented by federal bureaucrats (quoted in Kettlewell 1995:27).

Similarly, Kettlewell writes: The democratic nature of NF leadership is notable, and brings to light the original NGO proposal for an Arctic Council which states: The challenge in creating an Arctic Council is therefore not to construct yet another conventional means of inter-governmental co-operation, this time for the north circumpolar region. It is to devise a central arctic institution that innovates in giving new voice to those most heavily affected by decisions currently made by politicians and officials far removed from the consequences of their acts’ (CARC 1991:8, in Kettlewell 1995:27).

CONTINUED CONFLICT Thus, after the Arctic Council had been institutionalized, the challenge remained to determine more closely the focus of the Council and the content of its sustainable development program.17 One main source of conflict was the Terms of Reference for sustainable development. These were initially intended to set out criteria for the controversial issue of how to select sustainable development projects. Instead, they were watered down to little more than an extension of the Rules of Procedure (how meetings are run and decisions taken) (cf. Bloom 1999). This illustrates the difficulty of finding a direction in the Council, and, ultimately, defining not only what a sustainable development project but what a project with “Arctic” applicability was;18 that is, the difficulty in operationally defining the region or regional need. In attempting to set criteria for project selection, several different versions and drafts of the Terms of Reference for sustainable development were discussed between 1995 and February 1998 (when the Terms were agreed upon prior to the first Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting in September 1998). The dispute persisted between the Canadian drive for a strategy, as described in its earlier proposals, and the US insistence upon an ad hoc selection of proposals that required a consensus of the Arctic states for initiation of activities (cf. e.g. Canada 1997; First Rough Draft Arctic Council Sustainable Development Terms of Reference. September 11, 1997; US Dept of State, February 5, 1996; cf. US Dept of State, October 23, 1996). Thus, among other things, the US required unanimous state consent for projects to be

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undertaken—thereby retaining a functional veto over projects. It also demanded that projects be of “genuine regional applicability,” i.e. “only undertaken if at least SAOs of four member states indicate officially a willingness to participate in the project” (US Dept of State, February 5, 1996; cf. US Dept of State, October 23,1996). The US also suggested that the sustainable development program should be a “set of agreed cooperative activities focused on priority Arctic issues requiring circumpolar cooperation” (ibid.), to which the ICC replied that the phrase “requiring” would close out very many projects (Arctic Council Summary of meeting of SAOs and PPs November 15–16, 1996, Oslo). In choosing between the conflicting proposals of these states, other countries regularly aligned themselves with Canada, supporting the need for a strategy rather than an ad hoc choice of projects that would leave sustainable development work without any real guidelines or definition (cf. e.g. Arctic Council summary of meeting of SAOs and PPs November 15–16, 1996, Oslo; SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Ad verbum transcript). Around the time Iceland nevertheless expressed interest in retaining environmental protection as the main focus of the Arctic Council, while Norway attempted a compromise solution between the Canadian and US proposals (Prokosch 1998a, Norway 1997). While other countries supported the Norwegian compromise solution, which nevertheless retained the environment as a primary aspect of sustainable development in the sense that other aspects are not mentioned, it remained too far on the side of a strategy and beyond the procedural, ad hoc choice of projects by consensus insisted on by the US to succeed in its brokerage (Minutes of Arctic Council SAO meeting, Kautokeino, Norway. March 12–13, 1997).19 The disagreements on primacy for either environmental protection or sustainable development thus remained. Ultimately, these disagreements were not resolved, as Sustainable Development Terms of Reference, provisionally agreed upon in February 1998, one and a half year after the establishment of the Council, contained few specific guidelines 20 (Arctic Council Ad Referendum Terms of Reference for a Sustainable Development Program, February 5, 1998). At the same time, the question of who was to have the right to participation or a say in the forum and how this was to be decided remained unresolved. For example, there was disagreement on an observer application from the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW). Some countries suggested that the application was not consistent with the goals and objectives of the Arctic Council in sustainable development. The US, on the other hand, supported it, noting that the IFAW letter of application contained the statement that “IFAW does not oppose legitimate subsistence harvesting of marine mammals by indigenous people” (Minutes of Arctic Council SAO Meeting, Kautokeino, Norway. March 12–13, 1997, p. 28). The issue of marine mammals thus came to serve not only as a criterion for cooperation and conflict but, indeed, as a selecting characteristic for whether to include further

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actors into the organization, indicating that there was no real agreement on how such a selection would take place. THE ISSUE FOCUS FOR AN “ARCTIC”? In this situation of disagreement on an overall direction for the Council, Canada made yet another attempt to promote the strategic approach to sustainable development. The May 1998 SAO meeting was held in conjunction with a conference organized by Canada on “Sustainable Development in the Arctic,” which had first been announced by Canada’s Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs at the inauguration of the Arctic Council in 1996. Canada stated that although the conference was not an Arctic Council activity, the event was designed to contribute to the Arctic Council. Accordingly, Canada suggested a project that would utilize the recommendations from the circumpolar conference to develop the strategic approach to sustainable development (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). At the SAO meeting, others suggested, however, that developments should be built on existing work in the area, such as earlier work in the AEPS (cf. Prokosch 1998b). As discussions continued, it became increasingly clear that the broad agreement with the Canadian insistence upon a strategy for sustainable development, that is, for an overarching focus of the Arctic Council, does not imply an identification with the Canadian Arctic experience. Staples notes the differing approaches that surfaced in the conference: Differences in perspective, priority, and approach were born of some dramatic differences in cultural, social, economic and political circumstances…. Throughout the conference, the Canadian Arctic experience with sustainability emerged as issues of community development and community empowerment—an experience that has been dramatically mirrored in the land claim agreements of the last two decades. In contrast, the Scandinavian and European experiences were defined generally as the vertical integration and coordination of actions and responsibilities across national, regional and local governments, and horizontally the integration and cooperation of sustainable development initiatives across social and economic sectors (Staples 1998:15, my emphasis).

The Canadian understanding can here be further exemplified by a discussion paper on Children and Youth of the Arctic that Canada presented at the meeting, following up its introduction of “youth representatives” at its sustainable development conference. The motivation for the proposal was stated as being that “pressures of technological change, the intrusion of the western mass media and the introduction of a wage-based economy have, in a few short decades, transformed the values and lifestyle of many an Arctic community to the point of social and cultural crisis.” The proposal

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stated that this crisis was manifested in self-destructive behavior especially among indigenous communities but also non-aboriginal communities and cities, and exacerbates the threat of environmental degradation of these circumpolar communities, where youth were seen as often representing over half the population (Canada 1998 Discussion Paper Children and Youth of the Arctic, “Issues,” my emphasis; cf. SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings).21 The factors at issue here, as in the proposals for a strategy, thus continued to relate to the environmental, indigenous, and traditional, and, in addition, the high vulnerability of not only the environment but also the social situation in the Arctic. Such an understanding of what the salient issues in the Arctic were was also apparent in ICC work. Describing the rapid changes in Inuit communities that had led to dependence on unemployment benefits and resulted in substance abuse and high suicide rates, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, Vice-President of ICC Canada, highlighted that “[t]his whole issue of human development must be incorporated in any new forum or institution that is created around the Arctic people, the indigenous people” (Watt-Cloutier 1996, in the Arctic Council summary of meeting of SAOs and PPs November 15–16, 1996, Oslo, Annex 12). A similar description of the environmental and social Arctic in crisis was also prevalent in the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP) working group that was now becoming included under the Arctic Council. In 1997 and 1998, AMAP published popularized and full versions of a report describing this area primarily from an environmental perspective. The report describes the region as one where the population as a whole lives close to the environment, where the local harvest or catch is often the most important source of food and any threat of environmental contamination is thus a threat to subsistence. Populations in “the Arctic” are described as commonly being younger (on account of a high birth rate) and having lower life expectancies than elsewhere in each country; the Arctic populations are more often dying from accidents, and suffering from alcoholism, unemployment, and lack of access to advanced schooling in the region. Differing from the Declarations, which do not identify the exact extent of the region beyond eight states, AMAP, however, defines it: as at least the area above the Arctic Circle (in Europe) and at most 60 degrees northern latitude (in North America) (cf. Fig. 1). Its geographical scope is thus clearly indicated and can be compared with conceptions in the defined areas. For this area, AMAP further notes: The living standards of native people in North America are higher than among native people in Russia. Nevertheless, the Arctic average is substantially lower than elsewhere in each country. For Greenland, the same applies in a comparison with Denmark. Housing is often crowded, and many dwellings lack modern conveniences such as running water. In the

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This means that AMAP was largely forwarding an understanding of the Arctic as a place where people live close to the environment and under significant social and developmental challenges, and, as above, with very little description of the Nordic countries as opposed to the traditional Arctic areas of North America, Greenland and Russia. The qualifications of these descriptions were rather limited, as the main qualification stated that Arctic people live in a diversity of landscapes and cultures, with different diets, economic opportunities, and living standards. Some of this diversity is also apparent among geographically close groups or even within communities. In spite of this diversity, there are some similarities across the countries and regions that provide an important background for understanding how changes in the environment will affect people’s wellbeing (AMAP 1997, chapter “Peoples of the North,” subheading 11 [“Similarities and differences”], paragraph 1, my emphasis).

Indicating the focus as far as social description was concerned the chapter “Peoples of the Arctic: Characteristics of Human Populations Relevant to Pollution Issues” in the 1998 full report, notes: The primary focus of this chapter is on the indigenous peoples of the Arctic. This is for two reasons. First, indigenous peoples have been living as part of the Arctic ecosystem for millennia, and in most areas, continue to do so. As consumers of local resources, they are in some ways the end recipients of the types of pollution that are transported long distances, as described throughout this report. Many of the effects of environmental contamination are likely to be most pronounced among indigenous peoples. Second, the cultures and traditions of Arctic indigenous peoples are found nowhere else (Huntington 1998:142, internal chapter in AMAP 1998, my emphasis).

While the focus of the AMAP report is on environmental characteristics, the human element selected as relevant to these considerations is thus explicitly focused on a traditional way of life seen as being close to the environment, and thereby on the indigenous population rather than on the population at large. This is further justified as follows: While groups such as the Komi, Yakut, and the Russian “Old Settlers” have lifestyles similar to the indigenous minorities, and hence share similar environmental risks, this section gives prominence to the indigenous minorities for two reasons. First, they are few in number and very susceptible to cultural erosion, especially through changes to their traditional ways of life. Second, they live only in or near the Arctic zone,

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and are thus particularly sensitive to changes in the Arctic environment (ibid: 167, my emphasis).

On balance, these descriptions are, however, not accurate for all of the area currently defined as “Arctic”; in Norway, Sweden and Finland only a very small segment of both the indigenous and “other” populations rely upon “traditional” occupations (cf. ch. 6). Iceland, furthermore, has no distinguishable indigenous population and thus is exempted from description.23 Perhaps correspondingly, within sustainable development work responses to the youth proposal that forwards the view of the “Arctic in crisis” were mixed. Commenting on the project, the ICC asked that Permanent Participants be involved in every step of the proposal development process (and thus supported its continuation), while Sweden, for example, stressed the diversity of the circumpolar Arctic, suggesting it might be difficult to design projects that are relevant to the entire region (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). Sweden stated: we have to see that the differences in the circumpolar area are substantial. The differences between the Canadian North and the Euro-Asian part are very difficult to describe in a short word. Here, you have a vast area of very few people and not all that much industry. In the Euro-Asian area there are some parts heavily populated, the industry is difficult for the health of the people in many places… The bulk of people are not indigenous, but they have a difficult time all the same (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings, p. 103).

The description of an “Arctic in crisis” and whether this and its suggested foci are of relevance for the entire “Arctic” region was, however, not explicitly discussed: it constituted another “silence” that indicated the way in which Arctic discourse was delineated to deal with a certain selection of issues, as described above, but not with others. For the Arctic Council development in general, then, the sustainable development conflict was never resolved, as it to some degree deals with how to determine what a regional issue for the Arctic is and how to select one. The need for integration was acknowledged, but with the recognition that there existed no plan for how this should take place. While the Arctic Council 1998 Ministerial gave sustainable development a role at least on a par with environmental protection, the content of sustainable development and thus of a more general orientation to the areas beyond the environment remained undefined; any guidance as to the concept (or choice of sustainable development projects) was largely procedural (First Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, Iqaluit, Sept 17–18 1998. Draft report to ministers).24 With a lack of agreed upon procedures for identifying projects and overarching principles

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for the Arctic Council, the overall direction for the Council and the region it defined largely remained operationally defined ad hoc by participants, or through existing networks, in relation to main conflict issues. CONCLUSION: AN UNPROBLEMATIZED REGION? While “the Arctic” was increasingly being seen as a region, region-building cooperation continued to suffer from definitional and operational problems. The main conflicts here centered on how to define sustainable development and thereby a focus for the Council and an Arctic region beyond the environmental. This is related to the fact that an “Arctic” approach with a broad focus on the open concept of sustainable development is in practice determined by who the participants selected into cooperation are. Given the participants and, implicitly, the discourse selected in the AEPS—Arctic Council, conflicts came to focus on disagreements between groupings oriented towards environmental conservation, on the one hand, and indigenous utilization of resources, on the other. With Canada and the ICC the leading actors, the Finnish role was much diminished in comparison to the initiation of the AEPS.25 The main confrontation was instead the established conflict between the Canadian-driven sustainable development interpretation with a focus on indigenous groups and particularly the US view of environmental protection as conservation-related. The conflicts and issues established in this phase persisted over time, and the Council developed to an even more indigenous-focused body. The representation of indigenous groups in the Arctic Council was increased, first with the acceptance of the Aleut in 1998, and into six groups in 2002 (Arctic Council 2002). Similarly, the developed agenda, issues and actors were broadly retained, even if the weighting of different priorities of Council work differed with its chair. As chair of the Arctic Council (1998–2000), the US stated that its priorities were, among others, to move forward on specific sustainable development projects and on regional cooperation (Sherman 2000); that is, to not develop sustainable development into more of a strategy. During Finnish chairmanship in 2000–2002, the Finnish priorities included some movement both into forestry issues, and into linking Arctic work to its developing work on a Northern Dimension in the European Union, evidencing Finland’s more Europe-focused approach (cf. Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland 2000). Also, the sustainable development conflict remained prominent through changing chairmanships. At the 2000 Ministerial Meeting in Barrow, a Sustainable Development Framework Document (the Barrow Chapeau) was decided upon to establish priority areas in which the Council should pursue and adopt sustainable development projects, cooperative activities and priorities. However, the foci remained rather general and vague (Arctic Council 2000).26 In an evaluation prepared by the Arctic Council chair during Finnish chairmanship (Stenlund 2001), several member states emphasized that there

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is a need to discuss in what direction the activities of the Council should be developed and that work on the economic, social and cultural dimensions of sustainable development needs to be developed in line with the Barrow Chapeau framework. The continuous ambiguities in the focus of the Council could also be seen in some of the additional suggestions at this time that the Council should focus on circumpolar, region-wide activities and that it should discuss the limits to undertakings, in light of the fact that it operates as a high-level forum without a permanent secretariat and financial resources of its own (Stenlund 2001, US 2001). There was thus little change in the focus of the Council, possibly as the center of conflict continued to be on the environmental conservation— indigenous utilization problematique. As has been shown in this chapter, this is a rather specific segment of issues. The marine mammals issue through which this conflict manifested itself came to concentrate work within traditional “Arctic” parameters, and highlighted environmental and traditional indigenous concerns. Its importance as conflict was however major, showing in that it came to even constitute the basis on which new participants to cooperation were sought or self-selected. Thus, for example the US argued for the inclusion of a largely US-based indigenous group, presumably to gain an ally able to argue on indigenous terms, and for the approval of the International Fund for Animal Welfare’s application to become an Observer to the Council, where the US noted that the Fund does not oppose indigenous traditional subsistence, and other states disagreed because of this possible interest of the Fund. In general in the Arctic Council development, main utilization of resources was described in relation to the traditional and only confronted by the single category of “regional” representatives present: indigenous nongovernmental organizations. Indigenous groups, however, largely found themselves captured in an argumentative corner: while they argue for their rights to use not to be limited to the traditional, they gain their place in cooperation on the basis of relating their claims to a traditional connection to the environment. Argumentation for right of use, for example, has taken place through statements such as protecting “traditional ways of life,” that the peoples to be targeted are those who are “consumers of local resources,” and that “indigenous peoples…are threatened in their basic role as active stewards of Arctic wildlife” (respectively, Huntington 1998:167 and 142 in an internal chapter in AMAP 1998; and TFSDU 1995 Communication and Education, section 2.4). The environmental and indigenous foci are then also the parameters which “Arctic region” cooperation cannot proceed beyond and the discussions largely lacked explicit consideration of economic situations of the sort that would have been expected for example in domestic state debate on regional development. “The Arctic” is thereby retained as an area where a broader regional (sustainable development) cooperation deals primarily with environmental, traditional, and indigenous foci, limiting the scope of issues to those of established conflict and participants to the polar, environmental and

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indigenous actors with an established Arctic history or relation to the environmental conservation vs. indigenous utilization conflict. Here, one sees certain actors that are more involved than others in discourse: for example were Denmark-Greenland, Canada, the ICC and the US those who revised draft work on the Trade Barriers, Opportunities and Barriers Related to Sea Mammals project; and Canada, the ICC, Denmark-Greenland, and Russia were those who at first resisted the US-suggested extension of the Permanent Participant category beyond the existing three indigenous peoples organizations. The most active states on these issues have been the traditionally Arctic states, Canada in particular. Dominant in proposing as well as setting the agenda for the Arctic Council, the Canadian perspective seemed to suggest a particular and well-developed Canadian understanding of “the Arctic,” which is shared to different extents by other countries, but was largely limited from explicit discussion or confrontation by the prominence of the conservation-utilization conflict. There are however some indicators of that Arctic discourse in the way it is argued in the Council are not recognized as valid by all states (such as, for example, Staples indicated for the Sustainable Development in the Arctic Conference and Sweden indicated on Canada’s description of Arctic problems). Differences between state contexts can also be seen in data in AMAP (1997, 1998). The limitations of discourse are also indicated by points that are discussed or taken up, but which are consistently not acted upon or further problematized in cooperation. These “silences” or cracks in discourse fall into three related main groups: the continuous criticism of that cooperation does not include regional representation, the discussion of this and broader representation or groups in the areas as “other,” and the mention of unrepresented local groups as in statements on “indigenous and local northerners” (or presumably as those excluded by statements that add “indigenous” to “traditional knowledge”) (cf. TFSDU Draft No 3, November 9, 1995, Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic, “Protection of The Arctic Ocean and All Arctic Seas”). The conclusion so far must thus be that problems in cooperation are due to the limited nature of discourse on “the Arctic,” which gives primacy to a small and conflicting segment of issues (environmental conservation— sustainable use), but in fact leaves “the region” less defined than selected and created through this perspective. In sum, one may discern a systematically limited framing of the “region” in “Arctic” region-building initiatives, one which is more closely related to connotations of “the Arctic” as a concept than to differing situations in the areas or the region as a whole. Rather than an area-related regional focus, then, the historically and label-related discourse, it is argued here, is what has selected both “Arctic region” participants and issues, and steered conflict towards established interests. In all, the Arctic Council described here may be explained through the selection of participants, and, thereby, of issues, in relation to the large body of research, researchers, policy and policymakers who have been involved. The current situation can

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be seen as a response to the question: how may the involved state and indigenous non-governmental organization representatives define “generally applicable” regional needs? The following chapter illustrates how the identified Arctic discourse is indeed utilized more widely than in the initiatives that have been described and has come to influence also broader development. What the chapter predominantly shows is what happens to Arctic discourse when it is questioned along the lines of these silences, and how it then manifests some of the divisions indicated between states. It thereby shows the fragmented nature of Arctic work, and how the strength of discourse is dependent on the fact that its selection remains hidden and unquestioned, e.g., that the distinction between the “indigenous” and the “local” remains unproblematized.

CHAPTER 5

The Development of a Regional University for the Arctic

If one sees the organization of state powers into a political framework as taking place in the Arctic Council, the organization of knowledge on the Arctic was developed in the University of the Arctic (UoA) initiative. While this University had not been planned as any inherent part of the Arctic Council, the idea soon took on a high profile in region-building. It was advanced by the participants in Arctic Council-related work in 1996–1997, developed further by an especially assigned working group in 1998–1999, and was intended as a network of universities and colleges across the eight countries, to be based on common regional needs and issues and to center on the concept of sustainable development. It thus provided an additional way to promote the existence of and knowledge on the region, granting the issue of education and communication in the Arctic (given the focus of earlier sustainable development projects) a long-sought practical manifestation.1 The present chapter describes the first phases of the University of the Arctic development in the Arctic Council context from the initial suggestion to the end of the feasibility study, a period of somewhat less than two years. Differing slightly from the book as a whole, the chapter is, however, not a comprehensive study of larger developments but centers on the selfconceptions and reflections on “the Arctic” among members of a small working group. Rather than describing larger organizational processes, the chapter thus highlights the practical confrontation with and within “Arctic” discourse. While the Arctic Council establishment and difficulties in defining projects for a broad Arctic approach have indicated the diversity of an “Arctic region,” the University of the Arctic illustrates the way in which the so far un-discussed or passed-over silences in Arctic work on regional or local representation became apparent and contentious. It also illustrates how established Arctic discourse, based on historical Arctic studies, was continuously drawn upon; for example, despite the initial focus on

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sustainable development and knowledge organization on a regional basis, the University soon came to have a special focus on “northern studies” as a Canadian tradition of defining and explaining “the Arctic” as an entity to outsiders. It is here that the chapter most clearly illustrates the problem of determining in practice which issues are relevant for an “Arctic region” and which actors are entitled to speak on “the Arctic.” INTRODUCING THE IDEA The person who initially suggested the idea of the UoA derived its feasibility most immediately from his involvement in establishing a European Commission program on environmental research (the Arctic Terrestrial Ecosystems Research Initiative). In this EC project, O.W. (Bill) Heal, a retired British professor of biology, had become “very much aware of series of research projects that were done in different countries…with very little crossconnection” (Heal, interview). His idea was that an integrated network for the Arctic could make the research process much more cost-effective and eliminate duplication of effort. Later, at the time of the establishment of the Arctic Council, Heal was the UK representative in the AMAP working group of the AEPS and was speaking with Swedish SAO Lars-Erik Liljelund about the problems in the Arctic Council in the evening after a meeting. Heal recounts how the development began: We were just talking about, you know, how you get things going and suggested mentioned something like you know really you need a University of the Arctic. And he instantly stopped and said what do you mean and I described briefly to him the idea. And he said wait I must get [AMAP chair, Canada Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development representative] David Stone because this could be useful for the Arctic Council. David came along and we talked around the idea and he said this, ‘this is exactly what the Arctic Council needs, what Canada needs, because fundamentally the Arctic Council is not producing anything, it’s arguing. And this is something they would all agree with. Would you develop that idea into a concept note’ (Heal, interview).

The concept note was presented as an initiative of Canada-Sweden “with help from the UK” at the March 1997 SAO meeting in Kautokeino, Norway. An early proposal had also been submitted for the attention of Canadian Circumpolar Ambassador Mary Simon, asking if she would consider distributing the paper to the SAOs for review and possible decision at the Kautokeino meeting. There, the University of the Arctic was described as an “Idea for Arctic Council deliverable though up by Lars-Erik Liljelund Sweden; Bill Heal UK and David Stone during the recent AMAP meeting” (Stone 1997a). The rationale of the University was presented as, among other things, the “increasing importance of circumpolar issues of climate change, sustainable development, biodiversity conservation, and action both regionally and globally”; and the

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common needs of science, communities and the social and economic well-being of indigenous peoples (Stone 1997a). Four course subjects were proposed, to be based on core modules held at different universities: environmental science, sociology, resource management and international administration (Heal et al. 1997:16–17 [Annex A]). Ultimately, the paper suggested a review of the feasibility of a UoA and proposed collaboration between universities and other institutions of Arctic member and observer states to enhance training, education and research “initially at graduate level, in science and humanities related to the Arctic region,” to in the last instance establish a UoA (Stone 1997a). As it seemed uncertain at the time how SAOs would respond to work under the heading of sustainable development, that concept was not overly emphasised (Heal, interview). At a meeting between Heal, Stone and Liljelund in 1997, a first task force to work on the concept of an Arctic university was then created, chaired by Heal, and a short explanation of the UoA concept was presented at a conference of the Circumpolar Universities Association (CUA), an international organization that had originally been established in relation to a Canadian interest in northern studies (Weller 1991).2 “Northern Studies” is particularly interesting both in the large importance it would gain in the University of the Arctic, and also in the historical connotations it includes. It is worth to expand on. “Northern Studies” is a specific field that had been initiated at some of Canada’s universities in the early 1960s and since expanded into many different disciplines and a field of study in its own right (Graham 1997:509). Such a tradition is, however, not common in the states that were represented; rather, it is an established tradition only in North America. It is also rather similar to the Arctic Studies tradition of studies largely of the natural environment (such as in the journal Arctic) and of Arctic anthropology (such as in the journal with the same name). As Graham notes, “Northern Studies are less intended to prepare people for work in the North and more to explain the region’s importance to all Canadians” (Graham 1997:519).3 On the practical level, in the development of a University of the Arctic, the CUA—established on such a northern studies basis—was asked about its interest in the project; it included the UoA as an item on the agenda for its general assembly and then continued to assemble a small three-person working group on the issue (CUA Secretary General Outi Snellman, interview). Following initial contacts, Heal and Snellman decided in August 1997 to merge their working groups and make the first plans for a UoA task force meeting, which was then held in Rovaniemi in September 1997 with participants mainly from academia, including indigenous studies.4 At an Arctic Council SAO meeting in October, it was then agreed that the CUA would be invited to undertake a study of the feasibility of a University of the Arctic and report back to the Arctic Council (Stone 1997b). A Development Plan for the UoA was then put together during that autumn, building upon the task force documents and elaborated in, among other fora, a meeting in November 1997 of some of the task force members.

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This Development Plan (Heal et al. 1997), as a basic document for the feasibility study, largely described the Arctic area in keeping with the terms used in “the Arctic” descriptions discussed earlier; it was seen as an area comprising “highly dispersed and isolated rural communities…where subsistence lifestyles remain important” as well as larger urban communities with a broad mix of economic activities (ibid.: 2). In the area, the locally available resources would often be insufficient for satisfying the many educational needs, as levels of education would often be below national averages, and higher education would not be available in many places. Moreover, transportation and infrastructure were described as typically poor and undeveloped. Environmental threats included the impact from transboundary pollution, for instance, that contaminated the traditional foods important to the areas (ibid.: 2–3). The plan also made the argument for the circumpolar Arctic as a region, e.g., through statements that industrial and commercial issues are increasingly circumpolar and that the service sector is of major importance in all Arctic areas. There was also an emphasis on tourism, renewable resources such as fishing, forestry and reindeer herding as major traditional industries, that resource exploitation is primarily of benefit to lower latitudes, and that common challenges are presented by the extreme climate and long distances. To provide services to such an area, the plan suggested that the UoA should be geographically dispersed as an institution and made up of centers and facilities from existing bodies of higher education in the different countries. The University was to provide, amongst other things, disciplinary and interdisciplinary courses that are “fully circumpolar in content” (Heal et al. 1997:9) and thereby overcome the limitations of project-specific agreements between universities. Deriving its momentum from the Arctic Council process, the plan also placed a focus on sustainable development, which was seen here as including environmental strategies, scientific advice and traditional knowledge to “enhance opportunities for the dispersed communities, indigenous peoples, and increasingly autonomous northern regions,” to manage the circumpolar environment and strengthen the economic base within the region, and to expand the knowledge base of the Arctic through education and research (Heal et al. 1997, Executive Summary, my emphasis). Thus, the plan largely drew upon Arctic discourse, but also constituted a “bottom-up” perspective on needs in the region, in a somewhat similar manner to early Arctic Council proposals. Moreover, the extensive list of consultants with whom benefits and needs of the university were to be investigated indicated a broad conception of who should have a say in Arctic development: it included national governments and regional administrations of the Arctic countries; governments of non-Arctic countries with specific interests in the north; intergovernmental unions and councils; universities, colleges and international associations concerned with higher education in the north; women’s groups; indigenous peoples and minority groups;

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industry and commercial organizations with major national and international interests; international education and research organizations and networks (Heal et al. 1997:9). As in Arctic Council work, the region for which this consultation would take place was however loosely defined, here as “approximating the main administrative provinces, states etc. of the northern parts of the Arctic countries” (Heal et al. 1997, Executive Summary). To amongst other things undertake this broad consultation and continue development of the concept, a feasibility study-working group was assembled; at its first meeting in January 1998 it received this development plan. The Arctic Council influence was apparent also here, however, in that the composition of this working group was directly based upon the Arctic Council model of national, indigenous and observer state representation, reproducing the selection mechanisms of the Arctic Council. The national representation for the University of the Arctic initiative was, given its focus as a University, selected to cover the national academic communities in the Arctic states, and additionally, one representative was to cover observer, “non-Arctic,” countries (Heal, who suggested the initiative and also chaired the task force). One representative from the CUA, as well as a working group secretary, were also included in the group. The three indigenous Permanent Participant organizations of the Arctic Council at the time (the Inuit Circumpolar Conference ICC, the Saami Council, and the Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the Far North RAIPON) participated with one representative each, as invited by the CUA from the central units of these organizations. Besides these general requirements, however, an early document also stated that “members will, above all else, be selected on the basis of their considerable knowledge of and ability to represent circumpolar education and research needs and aspirations” (Brekke et al 1998:8). In practice, the selection of participants within the criteria of state and indigenous representatives then centered on expertise in Arctic and northern studies, such as professors or university faculty with interest in these areas. The national representatives were largely selected directly from the Circumpolar Universities Association. In Canada, this included requesting representatives from the Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies (ACUNS),5 which gathers Canadian universities with northern studies interests, and the board of the three northern Canadian colleges (as there exists no university in the northern territories). The Denmark-Greenland representative, from Denmark, was running a doctoral program in Arctic circumpolar studies; the Norwegian representative had been active in the development of Arctic studies in the natural sciences and especially the natural sciences university at Svalbard; and the two southern US representatives were working in Arctic studies units. The focus was thus placed on expertise in the north or “Arctic” as an issue area rather than, for example, experience in national educational bodies or in the smaller educational institutions in the region. As members had not

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been selected through official organs representative of the academic community in their countries, the originally intended national representation of members was, however, relaxed following a discussion at the second working group meeting. The issues which a group with a focus on the “northern” or “Arctic” encountered are discussed below. These include problems in consultation and the selection of consultation groups as well as in designing a university approach with relevance for the region and determining its scope; in practice, which issues were seen as relevant for an “Arctic” and to whom these related. CLIENTELE AND CONSULTATION At the first working group meeting, a discussion of the University of the Arctic clientele reached a conclusion entailing four groups: traditional higher education students, northern peoples in general, teacher trainees, and nontraditional higher education students such as native people and older students not necessarily studying for a degree (Rovaniemi WG meeting, detailed field notes). However, apart from such a focus on the needs for education in the area, the intended functions of the university included regionbuilding aims embodied in an emphasis on both integrity and solidarity of the region. This is exemplified in the suggestion that the functions of the University should include the need to promote the integrity and solidarity of the region, promote exchange and focus on circumpolar discourse and Arctic issues, for example indigenous studies; make funding agencies consider the Arctic as a region; and supply teaching, train researchers and promote comparative Arctic-related research work (Rovaniemi WG meeting, detailed field notes). The assumption from the outset thus largely seemed to be that the University should concentrate on Arctic studies or northern studies, to some degree contradicting the focus placed on the educational needs of groups in the region.6 Indicating such an Arctic studies focus, the consultation largely targeted Arctic research or education consortia or institutions and governmental institutions, above all those dealing with international affairs (Young et al. 1998; Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript); i.e., bodies involved in the present “Arctic” discourse.7 Discussions of consultation, however, also indicated that working group participants were operating from different conceptions of “Arctic” issues and the goals of a UoA. The relevance and added value of the UoA were often not clear to participants, or were emphasised through a focus on foreign policy, and a consistent comment to the consultations was that regional interests had not been investigated enough. This consultation is described below. As the body responsible for the feasibility study, the CUA undertook the consultation with the larger international actors. Preference was given to

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the Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region and the ICC, that is, bodies already well involved in Arctic work. The Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region (a body originally set up to support the establishment of the Arctic Council, cf. Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region 2002) was contacted through the CUA secretariat during spring 1998, and the UoA initiative was subsequently supported in the 1998 Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region Conference Declaration. Through discussions with ICC representatives, the CUA was then invited to present at the ICC General Assembly in Nuuk, Greenland in July 1998, and also this conference declaration subsequently supported the University of the Arctic. Asserting that “many Inuit have to leave the circumpolar region in order to enroll in undergraduate and graduate degree programs” and “many existing universities…remain insensitive to Inuit values and objectives,” the ICC conference resolution requested the working group to, among other things, “[e]xpand its consultation program to include the Inuit Circumpolar Youth Council and colleges in the circumpolar region” and “[i]nitiate consultation at the community level, including boards of education in the circumpolar region” (Young et al. 1998:61–62 [Annex I]). The University of the Arctic was also supported at the Sustainable Development in the Arctic conference that Canada organized to support the development of the Arctic Council’s work in this area. The Sustainable Development in the Arctic conference mentioned the UoA in roughly one fourth of its statements, largely emphasising the institution’s possibilities from a bottom-up or access-related perspective (cf. Northern Review 1998). Recommendations included that “[t]he growing momentum for an Arctic University, built less on a particular structure than the principle of a information-sharing, could represent a tremendous opportunity for northerners to pursue an education focused on northern concerns” and “[t]he proposed Arctic University could facilitate a coming together of different types of knowledge” (Young et al. 1998:63 [Annex J], Northern Review 1998). The need for increased consultation and region-based direction of the initiative was thus highlighted, in the case of the ICC with reference to the special situation of the Inuit, and more generally at the Sustainable Development in the Arctic conference. The foreign policy perspective was then emphasized by the Canadian, Finnish and, to some degree, Icelandic and Danish participants. Canada and Finland both consulted policy initiatives related to the development of a northern policy on the national level. In Canada, the Canadian Center for Foreign Policy Development (at the instruction of the Minister of Foreign Affairs) at the time organized a series of meetings called the National Forum. In 1998, the topic of these meetings was “The Arctic,” and the meetings were held in Whitehorse, Yellowknife and Iqaluit in the northern territories as well as in Quebec City and Edmonton. At the one meeting that had been held

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before the discussions of consultation at the second working group meeting, the Canadian participants took up the UoA in relation to the development of Canadian foreign policy: A very positive outcome of the Whitehorse meeting was that…there was three citizen groups looking at whether we need a foreign policy on certain fuller matters, whether there should be a University of the Arctic and… Yukon citizens of all persuasion said yes (Sally Ross [Canada north participant]; Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript).

In Finland, then, presentations had been made to the Finnish working group on the Northern Dimension, which aimed at developing a Northern Dimension in EU policy. This working group had been established with support from the Prime Minister of Finland and included as members the special advisor to the Prime Minister, representatives of Finland’s Polar Commission, the Nordic Council, the Ministries of the Environment and of Trade, and the two northernmost universities of Oulu and Lapland. The Finnish participant observed: One of the central items of this working group has been the University of the Arctic, we have talked about it and there has been clear support for the concept…the weaker areas of consultation this would be the actual involvement of the twenty universities of Finland. To some extent I think that this is an issue of lack of time that there has been an urgency in the process (Janne Hukkinen [Finnish participant], Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript).

Similarly, the Icelandic participant had consulted with, amongst other bodies, the Icelandic Joint Committee of Arctic Affairs (a body of universities and organizations concerned with Icelandic Arctic research, working in cooperation with the Icelandic Polar Commission) and informally reported to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the new Icelandic SAO of the Arctic Council. In Denmark-Greenland, consultation had been more extensive but along “similar lines; ministries, private persons, organizations, particularly seventeen organizations in Greenland” (R. O Rasmussen [Denmark-Greenland participant], Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). In the US, consultation had centered on people within universities who had an interest in northern studies or in the Arctic (Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript; Young et al. 1998). In contrast, Sweden and Norway stressed the need to attend to the formal systems for applying for government funding for universities and the university council representing Norwegian universities, respectively. Swedish consultation had extended only to informal contacts within the University of Luleå and with the Ministry of Education and the Swedish Arctic Council SAO. One response Johansson encountered here was that the initiative had not entered through the usual policy process (Gunilla Johansson, interview).8

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The aim of the University also seemed to be seen rather narrowly: “we already have research in Arctic issues and we have teacher education for Saami people so there is some [university education] on these issues.” (Gunilla Johansson [Swedish participant], Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript). The Norwegian participant then noted that Norway’s Ministry of Education had taken the view that Norway already had an Arctic university in the University at Svalbard (UNIS). It was instead the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs who had been more interested in following up the initiative: In the academic world I think there is some skepticism about the Arctic Universities, because usually phrasing this as another of one of these organizations which are coming from the above and trying to sort of guideline what should be done. For scientists in the north, I think the cooperation is very active and even during the Cold War we had something going on. So some people feel that this goes without any extra organization (Asgeir Brekke [Norwegian Participant], Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript).

There were thus differences between state contexts, as in the Arctic Council, as to which degree one identified with or even recognized Arctic discourse as valid to organize on the basis of. This ambivalent attitude to the development of an “Arctic-region” university was echoed in some comments when the interim report of the feasibility study, including reports of consultations that had arrived from working group members at the time, was presented to the Arctic Council SAOs at their May 1998 meeting in Whitehorse, Canada. At the meeting, the Saami Council expressed support but observed that previous efforts to establish circumpolar post-secondary institutions had failed to meet indigenous people’s needs. The ICC, for its part, endorsed the concept as a means of empowering indigenous peoples in the Arctic over the long run. Denmark-Greenland expressed reservations about the proposal, noting the lack of resources and indigenous academics in circumpolar institutions. Denmark-Greenland further called for a working group to strengthen existing arrangements within the region and recommended that the University of Greenland, not yet involved, be invited to take part (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). Interviews with the working group members confirm this spread in different attitudes and understandings of whom and what the university was being developed for. Asked about what the UoA should provide, the Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies (ACUNS) president Peter Johnson mentioned the need for native and northern studies to be more interdisciplinary and taught in the north, especially to provide educational access to indigenous communities (Peter Johnson, interview):

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However, Johnson also saw Arctic exploration history as a motivation for development: It is interesting to see how many of the circumpolar countries do have a very strong circumpolar focus…I think there is something in the sort of the history of these countries that started a sort of very polar orientation I would depict Norway which identifies itself with its explorers Svendrup Amundsen and people like this…countries which have always had a strong polar dimension which have been involved in polar exploration (Peter Johnson, interview, my emphasis).

Thus, the “circumpolar focus” of a state, in Johnson’s view, related to the history of polar orientation (the Arctic studies approach), seeming to suggest an understanding of Arctic regional cooperation as polar and focused on northern studies / Arctic studies priorities. What other participants in the process note is, however, that there seems to be an established Canadian understanding of the Arctic and that this involves an understanding of the Arctic / north as a poorly integrated area where the indigenous element is of primary importance. They also state that this is not an approach all parties automatically embrace. Asgeir Brekke, Norwegian participant and chairman of the group stated, without being asked directly on the Canadian role: When I came into it [the UoA process], my idea and solution of a University of the Arctic was units, UNIS [the Norwegian arctic natural science university at Svalbard], similar units around the Arctic, but at that time I did not know enough about the situation in Canada. And it seems that it is the Canadian situation—the problems they are facing in Canada—they are the strongest drivers in the whole process. So I think in ways it is a way to help the Canadians in solving some of their internal educational problems and among indigenous peoples in Canada…I was not aware when I started of that this was such an important issue in Canada (Asgeir Brekke, interview).

US north (Alaska) participant Karen Erickson likewise stated: I understood, you know, that there was a very specific Canadian perspective on the north that was very different from the northern perspective I got in Tromsoe and when I was living in Finland and Norway…in many ways the north was…a more integrated part of the domestic approach to the life of the nation in Finland and Norway (Karen Ericson, interview).

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Ericson further contrasted this more integrated view with a view in Canada of “the north” as the distant and remote, but which now serves as a national interest in foreign policy: In Canada, although such a large part of Canada occupies the Arctic arena, Ottawa is essentially a southern city. Ottawa is to the Canadian Arctic like Washington DC is to the US Arctic. In many ways now the reason that Canada does have more of a stake in the Arctic is that, I mean, that one thing is that it doesn’t have so much to do in foreign policy as the US…to develop their image and position and the role that Canada has taken in arctic affairs, for example the idea of the Arctic Council (Karen Ericson, interview).

What can be seen in participants’ descriptions of and reflections on consultation and the process are thus divergent relations to “the Arctic,” but ones with a considerable focus on foreign policy and targeting a rather highlevel audience. Among participants, developed, polar-oriented perspectives are juxtaposed with views that assert the particularity of this perspective. Comments further indicate that a “regional” approach and a coherent view on stakeholders in the area were as yet undeveloped. These contradictions could be seen also in discussions that developed of which should be values guiding the university. VALUES AND FOCUS OF AN ARCTIC REGIONAL UNIVERSITY: WHO ARE THE NORTHERN PEOPLE? Given this background of divergent assumptions on developing an Arctic university and Arctic-related education, it may not be surprising that at the May 1998 working group meeting several participants took up the question of what sort of values were guiding the process. Reminiscent of earlier discussions in the Arctic Council on its aim, it remained unclear what the exact focus or added value of the institution would be. For instance, the Saami Council participant, Ande Somby, noted the different North American, European, and Russian university traditions and stated: “if we don’t approach that now then these differences in tradition may reproduce themselves as personal conflicts within the Arctic university” (Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). On extra-Arctic consultation, Heal stated, referring perhaps most closely to Norwegian and Swedish comments, that: “two or three of us have the same reaction we have already got a network.” Asking what others saw as the added value of the University, he noted that his view was that the University should contribute something that is not being addressed through the individual sciences (Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). In all, a comment by the participant from the three northern Canadian colleges captured many of the issues concerning the university. These included

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the hastiness of the consultation, the lack of clarity on the added value of the institution, and, perhaps most importantly, the question of to what extent these problems can even be settled, given their profundity in questioning for whom the University is intended: We have been very hasty and I think it is a matter of great importance to connect thoroughly with circumpolar people the residents of the Arctic and I think we heard that concern expressed by several stakeholders at the Arctic Council…if people are not included they conclude they’re excluded. The other expressed concern was that the University of the Arctic could rob already struggling northern institutions of their resources and I think that what this institution could mean in terms of value added in comparison to those other institutions…The final point I think has to do with something more profound and that relates to who the students are of the University of the Arctic and whose interests are served in the creation of the organization as a whole and I would welcome an open and careful thoughtful discussion about those…questions (Sally Ross [Canada North participant], White-horse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript, my emphasis).

Sally Ross subsequently also addressed the need for increased consultation based on some representativeness or legitimate democratic conception of “the region” (the perspective on regional educational need): In my consultations with the other presidents of institutions and our board are meeting in Yellowknife next month I picked up in Canada a concern that the institutions of the University of the Arctic are for the people living in the circumpolar north first and foremost in their hopes and those who have an interest in the north: we need to connect them in in the way that serves the aspirations of people in the Arctic. And it is that distinction I think that has not been clear in our documents or in our discussion. And I think that distinction will make a very big difference not only in terms of the Arctic Council but in terms of the real acceptedness of this new university with real acceptedness and enthusiasm (Sally Ross [Canada North participant], Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript, my emphasis).

Similarly, the Russian participant R.M. Skryabin focused on democratic or representative involvement as a key issue for the regional university. He suggested though an interpreter that it would be important what position the Northern Forum cooperation between subnational governments took on the development. “[T]he project of the University of the Arctic will be realized if we assure that there is an understanding not only on the part of the Arctic Council but on the part of the northern regions and peoples as well” (Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). Skryabin also further suggested that consultation on the role of higher education institutions in the north would need to take place with participation of the regions, the aboriginal

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organizations and the regional institutions of higher education, as these would be the future centers of the University of the Arctic (Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). This focus on “people in the north,” expressed as something which had not gained enough attention in the process, was quickly contested, however, by the question of who the people in the north are. In the discussion on the values of the University, Heal stated that he had not been too sure what sort of message to present to outside organizations: “in relation particularly to indigenous [peoples], is it an indigenous peoples university, so what sort of balance? And secondly the concern of sensitivity of outside of the Arctic” (Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript). This echoed the difficulties in the Arctic Council of determining a regional focus, and the way in which the question of who the regional and local people’s representatives should be had been passed over. Here, when it was taken up, it resulted in conflict and was then silenced. In response to Heal’s question, the Icelandic participant replied: My understanding has been that it is a university here that could address the issues of sustainable development and livelihood and the future of Arctic inhabitants through education and I think its very important to note that for example in the Icelandic case we don’t have any indigenous people…there are many kinds of Arctic inhabitants of which indigenous peoples are particularly vulnerable…this is probably going into semantics but I think the words indigenous in Icelandic would be implicitly excluding Icelanders (Níels Einarsson, [Iceland participant], Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript).

The Saami Council participant countered: But the indigenous peoples we still have the colours and the powers of communicating across colours and we have also signalled quite a bit of support to the concept of the Arctic university. But we also have the practical question that there are other initiatives another group which is towards an indigenous university... so if I take it as that it is not seen as a good thing that the indigenous people are not seen as too visible in this, then I need to take it back to the Saami Council that is this where we are going to focus these or is it in the indigenous university [an indigenous-focused university developed outside the Arctic context] (Ande Somby, Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript).

The ICC participant (Terry Fenge) apparently recognized this line of argument, which in taking up who “northern inhabitants” are—in addition to the indigenous population assumed in discourse—also opened the question of who can represent these people, and thereby of who can speak for “the Arctic.” He stated:

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Following this exchange, many spoke up to agree with some sort of inclusive process. In doing this, the Russian participant also mentioned the way he saw “the Arctic” and characteristics relevant to a “northern agenda”: “traditional knowledge in the Arctic runs centuries deep for most of the inhabitants of the Arctic, and it is related to the environmental conditions of the Arctic, and that is what we are to aim for” (R.M.Skryabin, Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript, my emphasis; cf. Skryabin, interview). The implicit view of “the Arctic” thus seemed to remain structured around the environment, and, secondarily, around the groups that can argue a traditional linkage to the environment and environmental use (within this discourse, the indigenous groups represented by NGOs). The contested point here was how to differentiate and take in both indigenous interests and “others” with valid interests within the region, and how to represent these potential “other” priorities (the set of issues touched upon by the Icelandic participant). Such a sensitivity on the differentiation and question of relative importance of “indigenous” and an undefined “other” Arctic resident category was confirmed in interviews with working group members. For example, the Norwegian participant stressed: “for me the University of the Arctic should work for the people in the Arctic So but to sort of separate the indigenous from the other people living north of the Arctic circle that is meaningless” (Asgeir Brekke, interview). “Obviously the constantly sensitive issue is the indigenous versus the how should I say, indigenous versus local issue or something like that” (Janne Hukkinen, interview). Asked how this issue had been dealt with, Hukkinen replied: “one way of doing that is that if it is a difficult issue you just avoid it you don’t touch it…another way which is typical is the political solution you do precisely what you I think shouldn’t do from the intellectual point of view which is that you give tokens for, you give, you know, one slot for the indigenous and another slot for the other side” (Janne Hukkinen, interview, emphasis original). At the meeting, one of the participants also heard something else than a local-indigenous conflict behind this sensitivity over the indigenous emphasis in the university. One of the US representatives stated, what I heard in this was the question of whether the traditions of southern universities should be incorporated wholesale into the University of the Arctic, and I think that there is indeed consensus on that it is not to be so, there are more models to be created in this university and there certainly are

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reasons to do so (S. B. Young, Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript, my emphasis).

This seems to suggest that if these “others” are not defined or represented (or “indigenous”), discussion of this category of “others” might be resisted—so that not “neutral” (southern) state participants would be able to speak for them (by which they would otherwise be able to claim a larger role in the development). Given the setting of state and indigenous participation, the question of “non-indigenous” regional representation became politically volatile: who would be speaking for the so far unidentified “others” if these were not seen as represented by the indigenous foci? As the only non-indigenous participants present were those selected through a state framework, and indigenous NGOs could not speak for a category they by definition distance themselves from, this question prompted suggestions that the “region” was not accurately represented. Any acceptance of such a conclusion would automatically diminish the regional legitimacy claimed by the UoA and the broader Arctic Council, on which the UoA model of representation or participation was built. It would have posed the question of who can speak for the region and how to extend participation and representation, thus in practice decreasing the relative domination of state and indigenous representatives/participants, and leaving an opening for potentially different issue agendas. The problem of representation and participation thus runs through the Arctic Council and related organization. Here, as earlier, it was managed by refraining from discussions of it. STUDIES OF RATHER THAN FOR THE NORTH? The issue of who “the Arctic” inhabitants are was also reproduced in a discussion on education, here in terms of how to determine the educational needs for such inhabitants. In this context, the focus was rather explicitly placed on the UoA, however, as supplying education in Arctic studies or the northern studies tradition. In practice, studies of the north were thus largely equated with studies needed in the north for northern citizens themselves, i.e., that northern peoples would primarily require education about the region (as opposed to a focus of resources on, for example, widening general access and university education). This was both expressed and contested, largely because the northern studies or Arctic studies perspective seemed to be the assumed view. In this connection, one of the US south participants stated: One of the problems we are running into at the Center for Northern Studies is our efforts at maintaining a student body…the requirements for degrees are getting more and more specific and we are getting less and less freedom for the students to be able to take a semester off for something like that… if we are looking towards a degree maybe the first degree we are talking about

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Negotiating the Arctic should be on a masters level rather than an undergraduate level (S.B. Young, Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript, my emphasis).

This initiated a discussion of northern studies—Arctic studies education on higher levels, where the focus initially suggested was on a few Arctic studies students at more advanced levels of education. For instance, the Finnish participant suggested that from an administrative point of view the doctoral level might be preferable, as formal entry requirements are less strict than at earlier phases and one would also not want to run a doctoral degree with more than “a few good” students (Janne Hukkinen, Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). This meant that a focus was placed on specialized, non-entry-level, university education, for which the requirement was a first degree. The participant from Canada north countered in a statement worth reproducing at length: When we were talking about what level of degree and so an alarmbell rang and I need to tell you what that alarmbell is because it wont turn off and that is the whole question of access. And the typical situation is that people most invested in these themes are the least academically prepared…we can in fact reproduce the inadequate access of existing institutions for aboriginal people inadvertently if we don’t consider this matter in our design I talked earlier in the meeting about the importance of consociation and I raise this question ‘who says there is a problem’ ‘who are the stakeholders in the circumpolar Arctic’ and I really believe that we must either consult either in a matter similar to the discussion that you heard from Terry and others about the center for policy development kind of approach which is a very focused sort of grass roots approach I don’t want to anticipate other peoples response to this but…in the Canadian Arctic there would be a major problem with discriminate members of the Arctic Council and in my own constituency my own students. I, you know, we serve an enormous number of people indigenous and others and if their new university is created and its first act is to bring something wonderful that is beyond their reach…(Sally Ross [Canada North participant], Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript, my emphasis).

Following this disagreement on focus, which again reveals the differing foci on “the north” and which groups were seen as potential participants in cooperation, a brief discussion was held on the means for involving further stakeholders in order to help resolve the issue of whom the University should be developed for.9 The argument was not continued, however, as discussions of a broad consultative conference to which stakeholders could be invited in connection with the next working group meeting came to a close when a relatively inaccessible location at Svalbard was chosen for the meeting. In later developments, however, a program at initial, i.e., Bachelor’s, level

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of university education would become the first programmatic outcome of the University. It is organized around three elements, the first of which is the course An Introduction to the Circumpolar World. The draft course outline includes an emphasis on traditional and western knowledge systems, geography and history of the region, peoples and cultures of the circumpolar world (including Sami, Inuit, Nenets, Scandinavian, Finno-Ugrian), resource and land use, traditional and industrial economies, material culture, health and well-being, indigenous rights, and emerging political structures (University of the Arctic 2002). The course thus developed from a northern studies focus, but with prominence given to the historically identified themes of the environment and traditional indigenous elements, and a strong region-building perspective. THE FINAL REPORT OF THE UoA FEASIBILITY STUDY In preparation of the 1998 biannual Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, the report of the feasibility study of the Circumpolar Universities Association Working Group was drafted and submitted to the Arctic Council as agreed. The report stated that the University was, among other things, to address the need of developing “A Shared Region”: How can we facilitate the normalization of relations damaged by colonization and the Cold War and nurture the development of a true international region? …The particular role of the University of the Arctic in meeting these challenges is to develop a body of relevant knowledge, to create a forum in which people from the North and elsewhere may interact and share that knowledge, and to provide a mechanism to apply it to specific situations (Young et al. 1998:7, emphasis original).

The first annex “Shared Voices and a University of the Arctic—Views of Indigenous Peoples” was authored by the representatives of indigenous organizations in the process. It called for normalization of the region, and a university that “brings together indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, stressing interdisciplinary studies and our traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), [which] could add an important dimension to Arctic co-operation” (ibid.: 11). The representatives noted, in keeping with some of the elements of an Arctic regional description identified earlier, that [o]ur region is too often portrayed as a cold or forbidding place with poor living conditions and a fragile environment and in which we have been largely assimilated by other cultures. These negative images of the Arctic and of indigenous peoples as ‘victims’ are inaccurate. The Arctic has undergone extraordinary change in recent years, and it is important that a balanced image of our homelands be communicated to the world… We hope an early research project will be undertaken through the university to

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The report thus communicates a strong region-building approach, emphasizing the need for regional knowledge, relations and descriptions as well as the potential role of the University in the Arctic Council process. It maintains the unproblematized view of residents and places the main focus on indigenous peoples. The report ends its main recommendations on the note that “[t]he CUA Working Group has concluded that the time has come to move this initiative from paper to practice and, in the process, to launch the programmatic activities of the University of the Arctic” (Young et al. 1998:9). To this end, it proposes the appointment of a Provisional Board of Trustees, to start from the CUA Working Group and be adjusted over time; the creation of an interim Secretariat; the establishment of an initial (expandable) group of Associated Centers of Higher Education prepared to contribute to University of the Arctic programs; the development of a set of concrete programmatic initiatives to begin during 1998–1999, and the continuation and expansion of the consultation process (ibid.). When the CUA presented this final report to the Arctic Council SAO meeting in August 1998, as invited by the Canadian Circumpolar Ambassador, it was welcomed but with similar reservations as previously that regional needs had not been investigated. The discussion centered on increased consultation. For instance, the ICC representative at the meeting stated that while the ICC had passed a formal resolution in support of the concept, it had also proposed a significant expansion of the consultative process; support was conditional on a guaranteed role for indigenous peoples. Denmark-Greenland underscored the need to address funding issues and was concerned that the University of Greenland would need to compete against a new institution for funding. The Saami participant, supported by Sweden and Denmark-Greenland, suggested that the process needed to be slowed down to allow for consultation with the emerging framework of indigenous people’s colleges. Denmark-Greenland stated: “It takes time to collect support. It takes time to establish common understanding and I think it is really essential that the northern universities and colleges and the students participate in this process” (SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Ad verbum transcript, p. 130). As this was the last SAO meeting before the Arctic Council ministerial meeting, the meeting also set up a drafting group to include the UoA in the ministerial declaration—the dead-line that the feasibility study had worked towards. The University of the Arctic was thereby presented as a product of the Canadian chairmanship of the Arctic Council.10

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The University of the Arctic has since continued to develop, providing the bachelor’s course on the Circumpolar Arctic and extending its Arctic studies network and organizational structure, much along the lines suggested in the feasibility study report (Young et al. 1998). It has however not advanced any formal larger initiative to expand the low-level consultation called for.11 AN ARCTIC REGION? The discussions of an “Arctic” international regional university illustrate and highlight several recurrent points of Arctic regional discourse as seen so far. Firstly, one may note the high level of generality in discussions of “the Arctic,” which makes cooperation possible but at the same time complicates any real targeting of initiatives. This is common throughout “Arctic” regionbuilding discussions, which seem to center on the “region” as understood largely from historical and other connotations of the concept (selecting environmental and traditional indigenous perspectives on a considerably extended land area). Secondly, the discussions prominently manifest driving forces on an international political, rather than (sub)regional level, in which “Arctic” issues are pursued in some relation to foreign policy objectives. The development has nevertheless included a constant demand for extended consultation, and for defining needs beyond those of policymakers and specific Arctic studies concerns. As soon as discussions go into operational definition of the region, however, either in attempting to define stakeholders or their educational needs, conflict is provoked. These conflicts seemed to concern either the difference between Arctic/northern studies as a field and needs for education in the region or the differences in what a priority in indigenous or “other” concerns would mean. Thirdly, conflict was thus provoked by the difference between an Arctic studies / northern studies focus and a focus on educational needs in the region. In this conflict, one can perceive a tension between explicit statements (the priority for, e.g., entry-level students in the areas with wide educational needs) and practical foci (on students of the area with an interest in Arctic studies, possibly viewing the Arctic as an object for postgraduate or continued professional academic study). The problem of targeting and focus is also common in Arctic region-building, generally; while the explicit emphasis is on needs in the region, the implicit assumptions on what is relevant for “the Arctic” derive from a history that selects the environment and those social characteristics relatable to the environment (the traditional indigenous element). Fourthly, these conflicts over whom an Arctic university should be developed for was also seen in the question of who the stakeholders in the development in general are, and specifically, over what the relationship

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between “indigenous” and “local” is. While this is an issue that has been prevalent in Arctic Council development, the University of the Arctic was one instance where it was finally explicitly discussed, but resulted in conflict and again became exempted from discussion. The question of “indigenous” and “local” here became one of who the practical referents of these labels are: that is, who can claim legitimate decision-making power and representation in the developments. In discussions in the University of the Arctic, one finds that the “other” or “local” was implicitly equated with “southern” and contrasted with “indigenous.” This assumption is, however, not a given but a result of the way in which “Arctic” discourse describes actors. An outsider might assume that groups in the same localities (such as “local” and “indigenous,” if “indigenous” are assumed to refer to locally situated groups that indigenous organizations aim to represent) have more in common than those situated in different parts of the country (“southern” and “local”). What has happened, however, is that the “local” category was assumed to be represented by the state perspective—perhaps even to the extent that “local” from a frontier perspective would be assumed to be “southerners” that had immigrated to the region, thus making “indigenous” the only group with claim to the area; this category would then be seen as contesting the state framework and represented by indigenous organizations. Such a simplified description of historical development that sees “indigenous” and “southern” as those residing in northern areas is not viable for all of the areas however, as the following chapter will take up; neither does a view of the indigenous people as the only group to represent “the north” reflect the multifaceted situations in areas where the indigenous people are minority populations and not always as clearly delineable from “locals” (in any clear either-or framing) as in Arctic discourse. The division into “indigenous,” “local” and “southern” is thus not necessarily a direct reflection of “regional” tension but of the selections inherent in an Arctic framing. This framing selects central state and indigenous organizations on an international, not sub-regional level, as representatives, despite the fact that the Arctic is discussed as a regional development (cf. Kettlewell 1995). Given the northern regional aim of cooperation, however, this leaves the perspective of citizens in the region (both indigenous and non-indigenous) without regionally accountable representation. Fifthly, then, the present framing of the Arctic also works to place a primary focus on the social elements which can be imagined as traditional, dependent on local resources, and living close to the environment (even if this is not the situation for most of the subjects today). This can be seen for instance in the mention of those with traditional knowledge of the environmental conditions in “the Arctic” as the group to address, and in the descriptions of the Arctic in UoA publications that give a prominence to indigenous concerns and depict the region as largely consisting of rural communities with subsistence lifestyles; a perspective that is also characteristic for descriptions in broader Arctic Council work. There are however divergences in how well such a description

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depicts the area seen as “Arctic.” For instance, ultimately, is it suggested by some actors in the process that there is a particularly Canadian perspective on “the Arctic”/north, dominant in the cooperation but largely assuming the Arctic to be describable as an indigenous area poorly integrated into the rest of the state. In defining the Arctic as an environmental and traditional indigenous area, it then utilizes a clear indigenous-local differentiation both by ethnicity and place of residence (as discussed above). One can thus see the basic discourse of an Arctic played out similarly to that in the AEPS and Arctic Council developments, but with its conflict more visible in this closer discussion of the University of the Arctic. One can also see this discourse resisted or not participated in by the actors not traditionally invested in it, while the Canadian role, on the other hand, is seen as particularly significant. Along the lines of the solidarity of an international Arctic region that is promoted within region-building, in both the Arctic Council and the UoA, the UoA may thus in Paasi’s terms (1996:33–35) be seen as a knowledge infrastructure developed to establish the region more broadly in education and media. The discourse it carries conflictive among actors and between different state contexts, however, along similar lines in both UoA and broader Arctic region work. To explain how this discourse may have developed, the different allegiances to it, and some of what the silences in the discourse may hide, to the different state contexts and histories we will turn next, in trying to explain from where an Arctic discourse derives.

CHAPTER 6

Views of “The Arctic” in Different States

The developments of early region-building, the AEPS, the Arctic Council and its conflict-ridden sustainable development program as well as the University of the Arctic have indicated some of the disagreements over the discourse on the region and its selected environmental and traditional indigenous foci. It has been suggested that there are differences in the emphasis given to Arctic development, and in the context in which different states see the Arctic. Throughout, the study has noted the extensive Canadian role in developing and directing the development of an Arctic international region. It has been seen in that the Canadian driving force was manifested already in the AEPS initiative, which is often described as a Finnish initiative but in which Canadian co-drafting and suggestions played a large role. Canada was also decisive in the Arctic Council development and in placing its focus on sustainable development, and played a large role both in initiating and developing the University of the Arctic. Other important actors have been the ICC, both as an actor in itself and within the Canadian context, and secondly the states besides Canada which have traditionally seen their northernmost areas as Arctic and been comfortable with the discourse forwarded in the developments. The intention in this chapter is to deepen the discussion of the extent to which the Arctic discourse as advanced in international cooperation in fact relates to understandings in the different states, and thus the extent to which the current cooperation with its emphasis on the environment and traditional indigenous elements can be seen as descriptive of the area as a whole. This will take place to a large extent through historically tracing, in accordance with a genealogical perspective, the different perspectives that exist in the states that are currently defined as “Arctic” in cooperation. In particular, the chapter will develop the discussion of a frontier view of the Arctic that has been indicated for some states earlier in the work (ch. 2): it shows that one may trace the differences in a discourse on “the Arctic”

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back to patterns of settlement and the ideology of land development. The present chapter thus shows that whether states agree with and exhibit the characteristics that are described as “Arctic” in discourse largely depends upon whether they have had a relatively recent frontier development of their northernmost areas, conceive of development in relation to a frontier perspective, and are used to seeing their northernmost areas as Arctic. What is then also criterial is how widespread and important such a frontier understanding of its domestic north has been for the state, and, accordingly, in developing a state-wide interest in Arctic discourse. There is one state—Canada—for which such a development is typical, and the chapter both describes the earlier indicated specific view of the Arctic in Canada and shows how it has developed into its current extent: through contradictory conceptions as both a northern frontier and resource basis for state-directed development and through a focus on security and sovereignty in the north. It also shows how the understanding of the Arctic as a social area with internal political forces and self-determination has been a rather late addition to an understanding of the Arctic as a natural wilderness populated only by indigenous peoples. A comparison in extent and specific content to discourses in the other states now included in “Arctic” cooperation then illustrates both differences and similarities to the Canadian situation, much along the lines of how they have so far been manifested. A northern frontier development has been prominent also in some other Arctic areas (Greenland, Alaska and northern Russia), but there it has not gained a defining role for the states and thus has taken on a lesser role in their national and international development. For another group of “the Arctic” states (Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland), then, discourses on their northern areas have focused on terms differing from those in Arctic discourse and with little prevalence of frontier descriptions or understandings of their own populated areas as “Arctic.” Illustrating the very different state backgrounds with respect to involvement with an Arctic label, the chapter thus shows how historical development has come to create the divisions that can be seen in Arctic discourse today, as well as the discourse itself. Given the nature, extent, and specific context of Canadian discourse on “the Arctic” that earlier chapters have indicated, the chapter is structured such that the Canadian context is described in the following section, with a focus on the discourse, frontier development and emergence of the Arctic as a domestic and international policy area. The chapter further describes the way in which Canadian discourse has become generalized as representative for “the Arctic,” both historically and into the present. On this basis, the chapter then illustrates the development of the environment and traditional indigenous elements into principal descriptive foci in Arctic discourse and the partial coherence of Canadian discourse with that in Greenland, Alaska and Russia. Finally, the larger differences between such an Arctic discourse and northern discourses in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland are described,

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concluding that an application of the frontier concept in these countries has been criticized and that the distinguishing concepts in Arctic discourse cannot be readily applied upon the northern areas in these states. THE CANADIAN ARCTIC: GEOGRAPHY AND DISCOURSE In Canada, rather than playing a marginal role in description, as in other “Arctic” states, the Arctic has been a focus for both domestic policy and national identity. The concepts “Arctic” and “North” in Canadian discourse are also regularly used interchangeably—which is not the case in all the states currently involved in Arctic cooperation—and generally refer to the same area, the administratively delineated territories above 60° north. This area, some have commented, is “somehow ‘really North’ as opposed to the northern no man’s lands of the provinces” (Shields 1991:168; cf. Bone 1993).1 While this is the delineation of the Arctic in Canada, it is also the most southern definition that is now used in international Arctic cooperation. The intensive focus on these areas in Canadian domestic discourse and national identity—and in Canadian international cooperation is, however, rather remarkable in that it contrasts with a rather limited development and limited focus on conceptions within the areas. The Canadian Arctic discourse has to a considerable extent dealt with the Arctic from what is in Canada largely seen as an outsider’s, or federal, perspective. That is, descriptions of the Canadian Arctic have largely developed about the area, rather than emerged from understandings within the northern areas themselves. Such a discrepancy between a focus on the areas themselves and on descriptions of the area is a main feature of Canadian Arctic discourse, and critics have noted that “the Arctic” has been seen as an element of national identity, something to build a unified, fictional character upon. For example, Shields describes how since the 1970s, a public revival of the elements of Northern myths has taken place through a genre of Canadian identity quest books, in order to differentiate the Canadian identity from the American (Shields 1999). Examining North American, and particularly southern Canadian myths of the Arctic and Sub-Arctic, Shields argues that the spacemyth of the “True North Strong and Free” (words that appear in the Canadian national anthem, reminiscent of a Tennyson romantic poem with reference to Canada) has been adapted as one symbol of specific Canadian nationalistic discourse. By this myth, “Southerners construe the North as a counter-balance to the civilised world of the Southern cities yet as the core of their own, personal, Canadian identity” (Shields 1999:163). The Arctic is made to play a specific role of wilderness: “when men were uncertain as to the precise quality of their sensed humanity, they appealed to the concept of wildness to designate an area of sub-humanity that was characterized by everything they hoped they were not” (White 1978:151–152, quoted in Shields 1991:163). Developed in this way, Shields notes,” ‘True North Strong and Free’ has a striking prominence amongst English-speaking, central, southern Canadians

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and in the dominant political rhetoric this majority generates” (Shields 1991:164). It forms “a mythology which is first of all practiced, and only second consciously contemplated” (Shields 1991:199); to southern Canadians the romanticization of the North is manifested as a “wilderness zone of purity” and simultaneously a “resource frontier offering riches to developers” (ibid.: 181). He notes that both these conceptions of “the North” are part of an “ignorance founded on its irrelevance to everyday life” (ibid.). Shields’s view is thus that the Canadian North “forms the mythic ‘heartland’ of Canada but remains a zone of Otherness in the spatial system of Canadian culture” (ibid.: 4), a discourse for which this imagined character is what has been most notable. Similarly, for example, Coates is concerned that conceptions of the North simply have come to serve as a surrogate for “the old North American preoccupation with the frontier,” for which outside description in a dramatic manner was the rule: Of all of the potential definitions of Northernness, perhaps the least amount of attention has been paid to the region’s conception of itself. Scholars have, in a variety of ways, examined outsiders’ understanding of Northern districts. The opposite side of the equation—Northerners’ sense of themselves and their region—has attracted little scholarly work (Coates 1994:21–22; cf. Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988, Feit 1994, Flaherty 1995).

Current debate within Canada thus often rather unsparingly focuses on how the Canadian Arctic has been described mainly from a central state perspective and for central state reasons, contrasting it with a largely ignored northern perspective. That such a critique—and the situations on which it is based—has developed in Canada can largely be seen as related to the very special circumstances of the Canadian Arctic, including those of its geography— which are themselves a result of settlement patterns. Even today, northern residents comprise less than 2 percent of the total Canadian population of 26.5 million and are thus marginalized through both geographical isolation and lack of power over local developments (Shields 1991:166). While twothirds of Canada is boreal or arctic, no less than eighty percent of Canada’s population lives within 100 kilometres of the US-Canada border (the 49th parallel) in urban areas. Thus, almost 90 percent of Canada has no permanent inhabitants (Belanger 1995). Comparisons to make this vast area possible to comprehend abound in literature: area north of the treeline makes up 20 percent of the total area of the country, and 80 percent of the population there (in all, fewer than 20,000 people) are aboriginal, almost all Inuit. The territories make up 40 percent of the total area of the country but their population is only one-quarter of one percent of the national total (and 45 percent aboriginal) (Working Group on

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the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988: x). It should also be noted that the native population constitutes approximately four percent (1.2 million) of the total (27 million), an indigenous population that is spread out equally over the Canadian area, with its extremely sparsely populated in northern areas; this is a fact which perhaps goes some way towards explaining the relative prevalence indigenous political organization have attained in issues “northern.” Thus, “[t]he Canadian North is an exceptionally politicized community of various peoples” (Lipscomb 1999:105). At the same time, though, “[p]olitics, politicians, and policies are so overwhelmingly ‘Southern’ that one must understand what fuels the making of Northern policies to make some sense out of the psychological distance that separates the two” (Belanger 1995:51, cf. Alia 1999). In addition to being related to the particular geographic habitation patterns, then, the Canadian view of the Arctic is largely a result of its historical development—through which these habitation patterns and policy have at all formed. For instance the definition of “the north” or “the Arctic” along the 60th parallel is a historic feature.2 At the time when Canada was made up of mainly British colonial provinces, Great Britain had designated the areas above this line to the Hudson’s Bay fur trading company, quite probably with reference to the Antarctic in keeping with the spirit of cartography and exploration of the time.3 The delineation of what would become a territorial “north” in Canada, with relevance for current conflicts over power-sharing, thus even precedes the institutionalization of Canada as a federal state in 1867. When the area became part of the new Canadian state, it became seen as territorial, that is, as to some degree governed directly from the federal parliament as opposed to provinces which exist in their own right and with considerable independence within the Canadian federal system (Canada’s Provinces and Territories 2001:1, Hudson’s Bay Company Archives 2002). From the outset, then, Arctic Canada was seen as an area apart from southern Canada, and the way it was defined came to be institutionalized into administrative and governmental practice in the state, and into broader national discourse. CANADA’S FRONTIER DEVELOPMENT Canada is thus a rather young state, emerging in the form we know it today only since Confederation in 1867; it also took more than 50 years after that before Canadian representatives spoke for Canada internationally without British sponsorship (Abele 1987). This emergence of the Canadian state took place in bold relief against what was seen as a northern frontier (cf. Zaslow 1971:367, 370). But while both the US and Canada can be seen as frontierdeveloped countries, the development in Canada greatly differed from the US in this recency and the way the Canadian Arctic was retained as a dependent

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Figure 3. Contemporary map of Canada. Note that the 60th parallel is used as the dividing line between the southern provinces and northern territories (the Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut). Source: Natural resources Canada 2001.

region. While the US developed westward from east coast centers and became independent in 1776–almost a hundred years earlier than Canada achieved statehood—expansion in Canada took place later and more slowly northwards from already developed southern centers. “Since the frontier districts failed to achieve as full a development as the metropolitan heart-lands from which they sprang, they also proved unable to emancipate themselves from heartland economic, social, and political hegemonies as the American West had been able to do” (Zaslow 1988:370). The frontier settlement of Canada was, therefore, nothing like the fairly steady progress of the American people across the Appalachians and into the Midwest and beyond. It was a slower and intermittent process. The older settlements in eastern and central Canada were well developed before people sought new opportunities to the west. Canada also had a much smaller population to draw from, and immigration from Europe never attained

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anything like the numbers it did in the United States. Nor was there the fervor of ‘manifest destiny’ to push the Canadians across the continent with the same drive that their neighbors to the south had. In its place was a sense that inevitably all the land north of the United States would be consolidated into a single, self-governing nation (Encyclopaedia Britannica 1999, para. 69–70, my emphasis).4

This conception of the Arctic as a frontier played a significant role in setting up the categories through which Canada related to its north, such as the specific categories and interpretations of “the indigenous” and “wilderness.” Especially in North America where it has been described as “the central myth-ideological trope of American culture,” the understanding of land development through the concept of the frontier has had enormous importance (Slotkin 1985: p. xx, quoted in King 2000:16); the frontier it was even seen as defining a phase of American history. The epitomal work is that of Frederic Jackson Turner, who used the concept of the frontier to explain the development of the US and American national mentality and identity up until 1880. In the work, originally published in 1893, the frontier is seen as existing at the meeting of what is perceived as untrammelled land, “wilderness—also that in a particular understanding developed in the North American frontier context5—and what is perceived as “civilisation,” the culture of the colonizers (Turner 1976). From a frontier conception, wilderness was here directly related to the “primitive” state of man, the Native American Indian, conceptualized as part of the wilderness, who was seen as differentiated from civilization and its effects. The inclusion of previous frontier land and inhabitants (wilderness and the indigenous populations) into the state historically in the US thus included a development through a territory/colony phase where the area finally became part of the state by acquiring a certain number of established “free,” non-indigenous and male, inhabitants (King 2000:36– 37, 42; cf. Brogan 1999). Wilderness thus proceeded beyond this frontier status by integration as a part of the state at the point when “civilization had taken over.” While this mythology ascribed unity and progress to the colonizers, it thereby left frontier areas largely undescribed and without agency except in their role as wilderness: environmental and the indigenous traditional areas, conceived of as part of the environment. The frontier thus provided an identitybuilding feature for the immigrants to conceptualize their development into a unity through processes across geographical reach, i.e. as a force moving across untrammelled land, either gradually transforming wilderness into civilization or retaining it as wilderness: an area continuously left behind the frontier (Turner 1976:22–23; cf. Williams 2002). As frontier, “the Arctic” was thereby predicated on distance (to use the expression of Grant, 1993:249, passim): socioeconomic and cultural as well

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as geographical. “The Arctic” became the wild lands across which progress takes place and which are described in terms of an outside and an inside. That is, as a unit, but one without cultural agency.6 Such an “idea of the north” became integral in Canadian economic, social and psychological development and was applied internationally as well as domestically, in attributing Canada a national identity and a place in the world (Nord 1991:129). Even as late as in 1958, Prime Minister Diefenbaker launched and won a federal general election campaign by proclaiming a Northern Vision (cf. Zaslow 1988:308, 317ff), which was both largely frontierrelated and explicitly reminiscent of notions of the old West. In a speech in 1958, Diefenbaker declared: Sir John A. Macdonald gave his life to this party. He opened the West. He saw Canada from East to West. I see a new Canada—a Canada of the North Here in Winnipeg in 1909, when the vast movement was taking place into the Western plains, they had imagination. There is a new imagination now. The Arctic. We intend to carry out the legislative program of Arctic research, to develop Arctic routes, to develop those vast hidden resources the last few years have revealed. Plans to improve the St. Lawrence and the Hudson Bay route. Plans to increase self-government in the Yukon and Northwest Territories. We can see one or two provinces there (Diefenbaker 1958,para.2,7).7

These provinces still remain to be developed, however, despite attempts in the 1960s and later.8 While the mythical role of “the North” as a frontier and “center” was growing, infrastructure, integration and government of northern Canada lagged behind. Vallee wrote in 1972: We must continuously remind ourselves of the recency of large-scale Canadian intervention in the Far North. Until about twenty years ago, in most parts of the Canadian Arctic Eskimos had been in contact with only a small and unrepresentative sample of outsiders involved in the fur trade, the churches and the police (Vallee 1972:25).

What then finally forced a much greater role for the Arctic than the mythical onto the Canadian government were certain international developments. The American security offensive during the Second World War had a major impact: one estimation is that between 1941 and 1946 the American military population in northern Canada outnumbered Canadian residents three to one. This northern military activity became continuous due to the immediate advent of the Cold War. Military presence and training exercises were sustained at several locations and were extended with weather and radar systems in the 1950s (Abele 1987). “From this suddenly awakened concern stemmed much of the administrative activity and assistance Canadian government have

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directed since 1945 toward the northern territories” (Zaslow 1988:233; cf. Fogelson 1992: ix). Following the pressure from the US and the Canadian governments, which was retained through much of the Cold War, modernization was forced upon the territories rather than implemented in cooperation with their inhabitants (Abele 1987, Zaslow 1988). For example, it was only in 1965 that a first indigenous member in the Northwest Territories Council was installed (after the promotion of another newly elected member): late recognition that the Council did not represent the indigenous sector that comprised close to a majority in the Territories. Not until the summer of 1967, “[a] century after the inauguration of the Dominion of Canada its youngest territorial government was in place and ready to begin developing a distinctive northern jurisdictional persona for the [Northwest Territories] NWT” (Zaslow 1988:366). At that time, however, broader civil rights strife and an increased focus on the areas due to not only security but resource considerations provided possibilities for political leverage both in northern Canada and on the national level, and for the extension of democratic governance. Following the discovery of oil in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, in 1968, and the prospect of increased northern oil and gas development, indigenous groups developed politically in opposition to major land development projects (Abele 1987). The focus was similar to that in current Arctic discourse: on the indigenous linkage to resource utilization. Perhaps most significant was the resistance to an oil pipeline in the Mackenzie Valley, the 1973 court decision on which concluded that comprehensive indigenous land claims were legitimate. Two years later, all northern indigenous organizations had submitted land claims proposals that, among other things, included new models of self-government and rights to land use (Abele 1987). The focus on the indigenous and traditional, given this recency of change, was thus largely brought about by the late development and the frontier conception of the areas through which they had been defined. The recency of democratic governance in northern Canada, on the other hand, is pronounced. THE DIFFERENCES IN INTERNATIONAL AND DOMESTIC DEVELOPMENT OF THE ARCTIC IN CANADA What then largely promoted a foreign policy focus on the Arctic and thus explains the international role Canada has taken with regard to the Arctic, is largely the way the security conflict with the US developed during the Cold War. As late as in the introduction to a 1987 paper, Bankes wrote: This paper might have been subtitled The enemy within,’ for during the last 40 years the greatest practical threat to Canadian aspirations in the Arctic has been posed, curiously enough, by its formidable ally to the

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After the direct security-related conflicts over, for instance, early warning stations during the Second World War and after (Hitchins and Liander 1991:306–307), disputes arose over the journeys of the tanker Manhattan. This tanker travelled through the Northwest Passage first in 1969 and later in 1970, to test whether Alaskan oil could be delivered to the US east coast by this route (Hitchins and Liander 1991). Eyre highlights Maxwell Cohen’s analysis of the impact of the “Manhattan incident” on Canadian public opinion: Manhattan’s two voyages made Canadians feel that they were on the edge of another American ‘steal’ of Canadian resources and ‘rights’ which had to be dealt with at once by firm governmental action. In a sense…the kind of ‘panic’ atmosphere in Canada in 1969 and 1970 on the Arctic question was unfortunate. To a large extent, it was part of the near paranoia that was infecting much of the Canadian view of its continental prospects in Canadian-American relations (Cohen 1971:72, quoted in Eyre 1987:296).9

This perceived threat prompted changes in policy.10 For example, in 1970, Canada enacted the Canadian Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act, a unilateral regime that “governs everything, from penalties for polluters to the actual construction of ships of any nation traversing the international waters of the Canadian Arctic” (Klotz 1972:710).11 It thus authorized detailed regulation of activity in Arctic areas previously regarded as high seas in the name of environmental protection (Klotz 1972). While “[t]he Act was promptly attacked as an unjustified unilateral extension of jurisdiction in violation of international law” (Klotz 1972:710), [Canada] took the position that the usual high seas regime had little meaning in its Arctic Waters, where much of the high seas were permanently covered by ice and inhabited by Eskimos who live their entire lives on the ice without ever touching land (Klotz 1972:711).12

As part of the Law of the Sea negotiations, Canada (and many other countries) in 1977 extended its Exclusive Economic Zone to 200 nautical miles off the coast. Subsequently, Canada successfully negotiated the inclusion in the Law of the Sea Convention (1982) of an article (234) that made special provisions for Arctic shipping. Essentially, these measures supported the Canadian Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention legislation.

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Moreover, in response to the voyage of the US icebreaker Polar Sea through its Arctic waters in 1985, Canada announced the enclosure of its Arctic waters and its desire (or threat by constraint) to have the International Court of Justice decide the issue. As observers viewed it in 1991, “[d]espite the fact that 20 years have now elapsed since the Manhattan voyage, the US and Canada are no closer to resolution of their differences over the issue having formally agreed to disagree in January 1988” (Hitchins and Liander 1991:308).13 During this time, and largely for these reasons, northern security also developed into a prominent theme in research.14 One of the initiators of an Arctic security theme in strategic analysis was Professor Franklyn Griffiths (who would become prominent in the later development of Arctic international organization). First presenting his views in the 1976 edited collection called The Arctic in Question, Griffiths pointed out that “the United States is the principal offender” (Griffiths 1976:141, quoted in Ørvik 1983:117) among the states that may obstruct Canada’s sovereignty in the Arctic; in 1979 he suggested that “the European members of ‘the Arctic Community’” (Ørvik 1983:119, my emphasis) could greatly strengthen Canada’s position versus the United States on issues related to northern policies. These suggestions were also echoed in other work (cf. Ørvik 1983). In 1986, the Special Joint Committee of the Senate and the House of Commons on Canada’s International Relations report Independence and Internationalism then recommended a “northern dimension” for Canadian foreign policy, a suggestion taken up by the government of Canada in December that year. Funded by the Canadian Institute for International Peace and Security, a Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations formed and set itself this task. Showing that gone is not forgotten, the group in its 1988 report mentioned both the Manhattan and Polar Sea incidents, as well as the “special character of ice-covered areas of the oceans” and recommended the establishment of an Arctic Council (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988:42).15 The Arctic Council was thus largely a logical continuation of Canadian foreign policy. The year before the working group report, Oran Young refers to the “northern dimension” policy development in Canada and the increasing incentives for Canada to develop broader “Arctic” cooperation: Canada will experience rising incentives to take the lead in forming a bloc of lesser arctic rim states, not as a clear-cut alternative to its continuing ties to the United States, but as a means of adding a distinctive northern dimension to its foreign policy Given these differences in the emerging arctic interests of the United States and Canada, it seems inevitable that the two countries will experience significant conflicts of interest in the region from time to time (Young 1987, para. 9–10).

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On balance, both the Canadian role in Arctic region-building and the largely security- and sovereignty-based concern and context that in part fuelled that work were thus foreshadowed. As far as a focus on the inhabitants of the Arctic region is concerned, however, there are very few comparisons going beyond generalities in writings of this time. The Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations only noted: Like Canada, the Nordic countries have northern territories with minority peoples; a strong interest in social equality and opportunity, environmental protection, and programs to combat regional disparities; and a commitment to a world made more peaceful through international co-operation…they are arctic neighbours who, like Canada, are not superpowers and who are able to view arctic affairs in a way that emphasizes co-operation rather than confrontation (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations, 1988:48–49).

It may thus seem that international development continuously gained the upper hand over actual area-derived and area-based change. This was true also for domestic politics in Canada. With rather recent and rapid change in northern Canada, Pretes as late as in the end of the 1980s, drawing on Gurston Dacks (1981), went as far as viewing the situations for the northern territories as constitutional political colonialism (the constitutional dependence that the territories have on the federal government), and practical political colonialism (the limited input the territories have in the federal capital Ottawa). The northern territories were thus seen as unable to set their own agendas, despite the fact that local priorities are often seen to differ from those of the federal government (Pretes 1988). The structure for greater self-determination has continued, however. In 1999, the new territory Nunavut with a majority Inuit population was separated from the Northwest Territories (NWT) based on a land claims agreement (so that there now exists three territories; the Yukon, the NWT and Nunavut). Generally seen as a large step forward, the Nunavut agreement gave the territory the right to for instance land title, priority rights to harvest wildlife, and equal membership with government in the new public government institutions to manage lands, waters, offshore and wildlife. The hope is that the agreement will also foster a change in social conditions (Kusugak 2000; Hicks and White 2000). Hicks and White (2000) note, however, that while many parts of Canada developed an early infrastructure through massive federal government spending on railways, canals and other facilities necessary for economic development, governmental funding for Nunavut covers only the costs of government although the territory faces severe problems: relatively low life expectancy, high suicide rates, high population growth, high unemployment rates, and high rates of tuberculosis (ibid., cf. e.g. Stagg 1991, Allen 1991,

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Hazell and Osberg 1991). Economically, Nunavut can best be described as having a “mixed economy,” wherein households combine cash income from a variety of sources (wages, social transfers, arts and crafts production) with for instance hunting, berry picking, fishing and whaling (Hicks and White 2000). As explanatory factors for this situation, Hicks and White note that until as recently as the 1960s, most Nunavut Inuit lived in nomadic multifamily hunting groups, largely depending for food, fuel and shelter on fishing, trapping, and hunting of marine mammals (especially seals), with almost no exposure to mainstream North American society. While state activism in the 1950s and 1960s brought Inuit important entitlements that other Canadians had long taken for granted, such as public health services, schooling and social welfare, these benefits came at enormous social costs due to a quick and externally directed change (Hicks and White 2000). Rather than being a priority region through time, then, the Canadian Arctic gained its importance through outside developments, resulting in externally driven change, and has only recently developed into a political force in itself. This quick transition and the problems resulting from it seem to be what Canadians speak about when referring to “the Arctic” and “the Arctic as a crisis area.”16 Constitutional and political reform in Canada is thus an ongoing issue, and the understanding of “identity,” “ethnicity” and “north” in Canada and in foreign policy efforts along these lines can hardly be seen outside of the context of the need for a unifying force in Canada, or of its particular political organization.17 GENERALIZED ARCTIC DESCRIPTION This historically developed discourse and context of the Arctic in Canada has, however, largely been generalized beyond the state, as Canadian discourse has generally treated this area, and the northern more broadly, as something determinable by the nature of its “northerness,” rather than restricted to and resultant of Canadian development and organization. The view of the Arctic in Canada has thereby become detached from its cultural, social and economic context, and treated as an inherent characteristic of latitude. There are thus certain ways in which the Canadian context has been described as typical of “the Arctic.” One of the most influential examples of this originates from “the Canadian geographer, Louis-Edmond Hamelin [who] pointed out the necessity of creating a concrete and universally acceptable definition of the Canadian North and a language with which to discuss it“(Graham 1990:24). This approach was built upon a tradition of mapping “the north” in factorized terms.18 Graham writes: Hamelin worked almost exclusively with Canadian data, but felt strongly that any index should be applicable to any circumpolar location. He saw

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In Hamelin’s model, this “North” would be described as a system of delimitable zones of differing “nordicity” that integrated socioeconomic and environmental factors: latitude, summer heat, annual cold, types of ice, total precipitation, natural vegetation cover, accessibility by means other than air, air service, population, and degree of economic activity (Hamelin 1979:15, 17–18; cf. Graham 1990:25). This “nordicity” Hamelin defined as “a state or level of ‘northness,’19 real or perceived” (Hamelin 1988:41, quoted in Graham 1990:24; my emphasis). The definition thus aimed to capture an essence of general northerness, without making a distinction between imagined and real effects (“real or perceived”) nor including the socio-cultural framework that had served to form this “northerness” in the first place. This approach whereby the Arctic is described in essential rather than relative terms has been criticized: [Hamelin’s] approach of stipulating a particular cut-off point in terms of a reading of his index as the boundary of the North is arbitrary because a given location may be quite northern in some respects, such as vegetation, but less northern in others, such as social structure…[rather, the] dominant political fact in the North is its territorial status (Dacks 1981:5; cf. Coates 1994, Lyck 1996).

The tendency of thinking in terms of “northerness” and zonation persists, however. For example a recent Statistics Canada working paper (McNiven and Puderer 2000:10) argues for a combination of 16 criteria which “reflects the combined social, biotic, economic and climatic aspects” of the northern. Such a view, of course, directly promotes a view of “northerness” and those living in these desolate areas as inherently different. This is seen in Arctic research in Canada. In 1988, the Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations wrote: “Most scientific work in the North is southern-based, and despite well-meaning attempts in recent years to give some of it a northern orientation, a gulf remains between northern residents and their representative institutions, on the one hand, and the work of most northern scientists, on the other” (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988:15; cf. also Coates 1994:20, Vallee 1972:25; Feit 1994). Similarly, from a not uncommon northern Canadian standpoint, Flaherty has observed: As students of northern studies, you will be familiar with the practice where southerners come north, do their field research over a number of months, usually the summer, get to know people in the community, get local help, then go south to write and publish their findings, they are acknowledged as

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the ‘experts,’ more so if they have included Inuit in the data collection and can cite them in their research. The researchers are the ones policy-makers listen to when making decisions about design, delivery or funding programs for Inuit (Flaherty 1995:184–185).20

This reflects the limited basis of description in who is speaking behind “the Arctic” label. Nevertheless, Canadian discourse has been a major factor in shaping international Arctic research, also beyond Hamelin’s concept of “northerness.” A survey of the total of 1231 papers in the first 40 years of the leading multidisciplinary journal Arctic21 (up to 1987) showed that most of the papers were written by Canadian and American authors. Research was found to involve three major areas: biological sciences, earth sciences and social sciences, with subjects continuously and increasingly sited in the Canadian Arctic (growing from 23 percent to 42 percent of the total papers per volume) (Harrison and Hodgson 1987:321). The research was, however, mainly undertaken by people who did not permanently live in the northern areas, and dealt with what Harrison and Hodgson (1987:330) describe as “southern interests” of non-renewable resources, militarism and sovereignty. The indigenous peoples, a large proportion of the population in Arctic North America, were thus marginalized in determining these descriptions: Only nine items in the last ten years related directly to indigenous northern cultural, political or social topics It is equally clear that virtually all the research work conducted in the North was done by southerners… The number of northern native authors in Arctic seems to have been only one, Elmer Ghostkeeper, in 1987 (Harrison and Hodgson 1987:330, my emphasis).

The Canadian Arctic can thus be seen as discussed in a way that simply identifies it as “Arctic” and its conditions as generally “Arctic”; something Fienup-Riordan in 1995 also noted with respect to representations in Arctic films.22 Inside Canada, the distinctness of this “north” was also captured in a subject called “Northern Studies.” It had been initiated as a distinct study area at some of Canada’s universities in the early 1960s and later expanded into a field of study in its own right (Graham 1997:509). However, as Graham notes (and as has been noted with respect to development in the University of the Arctic), “Northern Studies are less intended to prepare people for work in the North and more to explain the region’s importance to all Canadians” (Graham 1997:519). More than being a tradition of regionally based education in the Canadian north, then, “northern studies” had a history as a field defining and explaining “the north” as an entity to outsiders; in this respect, it was somewhat similar to Arctic studies as a field defining and describing the Arctic environment and traditional peoples to outsiders as inherently different. Rather than becoming naturalized as a region, “the Arctic” retained its

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greatest importance as a myth and was represented mainly through outside descriptions. That this was a result of historical and policy-related development, however, indicates that any “intrinsic” characteristics of “northerness” or “the Arctic” that reach beyond climate and other environmental-physical factors are not essential, but relative, consequences of policy (or lack of policy) and unequal resource distribution. These representations have in fact allowed for the maintenance and specificity of current and generalized Canadian conceptions of “the north.” They constitute what may be seen as description of the Arctic through a predication on distance: a distance that is seen among describers as social, economic, cultural, ethnic, and geographical. THE ARCTIC IN GREENLAND, ALASKA AND RUSSIA: PARTIAL COHERENCE WITH CANADIAN DISCOURSE Given both the way in which Canadian discourse has been generalized and the way in which similarities exist in area development between some regions, some of the elements of a predication on distance have not been limited to Canada. A framing of the Arctic through a predication on distance can be seen in areas where an Arctic discourse and frontier concepts, as described previously, have been applied and come to impact area discourse and policy development, and where the changes from low integration and largely distinct societies have been recent. For example, Stenbaek describes how in the last 40 years, the Arctic regions of Alaska, northern Canada and Greenland have experienced enormous changes, e.g., from a subsistence hunting economy to a mixed economy, into more centralised settlements and under larger hierarchies of government (Stenbaek 1987). The largely climatically arctic and to different degrees Inuit-inhabited areas of Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland and northern Russia are also those which have in ICC cooperation been described as characteristic of “the Arctic.” One can here assume that the conceptions that were pinned on the Inuit (Eskimos) throughout exploration have continued to impact the way these groups and their areas were understood. The main features of a description of the Arctic predicated on distance can, however be seen as related to the understanding of the Arctic as a frontier and to specific historical development. Below, the relations in Greenland, Alaska and northern Russia will be described, briefly, with attention to similarities in development and Arctic discourse with relevance for any domestic or international role “the Arctic” has been placed in for the states. (As these accounts are necessarily brief, references to more extensive treatments are provided throughout.) Of these areas, Greenland may, in its relation to Denmark, exhibit features most similar to those in the north-south conflict in Canada; Greenland was also the area that the Special Joint Committee on Canada’s International Relations in 1986 recommended that Canada give special attention to developing co-operative arrangements with (Young 1987, para. 9–10).

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Besides the originally uninhabited island Svalbard (Spitzbergen), Greenland is also the only Nordic area that is generally seen as Arctic from a climatic and historical perspective, and it has in this respect contributed to some of the Nordic conceptions of the Arctic. “It has been pointed out that when the Danes talk about the Arctic they basically refer to Greenland” (Østreng 1999b: 235). Up until 1953 a closed colony entry to which required permission from the Danish government, Greenland has also undergone rapid modernization similar to that in Canada. Physically located as a climatically Arctic island far away from and with different conditions to Denmark, Greenland also has much in common with northern Canada through institutional cooperation in the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC) in, among other areas, resource use. Whaling and sealing are here practices of large traditional importance, and about 80 percent of the population are Inuit (Johansen 1997a).23 As in northern Canada there has also been a long and recent period of constitutional de-statusing vis-à-vis capital areas. Social problems have resulted from recent rapid changes on several levels. After Denmark ended Greenland’s status as a closed colony following the UN Declaration on Decolonization in 1953, the rapid influx of Danish staff in administration and education, attracted by economic, housing, and social privileges for those of Danish origin, resulted in discrimination against the Inuit population (Petersen 1995).24 Many problems similar to those in northern Canada, including high suicide rates, affect the population, and the population has also largely found itself described from a perspective from the outside. However, central Denmark, under which Greenland now holds a Home Rule government, lacks a discourse on “the Arctic” that is as vivid in the imagery of the state as the Arctic is for Canada. The Arctic focus for Denmark has therefore not influenced Danish national identity in any degree comparable to in Canada, and Greenland has not been attributed any state-building role or provided with resources that could have supported a Greenlandic political development in a state context comparable to that in the Canadian Arctic (cf. Stenbaek 1987). The range of issues and definition of Arctic discourse are, however, similar to those in Canada, and have possibly even been exacerbated by this lesser policy focus. For Russia and Alaska, the elements of this kind of predication on social, economic, ethnical, geographical and cultural distance are somewhat more limited (especially in national definition, as the two Cold War superpowers did not, unlike Canada, need to search for specific elements to define their foreign policy). Parts of a predication on distance, related to a frontierdevelopment over vast or remote areas, have nevertheless resulted in descriptions that have preserved problematic conceptions to this day. In comparison with the Canadian characteristics discussed, both differences and similarities are observable, and merit more detailed description. For Alaska, despite having some features similar to those of the Canadian north (Stenbaek 1987, above), the single state firstly holds a (significantly)

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lesser role for US foreign policy than the vast north does for Canadian foreign policy and identity-building. “It is just that the ‘south 48’ does not either think north or look north. We began thinking west and never got over it” (Stone 1976:32, emphasis original). Secondly, Alaska also has a constitutionally integrated status in the US. Stenbaek notes that while Canadian territories have long struggled for provincehood and Greenland changed its relationship to Denmark in 1953, Alaska assumed full state rights in 1959 in spite of its demographic differences (Stenbaek 1987). It also has what McBeath and Morehouse calls a “model constitution.” “The fundamental weakness in Alaska’s governmental system results not from institutional flaws, but from the state’s economic and social marginality and its comparative economic and social disadvantages as a non-contiguous state on the continent’s northern periphery” (McBeath and Morehouse 1994:313).25 Entangled with this economic problem are, however, problems of relatively late settlement, low integration and small population. In 1989, the US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences estimated the transition rates as especially high: that some 50 percent of Anchorage’s mainly non-indigenous population is replaced every five years by newcomers, both indigenous and non-indigenous (US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences 1989:51). The most stable components of the economy have been the highly seasonal, largely transitional workforce in commercial fishing and federal government (McBeath and Morehouse 1994). Alaska only has a total population of about 550 000 people, of whom 15 percent are indigenous (mainly Aleut, Inuit or Indian) and a majority live in rural areas—resulting in rural-urban divisions that are often seen as indigenous-nonindigenous divisions but are also reinforced in the administration (of, amongst other things, indigenous landclaims settlement funds) (AMAP 1997; McBeath and Morehouse 1994).26 At the same time, economic development in Alaska is impeded by the view of the state not only as a site of rich natural resources but as “wilderness” and associated interests—a focus that is closely associated with not only arctic natural resources and the environment but “Arctic” imagery historical and present (McBeath and Morehouse 1994) and works to obscure elements that do not fit into the environmental, indigenous, and traditional foci. Miller notes that by the early 1970s, through every channel of communication, more insistently than ever, the promotional and ceremonial phrases were repeated—Alaska, the Great Land, the last frontier…Yet Alaskans were more than ever concentrated in or near a few cities; the six largest of these clusters accounted for more than two-thirds of the state’s population…Even the Alaska Natives had become more urban, at least in the sense that almost half of them lived in or within reach of a dozen larger villages or towns, some of the communities supported by the fishing industry, but all of them centers for schools, medical services, and welfare payments (Mi1ler 1975:223).

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Russian discussions of “northerness,” then, also exhibit many of the features of Canadian Arctic discourse, such as the romanticization into frontier characteristics, and low political and economic integration. The Russian north is also of particular importance in discussions on the Arctic, as Russia occupies roughly half of the Arctic coastline. The differences across the Russian north are however pronounced in comparison to Canada; for example, Russia’s territories included into the Extreme North area in geographical terms stretch “latitude-wise from 82‘ (Rudolf Island) to 44’ (the South Kurile Islands), so the term ‘the economy of Russia’s North’ is somewhat blurred” (Izryadnova and Radygin 1999, para. 4). Accordingly, there are large differences within these areas: for example, while there exist traditional subsistence-based indigenous populations in some of the areas in the Russian north, the largest settlement centers anywhere in the AMAP-delineated Arctic are on the Kola Peninsula (Baerenholdt 1994, Slezkine 1994).27 There are also large differences compared to other states, especially in the current transition from a planned economy, which in the Arctic eight-state context is particular to the former USSR, and has hit the Russian north especially hard (Vartanov et al. 1999:81). This development has excerbated earlier problems28: due to institutional transformations, inflation and state withdrawal from earlier public fields, production assets in the oil and gas industry were not renewed and social privileges in Northern and Far Eastern regions largely lost their significance. This was especially important as the areas have traditionally been dependent on relatively few sources of income.29 Consequently, the basis to diversify from has been rather limited, and large out-migration has taken place (Vartanov et al. 1999). Despite these differences and qualifications, however, the natural point of comparison for Russia in Arctic literature has been Canada.30 With regard to Arctic discourse, a particular focus on problems can be observed. “We think that the problems of the Russian North are especially close to the problems of Canada and Alaska” (Koptyug 1995:40, my emphasis).31 Thus, in 1992, Roginko asks and explains to his readers: The question might arise as to whether we really need to preserve that untouched Northern environment and those Northern natives’ traditional life-styles?…No matter how paradoxical it might sound, the preservation of the Arctic environment and of the traditional life-styles of tundra natives, and their ancient culture is an essential prerequisite for the successful industrial development of the vast Northern territories. Without careful and thoughtful study and the use of centuries-long aboriginal expertise we will not be able to rationally exploit the natural resources of the Arctic, and to establish a sound food basis for its development (Roginko 1992:148, my emphasis).

This focus on the pristine and the objectification of those living there (“whether we really need to preserve”), the “traditional” and “ancient” as

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support for environmental protection (for instance, rather than in other conceptualisations or the other way around), and non-discussion of foci other than the ethnographic can all be seen as related to “Arctic” frontier discourse (cf. Wiget and Balalaeva 1998, Slezkine 1994)32; this is a common problem in the four states. Comparing the Canadian and the Russian north with regard to the situation of indigenous people, however, one notable factor is that the native northerners in Russia, made central to Arctic discourse on the areas, cannot be described by the north-south, indigenousnonindingeous framing typical to Canadian (or “New World”) frontier descriptions. This is a problem Canadian conceptualizations encounter and one, as will be seen, that is even greater in the Nordic context. Canadian researchers seeking to frame Russian “northerness” in ethnic terms express their confusion over Russian situations: There is generally no question that Indians and Inuit were in Canada prior to European contact or settlement and are therefore aboriginal, or the earliest-known inhabitants. In Russia the north and far east were occupied by northern peoples prior to the arrival of Russians, but the latter are ‘aboriginal’ in other parts of the former USSR in so far as their ancestors were the ‘traditional’ or earliest known occupants of large areas of Russia. While northern peoples might attempt to exclude certain settlers or the grounds that they are aboriginal, Russians in Moscow or Ukrainians in Kiev might be able to exclude northerners and others on similar grounds. This use of the concept of aboriginal rights does not exist for the Frenchand English-speaking majorities in Canada, although one can see its shadow in the concept of ‘Founding Nations’ (Bertels and Bertels 1995:97, my emphasis).

The underlying reasoning here, in its focus on earliest-known occupants, indicates the degree to which current Arctic discourse or “northerness” in such an Arctic-related understanding derive from frontier mythology. In Russia, where developments have taken place over a much longer time and without a clear separation in continent of origin, the characterization is difficult to apply directly, even if some sources see Russia as a frontier-developed country (US Library of Congress 2002).33 The difference in social situations between Russia and Canada is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that northern indigenous groups in Russia, unlike in Canada, constitute only a tiny fraction of the population: in 1989 about 185 000 out of a total of almost ten million in the areas (Batyanova et al. 1999:11–12). Even a brief survey of the most comparable states in the Arctic context thus shows that the perceptions and problems described in Canadian and generalized Arctic discourse are largely associated with the specific context of Canadian development and history, geography, recency of development, and foreign policy requirements, all of which have been influenced by the view of the Arctic as a frontier. The view of the Arctic as a frontier and

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organization on this basis is, however, less prominent nationally in these three states. They also differ from Canada in the degree to which environmental, indigenous, and traditional foci can be seen as dominant concerns or work to distinguish a “north” or an “Arctic” from the rest of the state. THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CANADA AND THE NORDIC STATES But if situations differ across the areas which also prior to current regionbuilding have been seen as “Arctic,” the difference between Canada and the Nordic countries, whose northern mainlands were earlier not conceived of primarily as “Arctic,” is much more striking. In the Nordic countries, the dynamics of large-scale recent immigration into indigenous lands seen as wilderness, which is characteristic of the frontier development (resulting in strongly disparate power basis, a clear-cut differentiation between “indigenous” and “immigrants,” and low mutual integration), do not exist on a scale comparable to that seen in the areas treated above, or typically Canada. The salient differences lie in both a discourse on “the north” and the dynamics in the areas. To start with, in the Nordic countries, a discourse on “the north” of relevance to international cooperation does not refer to the northern areas of the mainlands but to Nordic inter-state cooperation. This is unconnected to “the Arctic” as a concept, which has been used to refer mainly to areas located north of the state mainlands. None of the countries34 here are in the habit of viewing their northern mainlands as “Arctic.”35 In the Nordic context, “the Arctic” has thus not been discussed with any prominence, and “northerness” on an international level has been seen as based in the concept of the Nordic, Norden (cf. Jukarainen 1998).36 Ole Waever states: the term Norden is preferred because Scandinavia tend to exclude Finland and Denmark, while Northern Europe tends to include parts of Germany, the Soviet Union, Poland, Scotland, and other areas. Traditionally, the Nordic countries have formed a closer-knit community than this wider group. Norden is probably best defined as the members of the Nordic Council— Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden (Waever 1992:78).37

This Nordic cooperation was to large extent a by-product of the Cold War: five small-states uniting against the influence of US-USSR conflict (Simoulin Lereps 2000:7).38 Aside from any focus on identity, unifying language and similar social systems, what prompted the establishment of present Nordic cooperation was the need to ally against East-West pressures in the Cold War. It is thus the administrative delineation of the Nordic Council and thereby in that the Nordic that provides the basis of international discourse for the areas: not any essential understanding of the “northern” (Simoulin Lereps

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2000:7–9).39 “Northerness” here is also a discourse rather different from the Arctic one. Rather than placing a focus on tradition, “Norden has regularly been depicted as a particularly modern configuration” (Joenniemi 2000:1, my emphasis; cf. Neumann 1999).40 The situations in the northern parts of the Nordic countries also differ strongly from the Canadian Arctic experience. Warmed by the North Atlantic Drift, the climate in the mainland areas is much less severe than in North America (or areas not warmed by sea currents) and subarctic at most, as has been noted earlier. Part of the “Old World,” rather than the frontier-developed “New World,” co-habitation and intermarriages between different groups have been taking place during the last thousand years, yielding a cultural and ethnic blending where only a few percent of the population define themselves as indigenous and where groups which are distinctly local or place-oriented may emerge (in Iceland, as well, the only identifiable “people” are Icelanders) (cf. Eriksson 1997a; AMAP 1997, 199841). The northern areas also have proportional representation in the parliament, equal to all other areas of the countries (different from a Canadian situation of constitutional de-statusing), and social situations are roughly comparable in northern and southern parts of the countries. Northern and southern areas of the states have similar conditions, for instance, in terms of access to housing, which is privately owned or rented (as also AMAP 1998 notes). The northern areas of the states are also not characterized by a high birth rate (as in some Arctic areas) but in fact, as elsewhere in the countries, by an aging population. About similar numbers as elsewhere in the Nordic mainlands are also active on the labor market (as opposed to a focus on subsistence) but are impacted by a lack of jobs; large parts of the indigenous as well as the nonindigenous populations have to move south for work (Nordiska Ministerrådet Regionalpolitiska Basprojektet 1989, 1987; Allen 1989).42 There are also prominent examples of discourses that do not center on “northerness” or the concept of “north” in describing these areas, but on their low population and associated problems. There are notable differences between Arctic discourse and the complex of problems identified and targeted through concepts such as glesbygd: The lack of employment opportunities, the decline in population, the unbeneficiary age distribution [with a large part of populations in high ages], long distances to population centers, diminishing societal service etc are some of the problems that are often included in the concept ‘glesbygd’ [appr. ‘low populated area’]. The Torne Valley [the border area of Sweden and Finland, in the north of these countries] fill all these criteria (Muotka 1978:20, my translation).43

The large problems thus lie in the smaller economies and labor market. The way in which northern areas of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland (which also has less of a north-south delineation) are peripheral is to a large extent

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economic, given the relatively long transport distances, smallness of populations (and, hence, markets), and related lack of work opportunities. For example, in 1982, Groth and Lassinantti argued that regional policy had yielded positive results, but “not sufficed to solve problems of providing occupation nor secured the future of the North Calotte,” i.e. northern Norway, Sweden and Finland, established under this name in Nordic Council regional cooperation (Groth and Lassinantti 1982:144, my translation; cf. Armstrong et al. 1978:216–218).44 Similarly, Iceland and the Faeroes45 are in a special situation, as they cannot be described through indigenous-nonindigenous, northern-southern dimensions and have long been inhabited; thus, very little current “Arctic’-oriented cooperation literature takes up their situations. Iceland, with its population of only some 300,000 people (six times more than that of northern Canada, however), is also more of a state marginalized as a whole in global or hemispherical terms.46 REACTIONS TO ARCTIC DISCOURSE IN THE NORDIC COUNTRIES These differences between northern European/Nordic and predominant “Arctic” descriptions have naturally been reflected in “Arctic”-label work. Despite having a region-building focus, work that attempts to describe parts of “the Arctic” systematically acknowledge these large differences between especially North American and Nordic histories, political, geographical and cultural contexts. In particular, the different situations of the northern European areas are regularly stated in contrast to the assumed Canadian framing of an Arctic in crisis. Accordingly, in their early “Arctic”-directed work taking up eight states in relation to the Arctic Circle, Armstrong et al. write: “One must remember that a problem area in sophisticated and technologically advanced Scandinavia is not so severe when seen in a wider context” (Armstrong et al 1978:222, my emphasis). These authors also see Iceland as an “Arctic” state more on account of its relations with other northern lands than for its own attributes: wholly south of the Arctic Circle, warm due to the North Atlantic Drift, and with a “long tradition of stable government” (ibid: 230, my emphasis); Iceland in 1974 celebrated the eleven hundredth year of its settlement (Wonders 1976:6). Similarly, Niemi speaks of northern Norway in a statement countering against any assumption of traditionality: “First, the whole of Finnmark [the northernmost county of Norway] is highly developed and modernized, not lagging behind the rest of the country in this respect” (Niemi 1997:79, my emphasis).47 The question of ethnicity is similarly discussed with reference to North America, and centers on the contrast between Nordic and North American developments.48 Armstrong et al. write: “In North America, the ‘native people’s question’ has become probably the most important single issue” (Armstrong et al. 1978:271), and contrast:

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Negotiating the Arctic In northern Scandinavia, the Saami have long been a small minority. There the distinction between aboriginals and immigrants becomes somewhat hazy, for some of the latter have been there a thousand years Most Lapps [Saami] gain their livelihood in just the same way as most immigrants and the factors that are common to the two groups greatly exceed in importance the factors that distinguish them (ibid: 273, my emphasis; compare Niemi 1997:79).

Similarly, Kvist notes: Making comparisons with North American native policy, it is important to note that no initial contact date can be established for the meeting of Saami and Scandinavians. In fact, the ancestors of both the Saami and the Scandinavians co-existed for thousands of years, and Saami and Scandinavian ethnogenesis took place in a situation of mutual cultural and genetic exchange These factors also explain the Saami involvement in agricultural colonization and the rather easy assimilation of the Saami into the majority culture (Kvist 1995:20–21, my emphasis).

But while Kvist further notes that developments in Europe in the early 1900s (with the rise in a malignant nationalism generally in Europe) led to situations “fully comparable with current North American practices” (ibid.), Sillanpää observes: In the course of interviewing numerous public officials and Sami representatives in Finland, Sweden and Norway over the past year, this writer has noted that some Nordic citizens feel sensitive that one would want to compare Canadian Indians with their Sami. They point out that the Sami do not live on reservations and that Sami reindeer breeders can practice their livelihood over a wide area and even cross international borders. They also emphasize that the Sami are entitled to the same services in education and health as other citizens and that these are among the best in the world. There is no jurisdictional dispute in the Nordic countries between the two levels of governments as there has been in Canada over, for example, the delivery of schooling to Indians (a federal responsibility) while education is otherwise, under the Canadian constitution, a provincial responsibility. Also, while recognizing the validity of the term colonization as applicable to the settlement of the Sami homeland areas by non-Sami, Nordic specialists emphasize that this colonization differs greatly from the North American experience. There has been co-existence for hundreds if not thousands of years. Archaeological evidence, for example, shows that the Vikings have sailed along the northern coast of Norway to Murmansk for more than one thousand years and have shared the coast with Sami fishermen (Sillanpää 1991:148).

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On balance, these quotations then serve to exemplify how a clear indigenous delineation of northern European habitation, similar to that found in North America, is resisted.49 In some work, the differences are also stated explicitly in relation to Canada, as if its situation is otherwise the one default (showing the domination of the Canadian context to Arctic discourse, as well as its contestation). Writing in 2000, Brantenberg states that “Canadians only began to spend on major material change—housing, public services, community facilities, schools—in the 1950s and 1960s” (Brantenberg 2000:209). He continues, rather pointedly: One may hope that just as the late 19th century cities of the Nordic countries could be social hell-holes a generation or two before they became admired around the world for their order and well-being, so may another generation or two in time bring more positive outcomes in Nunavut, Greenland, and elsewhere. Sami have lived in close contact with Norwegians, Swedes, Finns, and Russians for a very long time. Much cultural exchange was inevitable (ibid: 210, my emphasis).

His explanation of differences between North America and northern Europe, beyond the historical and time component, center on a system different from what one might expect from a Canadian background and related to the social democratic concept connoted by “Nordic”: In general, social and political theory of the types familiar in Northern as well as the rest of Scandinavia, and in Europe as a whole, have had little impact in Nunavut In Northern Canada, as in the rest of North America and the English-speaking world, indigenous politics and grievances focus on law and legal rights, whereas it may be natural in Nordic countries to think of reform in terms of social theory and applied social science (ibid: 210).

Another factor that has been mentioned in the literature to explain the differences is geographic scale. The view of territory as well as the divisibility of available territory differs considerably between North America and northern Europe: the spatial history of Finnmark [the northernmost county in northern Norway] has other factors at play that does, for example, Canada. In addition, the restricted size of the territory in question creates problems for any model of rights distribution and management. With its 48 000 square km, Finnmark is tiny compared to other areas in which land tenure issues are in question today, as in Canada and Australia. In Finnmark there is no longer space for expansion. There is no frontier left (Niemi 1997:79, my emphasis).

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It is, however, also contested whether this “frontier mentality,” so prominent in North America, ever existed in a comparable form in Europe. CRITIQUE OF APPLICATIONS OF THE “FRONTIER” CONCEPT TO NORTHERN EUROPE One prominent example of the attempted import—and subsequent refusal of—the concept of the frontier to the Nordic countries is seen in discussions sparked by Brox’s application of it. Social scientist Ottar Brox emphasized North Norway’s role as the frontier of the north in, for instance, the book Nord-Norge fra allmenning til koloni (North Norway from common property to colony; cf. Brox 1984). Drawing upon Turner’s concept of the frontier, Brox argued that North Norway in 1800–1950 was the frontier of Scandinavia, where outsiders moved to utilize available resources but where local people chose to retain a subsistence-based economy, for example, fishing (Brox 1984), giving rise to a strong differentiation between groups engaged in subsistence and in industrial work. Many of Brox’s assertions have since been refuted. In a well-known debate with Brox, Einar-Arne Drivenes (cf. Drivenes 1985) claimed that capitalist business initiatives were able to compete with the subsistence sector for the workforce. Subsequently, Drivenes, Astri Fremmerlid, Steinar Ellingsen and Wenche Spjelkavik have shown that the workforce in important industrial centers in northern Norway at the time largely came from fishing and farming backgrounds and surrounding areas rather than from farther away (Vea 2000:239). Aas sums up the discussion: much of migration was inside north Norway; there were people leaving the region; and it is difficult to say for certain that the first emigrants from North Norway were those who had recently moved to the area (Aas 1998). Aas concludes that Brox’ theories about North Norway being a frontier are oversimplified, badly placed chronologically, and overgeneralized…. Not all areas with a positive net migration can be considered frontiers…the concept of North Norway as a frontier for migrants is a myth and not a documented, proven reality between 1800 and 1950 (Aas 1998:40; cf. Thorvaldsen 1996).

The discussion of Brox’s work can be seen as a discussion and refusal of the applicability of the concept of the frontier to northern Norway in the time period 1800–1950, as well as a discussion of the spread and importance of subsistence activity in northern Norway during the period. It can thereby be seen as a discussion of the relative importance of “traditional” and “modern” occupations at that time. This is largely reminiscent of the way “traditional” and “modern” are currently discussed for the Canadian Arctic, for which the time frame of settlement in some instances is as late as in the 1950s.

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To compare, while there is broad agreement that northern parts of Scandinavia earlier were subservient to rather than integrated in the states of that time, just as earlier all of Canada and the US were colonies, what clearly differs is the timeline, the validity of a frontier concept, and, accordingly, the accuracy of contemporarily comparing the compressed history of Canada and its current situations with northern Europe. “Government and parliament in 1848 stated that Finnmark had earlier been a colony” (Pedersen 1999:37, my translation and emphasis).50 Similarly, “[t]hrough the peace in Knäred [1613] one may judge that Norrbotten definitively became a part of Sweden” (Lundmark 1971:25, my translation).51 Additionally, one may note that the view of land use implied in the frontier concept also differs considerably between northern Europe and North America. As Saarinen notes using a Finnish example, wilderness (“erämaa”) in Finland has historically received its meaning not through its lack of human habitation and culture, but through the existence of human habitation in the form of hunting and fishing cultures. “In this sense, the Anglo-American wilderness concept has emerged more or less by conquering the wilderness— as an opposite to culture, while the traditional Finnish ‘erämaa’ has been defined by living in and with it” (Saarinen 1998:30, cf. Saarinen 2002). Rather than a place beyond human action and culture, then, wilderness has been defined not through separation or difference but as a place of living in, not far from. There has been no clear frontier. THE CONFLICTS IN IDENTITY POLITICIZATION An additional example of the impact the import of Arctic discourse concepts may have on northern European situations can then be seen in a study of how conflict is played out for the categorizations used in Arctic discourse in local communities in northern Norway, Sweden and Finland. As has been illustrated, issues of indigenousness are often less pronounced in a Nordic context than in a North American one: the dynamics of largescale southern migration into indigenous lands in modern times are not present in these areas the way one would expect from a frontier-related understanding. Rather, in northern Norway, Sweden and Finland, the population is resident with only low migration from the region. In general terms, many have both blended blood and blended allegiances to the state or other ethnic groupings and may not see themselves as simply either Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish, Saami or Kven / Torne Valley Finnish (the main identities in question). They may even derive their identity from place in a local sense. Many Saami also live in the national centers, and the vast majority are active in non-traditional (in a North American sense of indigenousness) occupations. What constitutes a “group” is thus far from clear, for group changes and assimilations into farmers or reindeer herders took place both ways among Saami, Norwegians/ Swedes/Finns and Kvens or Torne Valley Finns (the latter when groups immigrated from what is currently Finland into what is now Norway and

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Sweden before the national borders were established in the region). Differentiations thus exist both between and within the broad categorizations, on the levels of ethnicity/nationality, occupations, and practices.52 It is also difficult to say to what degree and in relation to what any commonalities can be described: while “there was undoubtedly a contiguous pattern of small Sami communities and polities which existed as coherent entities before the establishment of separate states and citizenships,” “it is questionable whether the Sami have always shared a sense of being a single people” (Eriksson 1997b: 81, emhasis in original).53 For example, in preparation for the opening of the state consultative body the Saami Parliament, to which Saami are able to elect representatives, Nora Wasara Larsson received calls on the Swedish Saami Parliament’s special phone line. She describes in the paper “Samefolket” (“The Saami People”) that most have asked: May I vote in the Saami Parliament election? And then they have told of their Saami background. But there are also many nonSaami who have phoned and want to join in and vote to support the Saami. One said: If they’re going to drag waste and crap up into the mountains I also want to be Saami and fight environmental pollution (Andersson 1993:11, quoted in Olofsson 1995:21, my translation).54

Like the ethnic delineation of groups, then, occupational distinctions to separate “indigenous” and “nonindigenous” can also not be made in a clearcut sense.” ‘Traditional Sami livelihoods,’ particularly hunting and fishing, are clearly a part of Finnish national identity” (Tuulentie 1999:108). While reindeer husbandry is often considered a distinct Sami livelihood, in Finland it is a right of all who live in the reindeer herding areas in northern Finland (cf. Sillanpää 1994:77–80). Similarly have some Saami organizations in Sweden and Norway, where reindeer herding is a Saami privilege, questioned the state supported advantages enjoyed by law by the reindeer herding Saami associations SSR and NRL, respectively, and the appropriateness of reindeer husbandry as the dominant symbol of Sami culture. For example, [f]or many coastal Sami the equation of reindeerbreeding with Sami culture formed a dilemma concerning their own identity. They did not want to be considered as an indigenous people belonging to the Fourth World. They left the NSR and founded their own organization (SLF), stating that they were Norwegian citizens acknowledging Norwegian laws (Zorgdrager 1999:195–196).

Claiming to represent the non-reindeer-breeding majority, they pointed out that other forms of livelihood “(modern market economy in the Norwegian welfare state) as important for the majority of the Sami” (Zorgdrager 1999:196). On this basis, the rather recent “Sami Movement’s construction of a

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Sami identity for ethnopolitical purposes has been highly debated and even caused conflict among former friends and families as well as occupational groups, regions and generations” (Stordahl 1997:146). Rifts caused by definition can be traced in local identities. “I am irritated that when my mother is Finnish and my father Saami and his father Norwegian, why should Saami win over the others?”55 Kramvig (1999:117, my translation) quotes an interview in Finnmarkssendningen 25.8.1997 radio in Finnmark, the northernmost county of Norway. Similarly, an older person observed: “Earlier we were Finns [an older word for Saami in the Norwegian area] and mountain Finns out here, but now it has become wrong to say ‘mountain Finn.’ Now it should be Saami and Norwegians, Saami and river Saami” (ibid: 127, my translation).56 In her analysis of this situation, Kramvig thus emphasizes: “it is not the categories in themselves which impose a violence, but the abstraction that takes place in the categorizations, which are not felt to include peoples’ specific experiences” (Kramvig 1999:137, my translation).57 Similarly, “[t]hat which creates dilemmas for people in the present debate over the right to land and water is that there does not exist a public cultural category which relates to these experiences in the political situation today” (Kramvig 1999:119, my translation).58 She notes that to avoid this (and rather than calling oneself a northerner, “nordlending”), regionality is used: “finn-marking”—a category that is not specifically Norwegian, Saami or Kven, but can be understood as a third alternative based on place (ibid.). The Saami debate, then, is also not the only ongoing debate that deals with ethnicity, origin and group belonging in the areas. Similarly, the Kven debate, dealing with a Finnish-related culture outside Finland, is full of controversial and conflicting arguments about language, culture, history and roots.59 Responses to this movement have, as for Saami movements, been refractory: It is not uncommon to hear opinions like ‘the organization is all right, but personally I am not interested in it.’ Some people are sceptical about or directly reject these political ideas, saying they can’t identify with this ideology: ‘I don’t understand what they are telling us. I am not more oppressed than any other Norwegian because of my ancestry’... In reality there are diverse interpretations of how to be a ‘real’ Kven or a ‘real’ Finn, Norwegian or Saami for that matter (Anttonen 1998:52).

As Anttonen sees it, some of these discussions can be seen as responses to the fact that a general “aboriginalization” is taking place; whereas it was earlier discussed whether the Sami were a national or ethnic minority, they are now undoubtedly considered an indigenous minority (Anttonen 1998:50). “We see a gradual shift from an ethnic identity based on Sami culture defined as a reindeerbreeding culture to a Sami culture where the position of language is of essential significance and finally to an ethnic identity where, in all three

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countries, Sami descent becomes the most important element” (Zorgdrager 1999:203). Similarly, the arguments for Kvens eventually being seen as indigenous have led to increasing tensions between the Sami and Kven organizations in recent years (Anttonen 1998:50). The difficulties and fractures in ethnic identity in these areas are thus significant. Hovland exemplifies these tensions with reference to the Kåfjord commune in northern Norway, where the majority of the 2700 residents can, if they wish, trace significant parts of their ancestry back to Saami-speaking origins. However, in the 1990s, only a small minority of the population spoke Saami languages, and, among these, primarily older people. Preceding the election to the Saami Parliament in 1997, 350 of the 2700 people in the commune were registered as Saami in the voting registry. With Saami, Norwegian and Kven roots, the difficulties in any ethnic identification or basis in Kåfjord become apparent. In a critical note in the debate pages, one contributor wrote: “I know that I have at least seven roots from which I stem.” (FiN 16.02.1995, quoted in Hovland 1999:176, my translation).60 Hovland, similarly to Kramvig (1999, above), posits an identification related to place, rather than based in ethnicity, as relevant to people’s experiences. Otherwise, “[t]he ethnic, cultural and definitionally unclear Kåfjord would be replaced with a Kåfjord which either locks you in or closes you out” (Hovland 1999:183–4, my translation).61 There are thus considerable difficulties in defining the northern Norway, Sweden and Finland of today using the categories of thought in Arctic cooperation. With respect to Arctic-related initiatives, this is also what critics have noted for these areas (cf. Hønneland 1995, 1998). Clearly differentiating between “indigenous” and “nonindigenous,” “northern”: and “southern” and assuming these to be easily identifiable and well-delineated groups can be seen as a political act and an enforcement of a difference between an undescribed “local” and traditionalized “indigenousness.”62 CONCLUSION In sum, then, a contextual description of the states and areas now included in Arctic cooperation shows rather significant differences, particularly with regard to frontier descriptions and what has in earlier chapters been seen as an environment- and traditional indigenous-centered Arctic discourse. Canada, the driving state in current international Arctic region-building, is typical of the Arctic discourse forwarded in cooperation and has been a focal point for Arctic discourse historically. The situations in Canada are most closely paralleled in Alaska, Greenland and northern Russia (also the areas where Inuit live and where a frontier discourse on the Arctic has been prevalent). However, especially northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and Iceland diverge rather sharply from these Arctic discourse characteristics. In these relatively long-settled states, a frontier discourse has not been prevalent and indigenous and non-indigenous groups have to some degree melded over time. The lines

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of differentiation, ethnic and geographic, are not as clear, and traditional ways of life are generally only practiced by very limited parts of indigenous and northern populations. As the areas are relatively well integrated into the states, in comparison to the Canadian context, most people hold “ordinary jobs” typical of “suburbia” (which is however relegated to a place of nondescription if read from a frontier mythology) (cf. King 2000). The problems are also general periphery and economic problems: many people have to move south in order to find work, and the small economies are not able to become diversified enough to be secure. The responses to Arctic discourse categorizations largely highlight this difference in the character and description of areas, underscoring that a simplified description does not represent the areas and peoples. One can thus identify large discrepancies over the Arctic area, as well as differences that indicate why Arctic discourse has most actively involved only some of those formally designated as actors in Arctic cooperation. These differences also illuminate the background to some of the “silences”: that there are indeed other parameters that define the areas than environmental and traditional indigenous issues, and that the “silent” groups of regional governments and local people’s representatives might well select other foci of work for the designated area than established Arctic discourse does. The remainder of this work discusses how such a discourse domination may have developed, given these differences, and what effects it may have upon groups in areas, for instance in extending frontier understandings to areas where they have not previously been prominent.

CHAPTER 7

Arctic Discourse Dominance

The previous chapters have illustrated that Arctic discourse is characterized by a specific complex of factors: natural and social relations to the environment. In chapter 2, it was shown that environmental definitions have been the basis for delineating the Arctic internationally: only in the time of region-building have political definitions become more prominent. The early understanding of “the Arctic” formed through exploration, which focused on the High Arctic and saw the Arctic and Antarctic as comparable areas. The primary view of the Arctic over time has been that of a purely environmental area, with social elements that have mainly been seen in terms of a relation to the environment. Overall, the social understanding has centered on the Arctic traditional indigenous peoples, a view on primary social inhabitants that derived from a focus on anthropology in polar research. These foci remained central, however, also in present cooperation in an extended Arctic. The principal issues in Arctic cooperation have been the environment and traditional indigenous rights (even to the point of setting these at odds with one another, as in the sustainable development conflict). Such a conception of the Arctic can largely be attributed to the frontier concept, which captures some of the understanding of areas through difference that were emphasized also in exploration: it assumes the areas beyond the frontier to be a wilderness only populated by the traditional indigenous peoples, and presents those moving into it as “civilization,” setting up an inherent differentiation also in decision-making power between these two actors. This understanding, although simplified, has had a large impact on how the Arctic has been seen. One of the main observations in this work has been that such a view of “the Arctic” cooperation area as describable in environmental and traditional indigenous terms is not applicable to all actors. Thus, for example, did Finland, the AEPS initiator, not have a developed priority with regard to the Arctic or even an established understanding of its own area as “Arctic,”

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but centered on the environmental understanding that is general to an Arctic perspective through time. Its development was also largely motivated by foreign policy considerations at a time of sweeping international political changes; the “Arctic” was in that largely a means to foreign policy rather than an end in itself. The further development of the AEPS and broader inclusion of social elements was then largely a result of Canadian influence and especially of the initiative of the state to establish the Arctic Council. Different from, e.g., Finland, then, this development was also a manifestation of a long-time Canadian focus on the Arctic as a source for national identity, through which it had attained a large myth-building role. The Canadian view thus substantially extended that in early AEPS proposals: the historically developed domestic view in Canada included a focus on environmentally related social elements giving a primacy to traditional indigenous concerns and understanding the Arctic as an area in “social and cultural crisis” (Canada 1998 Discussion Paper Children and Youth of the Arctic, “Issues”). In the previous chapter, such a conception of the Arctic has, however, been described as a result of a specific historic and policy development, relatable only to some of the states now involved in Arctic cooperation. It has been shown throughout the book to be a discourse that left out significant possible regional actors and issues, indicated as the “silences” or cracks in discourse that reflected its limitations. These cracks or “silences” were issues that were often indicated but not acted upon in cooperation and thus not problematized or included in cooperation, such as “local,” “regional” or “other” representation than the indigenous or state parties, with which these categories were sometimes equated. This conflict within discourse has been visible throughout the institutionalization of a region, in area and shape (ch. 2), in the development of institutions of administration (ch. 3 and 4), and in the development of a knowledge structure to establish the region more broadly in the media and education (ch. 5); the chapter on the UoA in particular highlighted the conflict that was based on an unproblematized and undecided view of who the residents of “the Arctic” are, and thus for whom regional development was taking place. On balance, Arctic cooperation as described in this book serves to establish a symbolic shape for the region. It serves to develop a geographical delineation, content and bodies of governance to be referred to as “Arctic,” but also reveals the particular system of discursivity for the “region.” Traced as drawing upon a historically established character, connotations, knowledge and networks, the discourse and its practice have been developed in and hold valid only for some of the state contexts, particularly those embracing the frontier concept. “The Arctic” is hereby shown to be a discourse, which is seen as “given” only by those involved and invested in it while obscuring other understandings. On this basis, the present concluding chapter will summarize the typical characteristics of Arctic discourse and the principal actors. It will also discuss

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the mechanics of how it has been possible to extend a limited Arctic discourse to this large area and into international cooperation despite the fact that it is only considered typical of some of the actors. The chapter then ends with a critique of this development of a regional discourse and some suggestions regarding the future research on regions. THE CANADIAN ROLE IN ARCTIC DISCOURSE It has already been noted that Arctic discourse is typical only of the development in parts of the now extended “Arctic region”—a perspective that was traced historically in the previous chapter; throughout, the most dominant actor and context in influencing discourse and organization has been Canada. This can be seen for instance in that Canada forwarded the domestic 60° degree north definition of the Arctic and was one of the main drafters of the AEPS—originally even suggesting it be based on the sustainable development concept that later became a focus of the Canadian-initiated Arctic Council. Also, at least one of the four main programs of the AEPS, CAFF, was a direct outcome of Canadian involvement. That the indigenous NGOs, whose involvement would make an environmental-indigenous framing one of the defining features of Council development, at all achieved the status of permanent participants (a status particular to Arctic development) has largely been attributed to the close relation between the ICC and the Canadian delegation. To a large extent, Canada treated the AEPS as a “stepping stone… to creating the Arctic Council” (Young 1998:158). Having long advocated a policy of treating the Arctic as a focal region, the then Arctic Basin Council was first suggested in 1970 in the Canadian context as including the five states bordering on the Arctic Basin. Made relevant for an eight-state instead of a five-state area, the Arctic Council was then suggested in 1988 by the Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations, and officially proposed by the Canadian Prime Minister in 1989. Illustrating the breadth of an Arctic approach in Canada, the Arctic Council Panel that played a large role in developing this approach was established by the sponsorship of several Canadian and Canadian-related bodies and there were also other groups than the Panel that actively developed the suggestion. Canada was then, together with the ICC, the major actor in placing the focus of the Council on sustainable development, with all the implications this had for region-building. As the first chair of the Arctic Council it initiated, Canada expended considerable effort to develop a strategy for this work, for example through the “Strategy for Communication and Education on Arctic Sustainable Development” proposal which resulted in one major point of conflict with the US. Canada also suggested the regional application of Agenda 21, which the US saw as allowing sustainable development to determine the other working groups’ agendas and which it interpreted as “primarily driven

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by Canada” (US sustainable development discussion paper, November 8,1995). Later, Canada for instance sponsored the 1998 sustainable development conference held in association with the May SAO meeting, where it suggested that new approaches could be elaborated to guide the Council’s conflict-ridden sustainability work. The Arctic Council, then, would not exist if it were not for Canada, nor would the AEPS have had the same form, or would the substantial sustainable development and indigenous foci have had the role they have today. Other organizational development as well can be attributed to Canadian agency. The 1974 Hokkaido suggestion for a Northern Forum was reawakened in 1989, fifteen years after its original proposal, through a Canadian conference and subsequent arrangements. In addition, the CUA, through which the University of the Arctic approach developed, was first established in relation to a Canadian northern studies focus. The Canadian role in the establishment of an Arctic regional university, then, can be seen even in that the University in practice focused some of its development on northern studies, which had arisen as a distinct field of study at some of Canada’s universities in the early 1960s. Canadian actors also played large roles in this development on the practical level. Following the initial suggestion by an actor involved in Arctic Council cooperation, the UoA was promoted by, among others, AMAP chair and Canadian Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) representative David Stone (where it is both notable with respect to Arctic discourse actors that a Canadian held the chair of AMAP and that such a department relating to indigenous and northern affairs exists at all within the Canadian government). Later in the process, the CUA was invited by the Canadian Circumpolar Ambassador to present at the last SAO meeting before the 1998 ministerial. The UoA also took on a rather high profile domestically in Canada where, for example, it was discussed at a series of meetings of the Canadian Centre for Foreign Policy Development in 1998, themselves centered on the topic “The Arctic”; the university was also a major focus at the 1998 Canadian-sponsored sustainable development conference. Observers have noted, however, that the conception of the Arctic forwarded in international discourse related primarily to an established area of discourse in Canada: for example, Scrivener (1996:13) saw the Arctic Council as an “external projection of internal political processes related to indigenous peoples of the Canadian north.” Indicating some disagreement on the focus and content suggested for the Council, the original Arctic Council Panel suggestions for development of the Council were strongly watered down in response to criticism from other governments. In UoA cooperation, the particular Canadian approach to the Arctic and its prevalence in cooperation was also noted by some of the participants as being a very specific, Canadian perspective on the north; the Norwegian participant and chair of the group, for instance, noted that the indigenous question in Canada was larger than he had been aware of at the time of his involvement in the UoA process.

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In all, this shows the major Canadian input into Arctic regional develop ment and even its very establishment. The issues, conflicts and representation that were developed during this time by Canada also persisted: the sustainable development conflict as outlined here has continued to characterize the Arctic Council work beyond an environmental focus, and the configuration of main state and indigenous participants as well as established issues and foci has largely endured. No other country is even remotely close to having a role as substantial as Canada’s. For instance, Finland, the other driving actor in Arctic processes through its establishing the AEPS, has played a much smaller part. Finland’s role in setting up the AEPS was limited by Canadian influence even at its inception, and over time the Finnish input decreased further. Lacking an established approach to the “Arctic,” Finnish involvement in Arctic cooperation was motivated to a large extent by foreign policy possibilities with respect to Russia and an opportunity to establish closer ties with the European community. For example, Rajakoski was “less concerned about the shape or content of the AEPS than about moving forward with some sort of environmental initiative for the Arctic” (Young 1998:73). Although Finland emphasized the importance of acidification as a motivation for the AEPS, this was not treated as an independent concern in the work that followed. Finland also did not problematize the delineation of the area seen as “Arctic” (where, in relation to pollution as a driving factor for the environmental initiative, the areas where most emissions affecting the Arctic took place were actually excluded from the cooperation). If one looks at the way the Arctic was seen in these developments, then, Finland can be seen as an example of a state with a rather unproblematized view of the Arctic (that of a country without any Arctic mainland); its focus on the environment is not unexpected given the history of Arctic exploration and research and its prominent comparison with the Antarctic. Finland thus represents the more general historical view of “the Arctic” as connected to the understanding of the polar area, where participation of states beyond the Arctic Eight in Arctic cooperation has been based on their interest in natural science studies of the polar environment and exploration more generally.1 The inclusion of a focus on the environment has here been the least controversial characteristic in the development of Arctic cooperation: the one which all participants have agreed with or even used to argue their own relevance. While Canada, like any of the actors, embraced such an environmentrelated framing of the Arctic, as we progress in time viewing the changes from the AEPS to the Arctic Council, indigenous questions were additionally accorded more and more prominence, in coherence with an understanding of the Arctic that had developed through frontier discourse2 and the historical development in certain of the areas. On this basis did the conflict between foci on environmental concerns in conservation, and, in practice, on indigenous organizations in sustainable utilisation arguments—albeit also argumentally based primarily on environmental considerations—become a major point of

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contention in the development of the Arctic Council. In this development, then, the actors that played the largest roles in cooperation were Canada and the ICC, and secondly those with similar Arctic discourse backgrounds (for instance, related to indigenous groups or traditional marine resource utilisation), that had an established view of “the Arctic” as inhabited areas within their own states. The prominent actors with such an understanding included Canada, the ICC, Denmark-Greenland and, Russia, and in opposition, especially the US (for instance in the strategic and marine mammals work under sustainable development and also during the conflict surrounding the inclusion of further indigenous groups in cooperation). While a selection of states thus played relatively large roles in cooperation, with pre-eminence to Canada’s role in developing Arctic cooperation and discourse on an international Arctic region, the states were then not the only actors with a large say in the development of international cooperation. DlSCOURSE CHARACTERISTICS AND THE ROLE OF INDIGENOUS ACTORS Given the substantial role that the ICC played in development, a notable trend beyond the extensive Canadian role in Arctic region cooperation is the large role played by non-governmental bodies, in particular indigenous organization. The ICC has been by far the most active non-state actor, a role that cannot be separated from that of Canada and the relation of this state to the ICC. The ICC involvement may in fact be seen as related to the dominance of the Canadian state context; as the region-building approach would argue, the relation between actors would largely be a result of their common development and interaction and thus their connection through discourse. The prominence of the indigenous perspective can be seen for instance in that while early suggestions on the structure of an Arctic Council differ on other actors to include (e.g., “other” and “subgovernmental”), all include states and indigenous representatives. Many of these early suggestions were also largely developed by the Arctic Council Panel, which was co-chaired by a former vice president of the ICC; she later commented that the Panel as a group made up of “aboriginal and southern Canadians” had been able to “convince the Canadian government” to pursue their point of view (Kuptana 1992:41). Somewhat similarly, the Arctic Council was later described by an observer as an “external projection of internal political processes related to the indigenous peoples of the Canadian north” (Scrivener 1996:13, as noted above), and the indigenous peoples were even discussed by observers as the grouping which has focused attention in Canada on northern issues. To sum up the ICC role, to some degree a repetition of Canadian action, the ICC also later participated with the Canadian Department of External Affairs in bilateral talks on the Arctic Council. The first Canadian Arctic Ambassador (working in Foreign Affairs and reporting to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Trade as well as the Minister of Indigenous

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Affairs and Northern Development), an earlier ICC executive council member, was also appointed at this time and made the first chair of the Arctic Council. It was also largely through ICC agency, separately and in relation to Canada, that the AEPS, in practice, and the Arctic Council came to include indigenous peoples’ representatives as Permanent Participants: a special status second only to that of states. Subsequently, indigenous actors were given a prominent role already in early Arctic Council proposals, further indicating the ICC role in domestic Canadian discourse; the Task Force on Sustainable Development and Utilization (TFSDU) was initially instituted to maintain a special focus on indigenous peoples’ economies, and in the same year indigenous participation in the Council was extended (and the Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat established). Similarly, CAFF, suggested by Canada, which early in Arctic cooperation administered the secretariat, was developed to include a focus on indigenous peoples’ traditional knowledge. Moreover, some observers saw the ICC as the main actor in introducing the principles of sustainable development, the major conceptual difference between the focus of the AEPS and that of the Arctic Council. The ICC also prepared the draft “Analysis of Agenda 21 in context of sustainable development,” on which the Canadian suggestion for the regional application of Agenda 21 as a strategy was then built; its indigenous focus and the extent of indigenous participation it advocated perhaps played the main role in the conflicts that the concept of sustainable development provoked. The ICC in itself also came to constitute an important body in broader Arctic policy-making: for example, when consultations on the UoA initiative were undertaken, one of the bodies specially targeted was the ICC, through a presentation at its 1998 assembly. Moreover, the UoA was early seen and evaluated in relation to indigenous issues, and the model for selection of participants for the feasibility study was built on the Arctic Council model of national and indigenous participation. While the UoA largely became seen as an indigenous-related project and contested among participants in relation to this, the special status of indigenous issues nevertheless remained unchanged. The importance of an indigenous emphasis as part of an Arctic framing is thus apparent. While it is visible in practice in the prominence the ICC held within cooperation and in the practical development of the sustainable development orientation, it extends beyond these into historical understandings of the Arctic, which are the basis both for the conflicts that have arisen in Arctic frontier-framed areas and for the prominence the ICC has gained as an actor. Both historically and in practice in the development, for instance in relation to the IWC category of subsistence hunting and the established US-Canadian conflict with regard to whaling this focus on indigenous matters is fundamentally connected to an understanding of indigenous communities as having a traditional relation to the environment; one main basis on which the indigenous peoples are argued to be especially relevant to the Arctic region. One can thus see the importance of history and

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the impossibility of to any degree starting with a clean slate: historic understandings and utilization have formed the IWC categories and international whaling and sealing conflicts, as well as the actors that relate to these; and in these areas, the indigenous peoples have been conceived of as and argued to be traditional. A conclusion of what an Arctic framing also presently targets must thus focus on the historic and frontier-related understanding of the Arctic as an environmental and traditional indigenous area—this despite the fact that it is now extended beyond earlier more limited geographic delineations (and into modern time). The environment does, as described above, constitute the least disagreed-upon understanding of the Arctic: one all actors include (although sometimes with a very limited problematization of to which geographical scope the focus is extended). The environment as a concept is also the basis upon which indigenous issues are included, as above, constituting the more contested extension to Arctic discourse and that which has become prominent as cooperation has developed, driven by the identified main parties. The traditional can then be seen to constitute the third key element in a framing or discourse of the Arctic, following and related to the environmental and the indigenous; actually, it constitutes the cement by which these are tied together by implying a direct, subsistence-based relation. Such tradition-based argumentation underpins the developments reviewed in this study. It is visible, for instance as above, in that it is largely on the claim of a historic traditional basis that indigenous people are the primary population in the AMAP report (1997, 1998). The emphasis on traditional indigenous elements as relevant to the Arctic environment can also be seen, for instance, in the focus on traditional indigenous whaling in sustainable development and broader whaling conflicts, and in the AEPS being seen by some observers as a way to improve cooperation between indigenous organizations and environmental NGO’s, a “relation not always rosy” because of the traditional hunting activities of indigenous peoples (Stokke 1992:229). In addition, the contested sustainable development documents largely discuss the relevance and motivation for the role of indigenous peoples in cooperation in terms of tradition. The “Strategy for Communication and Education on Arctic Sustainable Development” greatly emphasizes indigenous and traditional issues, for example, the traditional knowledge of indigenous peoples, and speaks about the indigenous cultural heritage that allows man to coexist with nature. In the UoA Development Plan, the Arctic region is discussed as one where subsistence lifestyles play a large role and where areas are suffering from rapid modernization and disruption of traditional ways. The Development Plan also mentions the dangers of contamination of traditional foods specifically. Discussions on the actors to target in the UoA process include, for instance, the argument that “traditional knowledge in the Arctic runs centuries deep for most of the inhabitants of the Arctic, and it is related to the environmental conditions

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of the Arctic, and that is what we are to aim for” (R.M.Skryabin, Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript), which signals the area on which issues of inclusion were disputed. The final report of the UoA feasibility study, in the annex written by indigenous representatives, describes the Arctic as an indigenous homeland subject to extraordinary change, including a change from the traditional to modern way of life. Thus, in some instances, even change in relation to traditional culture is presented as an argument for a particular focus (one on transition from the traditional rather than the traditional itself, but maintaining its importance as a discourse characteristic that serves as a basis for selection). In sum, then, through such argumentation, the environmental and indigenous traditional concerns came to constitute the principal elements of Arctic discourse. These characteristics together constituted the main factors that actors needed to address in order to speak in the discourse and to justify their role or the role of any representation, such as Skryabin expresses above. The traditional-environmental relation was that upon which regional inhabitants beyond indigenous people were discussed, and which constituted the foci of cooperation as well as of conflict among actors. THE ROLE OF RESEARCH IN ARCTIC DISCOURSE While the influential states and indigenous organizations and their role in forming a discourse on the Arctic has so far been discussed, there exists one further influential group: the Arctic studies researchers in, largely but far from exclusively, Canada and North America, and who traditionally dealt with a discourse on this basis. Such a group had been part in establishing Arctic discourse, both historically and presently, internationally and domestically in Canada (which context as illustrated in chapter 6 played a large role in developing Arctic discourse internationally). Arctic studies research therefore provided both a strong institutional basis and authoritative knowledge upon which claims could be built. Like the strong inclusion of indigenous actors in cooperation, it corroborates the assumption in the region-building approach that actors are those who can gain access to and legitimization in (and of) the region-building process. As a region-building approach would expect, researchers have interacted and become involved largely through their established, even historical, relation to Arctic discourse. By their relation to and role in the policy process and by their supplying a knowledge perspective, researchers thus played a large part in sustaining the established historically related Arctic discourse, in which Canada was a prominent actor. While this is not to say that researchers do not advance perspectives of their own and instead forward those of organizations, it is to say that, through their involvement in and with policy—or knowledge at all—researchers do take part in constituting the processes they study. If they hold roles in the process, these are necessarily in relation to their ability to speak on Arctic

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discourse in the form in which it is currently being advanced. At the least, this means that researchers’ perspectives, in relation to this selection through discourse, must be seen as political (in accordance with a region-building and Foucauldian perspective on knowledge). Given such relations within discourses of knowledge, the cooperation of research actors in networks with, for example, Canada and the ICC, or within developing or developed research-policy networks, is thus not a surprise; policy requires a link to descriptive authority. In the notable Canadian context, the research-based groups of actors appeared for instance as parts of the network through which the Arctic Council idea was developed: the researcher-indigenous Arctic Council Panel, the Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations; the National Capital Branch of the Canadian Institute of International Affairs; the domestic administration and governance organization related to the 60° north latitude delineation of the Arctic, including the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND); and researchers within this framework of Arctic organization, notably Griffiths, who co-chaired the Arctic Council Panel as well as the 1988–1991 Working Group on Arctic International Relations that dealt with the Arctic as a “distinctive region in international society” (Young 1996:6). Actors such as these could also be seen to have a part in forming the discourse on the Arctic and Arctic cooperation in these networks over a long time: for example, Young became prominent in the area already with his 1986 “The Age of the Arctic” article, and Griffiths had been part of developing the field in Canada since his work on a strategic research focus on the Arctic in the 1970s. Rather than the research-policy relation being an exception in “Arctic” region-building, then, it was the norm. Internationally, persons like Griffiths, Young and also Heininen moved in both research and policy, such as the Working Group on Arctic International Relations, Arctic Council Panel and the Kuhmo Summer Academy; and Arctic region conferences, workshops and events such as Canada’s 1998 sustainable development seminar and the IASC establishment regularly included researchers, policy people and NGO interests on the established historical Arctic discourse foundation. On balance, the selection of actors that has been presented above—a particular segment of states, indigenous organizations and research-policy bodies who were able to relate to discourse—constituted those who developed the particular discourse on the Arctic internationally in region-building, and along the defining lines that have been discussed so far: relations to the environment, through which indigenous foci understood primarily as being related to the traditional gained importance, and in relation to which Arctic cooperation has traditionally developed. The argument in this work is thus that Arctic discourse is derived mainly from features that have been associated with the concept “Arctic” through historical and policy processes but which do not primarily derive from the eight-state area comprising the Arctic today. Rather, they have a close relation

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to “the Arctic” as a historically established discourse. As was discussed previously, on the basis of historical conceptions, the only thinkable arearelated groupings with a claim in Arctic discourse have been the indigenous political organizations, and on the basis of reference to traditionality. Despite that this is an understanding directly related to the view of the Arctic as a frontier, where wilderness was seen as comprising both the natural environmental and traditional indigenous elements, such a focus has been reproduced in organization and research; yet, the indigenous groups are in total a very small minority in the areas defined as “Arctic” in cooperation and not always directly distinguishable by geographical north-south, traditional or even clear ethnic delineations from “other” population. Despite their emphasis in policy and research on the region, the environmental and indigenous foci are, however, not the only that could have been envisioned for an Arctic regional discourse, as the indications and critique of lack of local and regional government representation show; rather, critique brought up the undetermined issue of who the people in the Arctic could be seen as and who were to say so. The suggestion here would thus be that it is in historical categorization in organization and research, or directly on a discourse-level of defining “knowledge” for the Arctic, that argumentation on the Arctic has been shaped. The categorization into “indigenous” and “nonindigenous” in cooperation and its relation to a “northern” and “southern” is itself the result of a frontier history and conception of “the Arctic” as the less integrated, geographically remote and wild, ethnically and culturally different, and inherently traditional. The fact that discourse can at all be played out in this form is then related to the “neutral” position (and power) that state participants have been accorded through a dichotomy that establishes all “non-indigenous” individuals as relatable through the state. This is what creates the situation where “nonindigenous” may be utilized in discourse to add to the legitimacy of state representatives—rather than admitting the existence of a “local” or “regional,” which, paradoxically, itself is the very basis of the discourse claim to “the Arctic region.” This largely problematizes the territorial scope and the legitimacy of regional cooperation. CANADIAN DISCOURSE DOMINANCE Given that Arctic discourse is seen as constituting a fairly limited perspective, how has it then come to be extended over such a large area, and why have actors at least on the surface not questioned it more than they have? This section is an attempt to answer these questions. The first chapter discussed dominant, hegemonic, discourse as “a lived system of meanings and values, not simply an ideology, a sense of reality beyond which it is, for most people, difficult to move [and which is]…internalized” (Williams 1977:108–115, quoted in Thompson 1999, para. 1; cf. Mouffe 1979:195; Connell 1977).3 The suggestion here is that the Arctic

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has come to constitute such a dominant discourse, backed up by its claims to authoritative knowledge and its institutionalization into a multitude of different actors (state, NGOs, research) who even came to at all interact through their socialization into discourse. Discourse dominance is thus suggested to have worked by directing the parameters which actors need to accommodate in speaking of the “Arctic,” a development in which Canada has held the prominent role. From a focus on state context, then, one may say that the Canadian context has attained discourse hegemony on the Arctic as a result of its long-term Arctic focus and conception of the Arctic/north as part of the Canadian national identity, developed in connection with the large body of Arctic-related research and administration in the national context as well as more widely, and of the extensively developed linkages to Arcticrelated organization that have co-evolved with the national context, such as the ICC. Canada’s strong role internationally is thus a result both of its domestic development on the Arctic and of its role in and the connection of this discourse to broader, historically developed Arctic studies, research and state action. The Canadian perspective, prominent in having shaped Arctic work, which largely maintained a focus on North America and Greenland,4 was thereby well recognized and easily accepted in the policy-research fora that were associated with the developing Arctic region-building approach. In that, the major difference between Canada and other states with traditional interests in, for instance, Arctic studies in relation to their own inhabited areas—and thereby what distinguished Canada as an actor—is its major role historically in Arctic discourse and that the Arctic has come to play in Canadian domestic and international development, even in the emergence of the state and national identity. Arctic discourse became the most developed within Canada as a state context and strongly embedded into the state and policymaking: among “Arctic” states, Canada was the only one for which the national identity and, thereby, substantial central state resources and discourse development were explicitly connected to the Arctic. The hegemony for the Canadian state context in Arctic cooperation derives from this fact of historical development and the multiple bodies, alliances and conflicts that came to exist domestically with regard to these issues. Thus, Canada’s importance in Arctic matters derives not from its overall power, but from its discursive power in matters “Arctic,” and determining the issue agenda and available established knowledge for this area; which is something the state then used both in relation to established domestic and international context. Canadian hegemony is related directly to the Arctic field, and does not include broader issue areas.5 As Canada is a small-state in terms of power and related foreign policy scope, it is not able to impose its view e.g. by threat of embargo (to the same degree that, e.g., the US was in the broader whaling disputes). It was thus largely on the basis of discourse that Canada was able to develop an Arctic sustainable development context

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in relation to which the US then unwillingly had to argue its case (as seen in ch. 4); based on its dominant Arctic position and interlinkage into Arctic discourse. In contrast to its more limited general foreign policy influence, then, Canada could in any discussion dealing with the Arctic draw upon not just a few Arctic experts in limited areas of government (and where these in other states primarily related to natural science), but an entire apparatus in several departments, government-related organizations and administration, and even non-governmental and other bodies over a wide range of disciplines which had developed and defined themselves in relation to domestic discourse. In matters “Arctic,” Canada spoke on a discourse which it had historically been a large part in developing, and thus was both highly invested in and uniquely able to express on the basis of. The suggestion is thus that the development of an Arctic state focus and linkage between this state focus and wider, but to some degree co-evolved, knowledge communities has been especially prominent in Canada. Rather than being seen as separate from policy, knowledge is seen as having a role both in determining and delimiting discourse and thereby in defining state interests. This point of relation between policy and knowledge is coherent with a region-building and discourse approach and something that has been argued for throughout. As discussed in the first chapter, the actors in region-building are those who can gain access and legitimization in the process; the approach does not draw a sharp distinction between politicians as participating in setting the regional agenda and researchers as possessors of objective knowledge. While actors in the formal political system require the knowledge-building which serves to discuss a region into being, knowledge communities such as academia, pressure groups and non-governmental organizations can both serve as legitimizers of the process in return for impact upon it and play a necessary role in maintaining the legitimacy of the bureaucracy in certain constituencies as well as of their own perspectives. A region-building perspective reveals substantial interlinkage between knowledge and policy actors, which can be seen in the case of the Arctic as discussed above. Knowledge is thus not seen as either a property of only certain actors nor as objective; rather, it is seen as developed in discourse and connected to power. The argument thereby differs from what is advanced for instance in perhaps the largest knowledge-focused approach in International Relations, the “epistemic community”6 approach that was originally developed by Haas (1990) for the regional case of pollution control in the Mediterranean. Broadly, this approach argues for the role of the embeddedness of epistemic, research, communities in state administration as central to environmental cooperation, but would see research as non-political and differentiated from policy development.7 While an epistemic community approach has been recognized as important for discourse studies of international politics, as Litfin (1994) has noted, and has limited applicability to the present argument, the argument

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here thus differs from an epistemic community understanding in at least two central connected aspects: (1) the fact that an Arctic knowledge approach has not evolved separately from (and then come to embed itself in) the political sphere, but has rather evolved with it; and (2) that knowledge is thereby not seen as a commodity of research, but rather, in keeping with a region-building and discourse understanding, as political. In the Arctic case, such a connection between policy actors and groupings that could be seen as forming a knowledge community is visible in the way in which research and state actions regarding the Arctic have gone hand in hand; in establishing an Arctic perspective, research was an inherent part in exploration and often state-funded; later, the Canadian focus on the Arctic in policy research developed in conjunction with its larger role for the state, as discussed in ch. 6; Gorbachev energized the IASC process; and research projects that included policymaker meetings (such as the Working Group on Arctic International Relations) supported policy development. The knowledge actors speaking on “Arctic” matters were thus often involved with the political process, and researchers took part in the development of cooperation (such as in the Arctic Council Panel and in developing broader Arctic Council/ AEPS approaches) rather than merely remaining in a research role. These sorts of bodies also provided the meeting point for researchers, policymakers, and NGOs and thereby the social context for the development of common perspectives. In short, research has been part of and interwoven with, not separated from, political and historical development. The “objectivity” or “non-political” nature of Arctic knowledge is also something that has been challenged throughout the study. The discussion in the previous chapter, for instance, showed that the Canadian context has been prominently described as the template for the general “Arctic,” e.g., in the journal Arctic, in film and in the expansion of northern studies. Although such descriptions have often been seen as objective and attempts have been made to extend these circumpolarly, such as in Hamelin’s description of a northerness that was to set up a general description of “the north,” the Arctic perspective is thus strongly related to historical and political development and has been elaborated in a political context. In short, then, in a discourse focus, a principal point of departure is that knowledge communities cannot be seen apart from larger “power,” but must rather be seen as both political and the result of development in certain contexts. Or, as Haggard and Simmons argue: “‘[i]nterests’ only emerge within particular normative and epistemic contexts and cannot be understood outside them” (Haggard and Simmons 1987:511).8 Rather than existing as a development outside power, then, a discourse such as the “Arctic” and the perspective forwarded in it are to be seen as integral to power in that they provide necessary legitimation of the state perspective from a point that may be organizationally external to, if coevolved with, the state apparatus. For practical legitimacy, the political process therefore requires a relation to research perspectives—but also to other, such

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as NGO, perspectives of knowledge and validation, as one can see in that non-governmental actors were of considerable importance in defining cooperation and domestic linkages and that issues such as Canada’s relation to the ICC influenced cooperation. To explain the scope of Arctic discourse, one would thus conceive of an internationally organized grouping that developed historically and draws on historic elements of Arctic discourse but is most closely embedded in and related to perspectives associated with the state on which its knowledge has retained influence and co-developed into, for instance, administrative structures. As Foucault has observed, bodies of thought are quite resistant to social pressures and change even over the long term: the extent to which issues in which discourse and knowledge perspectives are expressed is strongly influenced by deeper social, political, and economic structures that are related to the intellectual history of knowledge perspectives and the interaction and embeddedness of these in networks of power (cf. Foucault 1974, 1983). The scope of interpretation available to researchers, policy actors and NGOs as well as the mobility of these groups in terms of the role taken on in different situations would thereby largely be developed and maintained through the socialization of the actor into discourse. As the state has long been, and perhaps still can be said to be, the main context of socialization, it is suggested that approaches in it have been naturalized over time and come to be seen, simply, as the way to conceive of the north. In this vein, “it is difficult to determine precisely when and how new knowledge has led to the redefinition of national preferences…particularly because the appearance of new knowledge and the restructuring and redefinition of interests has rarely been sudden and clearly visible, but protracted and subtle” (Bernauer 1993:361). Rather than being objective or even objectively assessed, then, may “certain ideas and beliefs prompt policymakers in subordinate states to pursue certain policies favoured by a hegemonic state not because these ideations possess the ability to produce these policy effects, but because these ideas and beliefs have been internalized by those policy-makers through a socialization process” (Yee 1996:71).9 A knowledge perspective, such as one focused on specific understandings of the Arctic, may thus come to exercise political influence to the degree that it even acts to determine the range of policy and state claims to legitimacy, as suggested in the case of the Canadian relation to the development of an Arctic knowledge perspective in constituting the present Arctic region approach. As long as a perspective and those maintaining it remain well embedded in their national policy-making process, they will encourage international commitments and the adoption and enforcement of common policies that correspond with their shared world view (cf. Haas 1990:57). The resulting discourse largely draws upon developed approaches related to the symbol or name used—“the Arctic”—and thereby activates the entire network and interests concerned with this Arctic symbol, i.e., largely those related to and developed in a Canadian context. (This has also been illustrated in chapter 6, which shows the large importance the Canadian context has played for Arctic

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discourse development). Especially, this choice of name and thereby main symbol is something, e.g., Paasi (1996) has emphasised; it itself selects one perspective of knowledge rather than another. By use of the concept “Arctic,” a specific discourse community was thus implicitly brought into the present expansion of “the Arctic” into a much larger area of cooperation. In the present case, this process would serve to explain the development of current Arctic discourse as well as how a limited perspective has attained such a strong standing: by socialization into the discourse among certain policy and knowledge groupings that are to a large degree related to a state context. What the Arctic case illustrates is thus the importance for a state of being able to draw upon a naturalized approach (developed in Canadian northern studies and Arctic studies) that deals explicitly with knowledge— which is not to say that it is apolitical, even if the fact that an established knowledge perspective is often taken for granted and assumed to apply more generally may have contributed to the specific content and success of Canada in developing an Arctic region and utilizing Arctic conceptions to defend and extend its national position. What made an Arctic Council even possible to establish were the extensive domestic alliances and organizationally and governmentally well embedded Arctic studies perspective; the Arctic approach was integrated in the Canadian state and with a small but existing Arctic studies network existing in other states even if not as state foci. The existence of an “Arctic” studies network, which produced, e.g., the literature quoted throughout this book and in which Canada was the most interlinked state, was one factor which maintained an Arctic regional approach in the face of broad unfamiliarity in other governments with an established Arctic discourse; for lack of any descriptive foundation of their own readily relating to the concept “Arctic” as extended beyond the polar, and in their search for a way to deal with the common domestic problems of peripheral areas, the established Arctic discourse became dominant. Thus, the state initiative of Canada opened a window of opportunity for the broader Arctic discourse community to extend itself (one which presumably could not have been opened by any other state, as no other state had such a domestically strong Arctic self-definition as Canada, where this is linked to national identity and central government resources). Similarly, the motivation, impetus and resources for organization and knowledge development on the Arctic (for example in research programs, or the development of a national relation to “the Arctic” that makes this sort of orientation viable and marketable in research) can be found in the Canadian development of the Arctic as a national focus. Such a discursive power only came into play, however, through its interlinkage into state contexts and existing agencies: through a knowledgepower interlinkage. Arctic Council discourse was utilized to promote/constrain various actors, namely on the issues of sea conflict (indirectly), marine mammals, state-indigenous relations domestically and internationally, and as profile-building for influence and foreign policy development in a world

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where state action increasingly takes place through international cooperation (which may, as here, create standing fora that embody the ideas forwarded by states or by a state with a large interest in an area and able to rally other states to the cause). THE GAINS FOR OTHER ACTORS What made the predominantly Canadian framing of “the Arctic,” or rather cooperation with its selected participants, attractive to other states can then largely be explained through issue benefits (e.g. relating to environmental cooperation and whaling/sealing interests), synergy benefits, and the role the existence of an established “Arctic studies” / “northern studies” network played in promoting the approach forwarded by the dominant state internationally (the Canadian Arctic Council initiative). In any cooperation, participation allows for the development of knowledge about the other parties and achievement of possible advantages that might result from the forum, for example, in raising the profile of participating countries. The Arctic Council, established as a “high level forum” (similar to the AEPS as a “strategy”) rather than in any more demanding form, has not required much from its participants. This made it possible to set up the Arctic Council although support for it and established knowledge among all parties on its suggested issues was weak. The Council was thereby also compelled to exclude many contentious areas, such as military security. Given the history of security conflict in the area, it would have been unlikely that states would have turned down cooperation that promised to provide an insight into the plans and policies of other states and served to normalize relations that had earlier been dominated by US-USSR conflict. As Haas notes on his regional case, on a practical enough level to benefit comparisons: [F]actors that may facilitate cooperation have to do with the future: these include such factors as long-time horizons, reciprocity, the regularity of stakes, reliable information about others’ actions, and quick feedback about others’ actions Improved transparency of actions generated by smaller numbers of actors and other countries aware of each other’s actions would ease cooperation. Lastly, international arrangements that create diplomatic channels between countries otherwise unable to communicate would priovide states with strong reasons to support arrangements, regardless of their substantive nature. The forms that such arrangements would be likely to take would be largely informational (Haas 1990:183).

In a similar vein, cooperation provided benefits to participating actors that outweighed the low costs of participation in fora that were not able to enforce decisions under international law, and would therefore not be able to force participants into actions. For the Arctic case, too, “[r]epeated

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intergovernmental meetings and the vast number of…projects allowed governments to think that they would achieve future benefits” from the cooperation (Haas 1990:184). This also meant that the threshold for participation in the AEPS/Arctic Council was rather low; one did not need to strongly agree with or problematize cooperation if the issue at hand was of little particular concern. Rather, given prior security tension in the area the broader aims of diplomatic contact may have been enough to motivate participation. For the issues on which an established state focus existed, then, the linkage politics practiced by many states also made it possible to use the Arctic Council to work on marine mammals questions. These established foci and possibilities for policy work in this respect may have motivated some of the countries. The states mainly concerned with the whaling and sealing issues here are Canada, the US, Russia, Greenland, Norway, and Iceland (where perhaps especially the Greenlandic context is not far from the Canadian, as discussed in ch. 6); their common interests do not, however, necessarily stretch beyond an involvement in sea resource issues. Thus, the extensive focus on marine mammals that was selected in cooperation indicates less of a broader agreement on issues for the defined region than it does the established nature of sea resources conflict. The principle of sustainable development, under which these conflicts were played out, may also have motivated some actors for cooperation, given the general momentum for sustainable development at the time around the 1992 Rio Summit. This could be seen for instance in the support Canada received from other countries not directly involved in the conflict on the principle of sustainable development as well as from other whaling and sealing-friendly actors on the issue itself, a development that served to build cooperation. For the marine mammals question that was given prominence practically in cooperation, however, the Arctic case can given the conflict background between Canada and the US even be seen to represent an attempt by a relatively small state (Canada) to oppose a larger power (the US). It shows that discourse domination (and a focus on principle, such as on the pre-eminence of sustainable development that could then affect policy on whaling) may make certain small-state agency possible despite an otherwise overwhelming difference in resources and ability to enforce claims—even, given the international opinion against whaling. In other words, discourse and the framing under which issues are advanced play a major part in making it possible to pursue certain issues at all. The Arctic case can, accordingly, be seen as an example of new ways to exercise or extend sovereignty: through environmental cooperation and region-building. While a discourse approach places the emphasis on the construction of an interest in or understanding of an area, as well as on agenda-setting power in the area, this is thus not to negate the importance of sovereignty but, rather, to explain the ways sovereignty is exercised through discourse. Thus, to gain power, prestige and wealth, actors in an increasingly interlinked world need

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to also defend and argue their claims and defend their sovereignty in discourse. As the role of knowledge is gaining importance as a major policy tool in increasingly multi-actor negotiations, “the tendency to contest issues with alternative proofs seems likely to grow as a central feature of world politics” (Rosenau 1990:203, quoted in Litfin 1994:195). While states continuously act to preserve their autonomy and independence, and improve their standing, then, a constructivist analysis adds an understanding of the processes of issue and actor definition and discourse by which power can be pursued, these including historical, knowledge-related and domestic factors. “Power in postinternational politics [that includes state as well as nonstate actors], then, would be primarily discursive” (Litfin 1994:195). ARCTIC CONFLICTS AS RESULTS OF FRAMING: IMPLICATIONS OF THE STUDY On balance, it can be concluded that the principal actors are traditional Arctic states acting on a relatively traditional Arctic agenda: the main determinators of description remain the central states, indigenous perspectives and international bodies or research concerned with the Arctic from a polar or environmental perspective, and, where education is concerned, northern or Arctic studies actors. It has also been indicated throughout that it remains to be decided what “the Arctic” is from the perspective of, for instance, democratically elected and accountable representatives of regional government, or in a perspective that does not relate directly to “the Arctic” symbol and established network of actors but to local descriptions in the respective states. Such a need for an investigation of understandings and problems which are defined on the basis of and within the region that has been delineated (the eight states and parts of these that have been made relevant) is perhaps the principal practical implication of this study. One suggestion is that this may be connected to the extent to which current cooperation, drawing upon limited discourse, is also derived directly from outside the area. Thus, in the discourse that connects the actors, several of the established elements derive their origin from understandings which have not been particular to the region; these include the common polar, the frontierbased, and an organizational motivation that has been largely related to foreign policy. The practical models and comparisions established early in Arctic organization have thereby continued to exert influence throughout, even after their original relevance has faded: the continuous comparisons of an extended Arctic with the Antarctic10 have become a prevalent framing to which even the concept of “the Arctic” has been linked; and the definition of the Arctic as an essentially eight-state area, established by IASC in relation to Cold War and other security concerns has remained in current Arctic Council cooperation.11 The assumption on “northern studies,” related to the Canadian Arctic tradition and historical perspective, continued to guide the University of the Arctic organization of studies internationally “for the north.”

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Rather than being of limited impact, both early topical choices and the omnipresence of Arctic frontier discourse thus contributed to forwarding issues based on more traditional Arctic discourse. That is, focal issues have not necessarily been novel or unique to the new regional delineation but motivated by the various assumptions associated with the “Arctic” symbol. One argument in this work is thus that rather than being problems of practical organization, key problems in Arctic cooperation are related to the conflict set up by framing and its internal contradictions: internal conflicts created within the framing of the Arctic and the “baggage” it carries in the form of models and assumptions. It is the very selection of “Arctic” issues that produces disputes, for instance, among the prioritized indigenous organizations who are legitimized through traditionality arguments but claim economic development rights against a predominantly environmental conception of the area that has both privileged and limited the scope of their involvement.12 Similarly, broader regional elements such as the economy, which plays a role in any sustainability discussion, have not been allowed as independent variables in “regional” description, and regional groupings have often been discussed indeterminately as “other” or even made too political to discuss explicitly (ch. 5). As a result, the retained environmental and traditional indigenous perspectives are juxtaposed through conflicts in a conservation-utilisation perspective or disputes over who can speak for the “local” or “regional”; the primacy given to the Arctic environment is made to conflict with that accorded to indigenous issues; and the sustainable development concept is interpreted in terms of established Arctic issues. This argument and problems inside a framing as noted can then be uniquely conceptualized through a focus on the discourse on “the Arctic,” which so far has not gained emphasis in work on an Arctic region. Work on the region 13 has often taken the starting point of the cooperation itself; that is, it has proceeded from the established structure and criticized the way in which it promotes its aims, in some instances in relation to suggested developments in cooperation at the time. In this literature the boundary of the Arctic, and thereby the area to which suggestions pertain, often remains unproblematized; the international region is taken as given and of equal interest to all parties, which obscures the difference across national contexts and the role national understandings and national politics play in the definition of the Arctic; political motivations for initiatives under an Arctic label are not traced to the history of cooperation of certain of the parties or to domestic and international conflicts (such as established domestic Canadian and Canada-US conflict). “Arctic” work is seldom related to historical and discourse understandings of the “Arctic,” which inevitably include assumptions and structuring metaphors, such as the exploration conceptions discussed here, which have survived until this day. The established foci of the literature thus leave several important points untouched, such as the correspondence between

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cooperation and the actual area it designates as “Arctic,” that is, the central question of this work: the structuring metaphors or understandings that guide “Arctic” cooperation, and their relation to area, which has here been shown to be a rather limited selection. It thus fails to distinguish the conflicts on a level of discourse between states and excludes certain perspectives that may serve to explain how and why the Arctic cooperation process is so difficult to forward. The present work, on the other hand, has attempted to analyze the development of “Arctic” region-building, the “Arctic” region and “Arctic” governance mechanisms together. It has placed the primary focus on the relations within discourse and the metaphors underpinning these, rather than on the efficiency of its governance mechanisms as such. This work conceives of the principal problems of regional cooperation as inherent in what is assumed as “the Arctic,” and is able to see many of the problems that manifest themselves in Arctic organization as related to the discourse of Arctic cooperation and the Arctic symbol. As a main argument based on the presented conclusions on Arctic actors and discourse characteristics, then, this work asserts that problems in “Arctic” organization fundamentally derive from the unproblematized nature of “the Arctic” as a “region,” and its limited description in the discourse. By not assessing or developing Arctic organization and discourse directly in relation to, e.g., different perspectives in the areas, the conflicts set up between established actors become unsolvable. The problems of Arctic cooperation therefore derive not only from its organization and whether or not this is effective, although there are certainly many different issues there, but from its main discursively selected characteristics and actors, such as environmental and indigenous14 concerns as these are understood in cooperation. These discourse characteristics are also not easily recognized and modified by actors, as they are connected to and embedded in much larger conceptions: the AngloAmerican understanding of wilderness and its roots in romanticism and developments such as naturalism and conservation, as well as the view of the “savage” in the periods of imperialism, which are only possible to begin to describe here. On this basis, while it may be early to assess Arctic organization from any focus on the organization itself, it has been possible to assess the framing and values in Arctic cooperation on basis of the hard and persistent character of established discourse, which makes it unlikely for developments to be able to within themselves diverge from the basic framing that is dominant. Discourse is developed through a history and established actors that inevitably impact work that is undertaken; this discourse acts even to determine the scope of discussions, parties, conflicts, and actors that are drawn to Arctic cooperation. While initiatives develop and the understanding of the multifacetedness of the Arctic deepens, modifications to the frames of selected actors and characteristics can thus not simply be assumed. Rather, changes in the conflicted scope of Arctic discourse to a development based on the

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geographically selected region would require thinking outside frames and consideration of the question Coates (1994:35) poses: maybe “north” or “Arctic” is not the right label under which to organise our studies—or cooperation ? For present organization to develop into a less symbol-related view of the “region” and deal with the problems of framing and limited selection targeted here, developments would at the least need to proceed beyond region-building enthusiasm to focus on the problems of description, representation, and thereby legitimacy. THE PROBLEM OF DESCRIPTION AND REPRESENTATION The argument in this work is thus that the limited frame of “the Arctic.” creates a description that ultimately restricts regional development, through its adherence to features derived from established Arctic discourse literature and organization. As seen in the previous chapter, such approaches both run the risk of generalizing the dominant situation to other areas and carry a substantial conceptual baggage of the traditions in dispute with which present Arctic discourse has developed (such as the external description against which indigenous actors have organized, for instance, in Canada). These relations between description and representation are important in any territorial “ideal” imagination: any area defines itself largely in relation to external description, as well as to other areas and to history. If one looks at the areas comprising “the Arctic,” these are peripheries with relatively little representative power vis-à-vis the centres, and the risk that they would be described from a focus on the different is especially prominent. The external image of the Arctic can therefore not be seen as a marginal or easily disposed-of factor in description that current region-building has transcended. It continues to affect many who are not directly involved in creating it, such as residents of the areas, who may nevertheless be forced to relate to and even self-identify with it by addressing the traditional or contesting a wilderness or crisis problematique. Region-building discourse, in its search for the authentic, may thus, instead, through its imaginations of the environmental, indigenous and traditional elements create its opposite, the manufactured.15 For instance: If professional identity depends on such notions as aboriginal, pristine, original culture, primitive enclave etc connotating an isolation from pollution of industrial capitalist civilization, and if anthropological discourse consists in the analysis or interpretation of cultures, then a Hawaiian movement whose membership drinks coke, watches home videos, and at the same time is engaged in the reconstruction of its own cultural identity, is a potential threat (Friedman 1994:13, quoted in Olofsson 1995:40 in a work on the Saami).

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In an example from some of the areas currently seen as “Arctic,” Paltto notes: The Mythic North? That is a concept that was created by the outsiders, ethnographers, anthropologists, Christian ministers and occasional travellers. For us Samis there is nothing mythical about the North…you no longer encounter the mythic anywhere except where attempts are made to subjugate people The notion of the wildness of the North derives perhaps from urban living circumstances and that so-called community of systematic organization (Paltto in the discussion Paltto and Kailo 1998:27–29).16

As the previous chapter shows, a predication on distance has perhaps been the strongest characteristic of Arctic discourse: conceptions of the north as a delineable unit in itself are still utilized, and many areas in the Arctic continue to be described in terms of difference, not as naturalized “civilizations” but as particular “wildernesses.” This occurs even to the extent that essentialism can be traced in Arctic discourse in its references to externally defined categories and attempts to define and delineate the Arctic by levels of “northerness” that would integrate social and environmental characteristics and thereby juxtapose an essentialized “north” with a naturalized “south”: essentialism, as has been noted earlier, can be said to refer to a “mode of analysis in which social phenomena are analyzed not in terms of their specific conditions of existence and their effects with regard to other social relations and practices but rather as the more or less adequate expression of an essence” (Hindess 1977:95, quoted in Wickham 1986:149). “The Arctic,” even in current cooperation, is thus often seen not as a result of particular policies but as a given unit that can be relevantly described in terms of “northerness” beyond its widely differing state contexts and terms of development. There are many examples of such a problem of representation. If one looks generally at the problems in area studies based on historic conceptions, the most prominent example is perhaps Said’s well-known description of Orientalism as a discourse to define the Orient in juxtaposition to other areas. While this case may not be directly applicable to the present-day discourse of the “Arctic,” some parts of it can serve as an orientation to one major problem of area studies, and one which “the Arctic,” especially given its historical development, is not exempt from. Thus, as the Arctic was imagined as an essentialized and fundamentally different unit (and has been so through time), Orientalism created the Orient as an unit: “The relatively common denominator between…aspects of Orientalism is the line separating Orient from Occident” (Said 1985:90); this can be compared to the view of “the north” as differentiated from “the south” (something also Hønneland [1995, 1998] and Shields [1991] have noted). Said described such a conceptualization for the Orient as forming a “created body of theory and practice,” an “accepted grid for filtering though

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the Orient into Western consciousness” which “depends for its strategy on this flexible positional superiority” (Said 1979:6, 7, emphasis original). This can be compared to the view of the Arctic as an environmental and traditional indigenous wilderness, in contrast to an acculturated south; this is something Shields has referred to in relation to Canadian Arctic discourse with a similar pointedness: “when men were uncertain as to the precise quality of their sensed humanity, they appealed to the concept of wildness to designate an area of subhumanity that was characterized by everything they hoped they were not” (White 1978:151–152, quoted in Shields 1991:163). Said further noted that to speak of a scholarly specialization as a geographical” “field” is, in the case of Orientalism, fairly revealing since no one is likely to imagine a field symmetrical to it called Occidentalism” (ibid: 50). As the impossible counterpart to “Arctic” or “Northern studies,” shall we have then, “Southern” or “Temperate studies,” to describe urban areas of the industrialized northern hemisphere? The behavior and characteristics of Orientals were similarly supplied by Orientalism; “they supplied Orientals with a mentality, a genealogy, an atmosphere; most important, they allowed Europeans to deal with and even to see Orientals as a phenomenon possessing regular characteristics” (ibid: 42). In Arctic discourse, then, the indigenous peoples are required to be framed, or frame themselves, in terms of non-modern, authentic, traditional and other labels valid from an understanding of “the Arctic” as wilderness and become possible to understand and classify according to this characterisation. This is also the understanding that leaves “others” out—they simply have no descriptive locus in discourse. A specific representation is created, or, rather, demanded to gain political voice. Thus, as Said (1985:95) resists any “segregation or confinement of Orient to go on without challenge,” therefore “refusing designations like ‘Orient’ and ‘Occident,’ this work avoids treating the “Arctic” as an established category. This definition of “the Arctic” as a category of content and relevance is in fact the goal of region-building. One may paraphrase Neumann (1999:131), when he writes on inclusion of a state in international regionbuilding: first comes the insistence that the region really exists, “then the conclusion that this fact should ‘naturally’ and if possibly exclusively, be given a special droit de regard” in representation and international cooperation. This status as a given connotative and selective framework is one which the analyst must resist. THE STUDY OF REGIONS This work carries several implications for the study of regions. While they are not novel (cf. e.g. Neumann 1999; ch.l), they deserve further emphasis in concluding the study.

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As has been discussed in this chapter, one and perhaps a principal conclusion along the lines of a region-building approach is that the representation of and thereby the discourse on an area should not be assumed to be sustained only by state or other explicitly acknowledged actors in the political process. As we have seen in Arctic region-building, the representation and political targeting of the region was undertaken by a variety of actors, all having in common that they could speak from the same descriptive frame and take part in further developing it. This group included, and includes, an array of both domestic and international actors: politicians, civil servants handling the day-to-day matters, researchers who present papers on the development, supply descriptive fuel to the process and underpin it, and other groups such as international organizations. The selected actors and issues thus did not primarily follow a domestic-international or statenonstate division, but a selectivity derived from discourse that worked across these boundaries and determined who could access, agree and work within this understanding of and network on “the Arctic.” As an analyst, one should thus not limit oneself to any one group of actors, but be open to describe the alliances along discourse lines that may unfold. Analogously, one should also not see political representation and text representation as unrelated, perceiving one as political and the other as undertaken by disinterested or objective knowledge actors. In a discourse approach, knowledge is political and related to power as well as to situation, and the structuring metaphors (the frame) are what guide people towards or away from cooperation. Researchers are no exception: they choose topics, among other things, according to research interests formed in and through discourse, and are guided towards or away from cooperation in relation to its framing; this is a role of knowledge actors that has here been illustrated throughout. Thus, there are no actors that can be assumed to be non-political; their positions are constructed in and through discourse in the interlinkage between power and knowledge. In a Foucauldian sense, power brings into play relations between individuals and groups, and is rooted in the system of social networks: it is “power/knowledge, the processes and struggles that traverse it and of which it is made up, that determines the forms and possible domains of knowledge” (Foucault 1979:27–28, quoted in Dreyfus and Rabinow 1983:115). This work also makes a strong case for not judging regional formations solely on the basis of their regional cooperation structure, i.e., restricting one’s analysis of, say, the Arctic Council to the formation processes of the organization itself. Rather, a study of region-building needs to take into account the play in which regional formation takes place as related to other regional formations (such as the EU, EU policy, or US policy), changes in broader political systems and international order (such as here the specific effects upon countries active in present region-building following the end of the Cold War), and recent history which has inevitably played a part in building

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the relations and, indeed, the very institutions in which cooperation and conflict take place. Archaeological and genealogical study is particularly well suited to allow for such a contextualizing and tracing of the main lines of discourse in a wider spectrum than the direct organizational context. Such a study also allows for the comparison of the discourse developed in one’s case with other possible discourses on the areas, or with resistances to main discourse characteristics. In particular, the matching of practice to ensure legitimacy with claims to it is what needs to be investigated and not presupposed, with special attention paid to the potential of descriptions to contest claims and characterizations, i.e., to avoid fostering essentializing descriptions. What this indicates is that the analyst should be suspicious of descriptions and view the development of territory largely in relation to its descriptive processes. The analyst must ask who the actors involved are, and to what extent (and by what means) the construction of the region addresses regional problems rather than leave unproblematized whether it supplies or suggests the means (for example, democratic accountability) to determine and deal with regional concerns. Additionally, in analysis, one would need to focus not on the fiction of a state or national image as directly translatable to individuals but the actual characteristics of the population and its present, possibly multiple, identity frameworks. One question that must be asked for a given regional development, then, is from where it is driven: whose discourse is it? In the present work, the question has been, whose Arctic? Who are those who construct and negotiate the region? In this connection, a general problem in describing “regions” (or other communities which by necessities of scale are largely imagined) is of course how to get at experienced reality. Generally, given from where description has taken place, descriptive frameworks often center on the level of state and state identity. With cooperation mainly focused on this level, there is very little checking on the fit of cooperation to the regions involved; rather, the character of cooperation is shaped to fill the needs as perceived by dominant actors. The citizenry and their needs remain unknown, or even undescribed. General statements on similarities in language, political systems, etc., say very little about how people in the countries relate to each other, and speech may take place for rather than from any “bottom-up“development. In the present case, despite or perhaps judging from the talk of “for the region,” very little linkage could be found with decision-making systems in the areas; yet, this is a relation which must be targeted in discussing spatial representation. Analysis must therefore also be directed towards systems of accountability and their development. The functioning of organization and its accountability and links to regional administration also affect its ability to enforce decisions through these networks. Accordingly, further research on “the Arctic” needs to target problematic conceptualizations from the point of view of the inhabitants themselves and

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with considerable reflexivity on the part of researchers; the present work goes only as far as to indicate that conceptualisations of needs more broadly in the areas have not proceeded beyond a largely historically derived Arctic framing. To investigate the different areas without locking oneself to what Arctic discourse directs attention to would be an additional aim of future work and possibly of cooperation.

Notes

CHAPTER 1: REGION-BUILDING IN “THE ARCTIC” 1. Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland and Denmark-Greenland. Greenland is under Danish jurisdiction, although since 1973 it has had a Home Rule government. The form of writing Denmark-Greenland together will be utilised here. 2. AMAP (1998) judges the Arctic area to include about 3.8 million people. Broader conceptions (Young 2000, ch.l, para. 4, in a paper prepared for the Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region 2000 conference on request of Finland) take in “roughly 10 million people in an area that encompasses some fifteen percent of the planet’s land area.” The fact that delineations of the area differ strongly is discussed in ch. 2. 3. I thank Oran R.Young for helping me to define these foci. 4. The concept “Arctic” will be used to highlight the constructedness especially of the international region that is the focus of this work. The brackets will be left out when speaking of areas traditionally or climatically seen as Arctic (such as the Canadian Arctic, or the High Arctic). Brackets will also be left out when sentence structure or phrasing such as “Arctic discourse” make clear the nature of constructedness without bracketing. 5. The concept of region-building, then, has been explicitly applied by Neumann (e.g., 1992, 1999), but can be seen as descriptive of the social constructivist work on regions by, e.g, Paasi (1996); the approach draws upon a broad array of social constructivist work, notably Michel Foucault’s discourse analysis approach, as will be discussed later. 6. Heffernan relatedly notes “the constitutive significance of geography as discourse, as a way of describing and analysing places and peoples” (Heffernan 1998:5, emphasis original). 7. Thus, for example, the view of “the Arctic” as a “unit” would imply that comparisons are made between areas which perhaps would not have been compared earlier, and where now the search for similarities may guide the description. 8. Similarly, Schattschneider argued about the general impact of structure: “organization is the mobilization of bias” (Schrattschneider 1960:71, quoted in Bosso 1994:193, emphasis original). 9. This is not totally unrelated to, for instance, Kingdon (1995) and new institutionalism authors such as March and Olsen (e.g. 1989), who argue for appropriateness as a main selecting agent for actors. 10. Understood by Gramsci as a focus on alliance of social classes, the concept of hegemony has later been developed by authors progressing beyond a Marxist framework. The argument has subsequently become that one cannot assume ideological unity to exist among members of what may externally be identified

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Notes as a social group. Rather, any unity, or hegemony, that would come into existence requires continuous social production and reproduction. Beere writes: Hegemony is achieved through forging alliances and willing a substantial level of popular support by persuading different social groups, not naturally or inevitably disposed to align themselves with one another, of their common interests in a social vision. It is this dual process whereby interests are both expressed and contingently linked that is captured in the concept of articulation, which plays on the double meaning of ‘articulate’ (Beere 2000:49).

11. As Connell notes, discourses “are not “soft”, epi-phenomenal and ephemeral matters. On the contrary…they are extremely tough and resistant patterns of customary interaction’ (Connell 1977:217). 12. Lindgren describes that in comparison to regular historic writing and the history of ideas, Foucault’s approach centres on making its comparisons over a limited and regional scope, emphasising similarities between different fields developing in similar times, problematizing the continuities of the historical description, and revealing connections between discourses, institutions and political events, rather than just refering to the changes. Foucault’s approach also gives primacy to the question of which the multifaceted situations are that provide for the development of a speaking subject (Lindgren 1988). 13. Here, a Foucauldian view would suggest that actors in discourse are best understood as speaking positions, as they are constituted in and through discourse. For simplicity’s sake, however, the more common term “actor” will in general be used throughout the work to denote those active in regionbuilding. The term is used, however, without intending any distancing from the Foucauldian position. 14. Neumann states: One should not ask ‘How can this region be defined?’ or ‘How can we help the participants in this discourse define their object?’ but ‘Why do certain people, at a certain point in history, within a certain political context, try to build a region?’ The point of such a region-building approach is the same as in certain quarters is held to be the point of social analysis at large, namely, ‘not to discover the roots of our identity but to commit itself to its dissipation. It does not seek to define our unique threshold of emergence, the homeland to which metaphysicians promise a return: it seeks to make visible all those discontinuities that cross us’ (Foucault 1977a: 156, quoted within Neumann 1999:146–7).

15. One may compare this with the notion of critique in the work of critical theorists. Although this includes the emphasis on progressing beyond illusions towards emancipation, another, deeper sense is of “critique as oppositional thinking, as an activity of unveiling or debunking” (Connerton 1976:16–17, quoted in Smart 1989:135). “It is this sense of critique which constitutes a common denominator between the work of Foucault and the critical theorists” (Smart 1989:136). 16. Foucault notes. “In effect, what defines a relationship of power is that it is a mode of action which does not act directly and immediately on others. Instead it acts upon their actions” (Foucault 1983:220). “‘Government’ did not refer only to political structures or to the management of states; rather it designated the way in which the conduct of individuals or of groups might be directed… To govern, in this sense, is to structure the possible field of action of others” (Foucault 1983:221). 17. One of the fundamental tenets of liberal theory is that the exercise of public authority has to be based on the consent of the governed. The consequence

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of this is that actions of a public authority are “legitimate only insofar as they can be construed as the result of the consent of the subjected, and two, that there should be congruence between ‘the people,’ and the jurisdiction of the public authority” (Kratochwil 2000:187). 18. The interviews were structured around five main themes: • • • • •

Involvement (How did you become involved in the university initiative?) Diverging views (Which do you see as the main points of divergence in the discussions on a Arctic-region university? Examples, events) Organizational connections (Which do you see as the most beneficiary organizations for the university to be connected with? How have you found working with the Arctic Council?) Consultation (Why did you undertake your part of the consultation as you did?) Role (How do you see your role further on in the process?)

CHAPTER 2. REGION-BUILDING AND DEFINITIONS OF “THE ARCTIC” 1. To indicate some of the scope of exploration, the northward quest towards the North Pole, can be seen as more broadly beginning in 1596, when Willem Barentsz discovered Svalbard (Spitsbergen). What followed was a succession of explorers, of men hunting for adventure, or perhaps more for the results of adventure, and attempting to reach as far north as possible: Constantine John Phipps, Adolf Erik Nordenskiold, Fridjof Nansen, just to name a few (cf Holland 1994). 2. As M.J.Ross states in “The Arctic Grail,” “[t]he primary objective of the naval expeditions that left England between 1818 and 1845 was not that of pure geographic discovery, but of sailing a ship through from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean by a route north of the American continent—and before any other nation did so” (Ross 1989:173). 3. The High Arctic is the northernmost region of the Arctic, which is the broad understanding we will use here. The term is, however, ecologically defined, as the area where the growing season lasts only 1–2.5 months and where mean July temperatures range between 4–8 degrees. This is a situation corresponding to that often thought as the “polar,” as it only supports eight mammals and is a desert and semi-desert area: “[t]he High Arctic zone is often divided into the sparsely vegetated polar desert and the more productive polar semi-desert” (AMAP 1998:119). 4. Spuffold describes: The word primitive gained its modern sense over the course of the nineteenth century, in line with the revision of what it meant for something to hark back to early times. It had expressed an uncorrupted similicity, a first rightness, as in the phrase ‘the Primitive Church,’ or the consequent choice of an eighteenthcentury sect to call themselves ‘Primitive Methodists.’ Without ever quite losing its complimentary meaning, it also began to convey roughness, underdevelopment, a first crudity (Spuffold 1997:208–9).

5. Twelve governments that had participated in the 1957/58 International Geophysical Year and discussed the governance of the Antarctic proceeded to ultimately sign the Antarctic Treaty on December 1, 1959. With that, the development of the Antarctic Treaty System, governing the area south of 60° south latitude, had been initiated, retaining the Antarctic as an area for peaceful cooperation and outside state jurisdiction. The Antarctic Treaty

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12.

13.

Notes System would in time come to centre on civilian, environmental cooperation (Joyner 1998). The Antarctic Treaty area was created in 1964 as a “Special Conservation Area,” later supplemented with measures for, among others, the conservation of Antarctic fauna and flora, marine living resources, and, in 1991, the Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty on Environmental Protection (Joyner 1998:21–23, 265). As Koivurova notes, “definitions of the Arctic…normally exclude the Eurasian part of the region (Scandinavia, the Kola Peninsula and Iceland)” (Koivurova 2001:25). Finland, Sweden and Iceland, and all but the northernmost tip of Norway, are excluded from the Arctic altogether by a treeline definition (Koivurova 2001:25, AMAP 1998). The term “subarctic” is similarly defined by boreal forest areas limited to the south by the spread of more temperate tree types (oak, beech) or grassland. The similar technicality of definition applies: climatically at least one but not more than four months must have mean temperatures of 10 degrees or above, and at least one month must have mean temperatures above zero (S.B.Young 1989:13–18). This delineation of the Arctic (or “north,” two concepts often used synonymously in Canada) as the area north of the sixtieth parallel is actually often criticised as mythifying. Dacks continues: “The social problems found north of the sixtieth parallel also plagues communities in the northern parts of the provinces. Still, governmental responses to the similar conditions on both sides of the line differ substantially because of the political fact of the line” (Dacks 1981:6). Similarly, Shields writes:“ ‘North of 60’ is somehow ‘really North’ as opposed to the northern no man’s lands in the provinces” (Shields 1991:168; cf. Bone 1993). Wondering “why is it necessary to define the limits of the North?,” he continues “[t]he main standard of ‘isolation’ is distance from major cities. It is futile to draw further lines across the maps of the continent: ‘60 degrees north’ is at least a memorable phrase.” (Shields 1991:171). Bone also writes, with a hint of irony, that “[a]s each territorial government produces its own statistics, the task of assembling numerical data needed to bolster the text is greatly eased. Lastly, the territorial process of development is less complicated than that found in the northern provinces” (Bone 1993:183). There is some evidence that the Americas were discussed in a way that compared the areas below 60° south and above 60° north latitude at the time of the inception of Canada as a state in 1867 (cf. Gilpin 1873:162; DeBow 1854:526; also cf.ch. 6). 6). Even though this is a very simplified understanding of “the Arctic” and obscures differences between the Arctic and Antarctic, it is continually used. For example, arguing for a continuation of common polar studies of the Arctic and Antarctic in 2000, Adams states that “[c]oncerns are very similar, and interactions and exchanges among environmental specialists in the two regions are of mutual benefit” (Adams 2000, para. 28). This metaphor continues to be used in current cooperation. For example, S.B. Young note that the concept of the “Circumpolar North” can be defined through that the “northern polar regions form a nearly continuous ring of land, surrounding a mediterranean sea, the Arctic Ocean” (S.B.Young 1989:17, my emphasis). Early agreements include a 1911 fur seal protection convention and the 1920 treaty of Spitzbergen (Svalbard), which established Svalbard as an area for international research but politically under Norwegian jurisdiction. Several bilateral agreements on environmental issues in the Arctic area date from the 1970s-1980s, such as the 1972 Soviet-American Agreement on cooperation

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in the field of environmental protection and the 1984 Soviet-Canadian Protocol on Arctic scientific and technical cooperation which among its concerns includes cooperation in environmental protection of the North (Roginko 1990). Polar bear hunting is limited by the Oslo 1973 Agreement on Conservation of Polar Bears (European Environmental Agency 1996). 14. Similarly, Karlqvist and Heitzenberg write: Most of us would like to think of the polar regions as pristine places unspoiled by man There are [however] few Arctic research problems in which the transnational aspect is more striking than the case of atmospheric pollution (Karlqvist and Heintzenberg 1992:156, 168).

Or, as Heininen writes: Nature in the North—both fauna and flora—is unique. The environment is full of contrasts: light and dark, cold and warm, drowsiness of winter and passion of summer, shortage on one hand and abundance on the other. It is also extremely sensitive, vulnerable and slow to recover. Food chains are shor—lichen-caribouman, for instance—and sources of nutrition are limited (Heininen 1990:7).

The earlier on in the period of region-building, the stronger is the prominence given directly to the environmental perspective. One statement typical of the re-description that shifted the focus from military security reads as follows: today, there is an increasing awareness that there are many other dangers that pose a much higher risk to human life in the long run or inhibit the development of the full potential of the Arctic in harmony with nature. Research findings are making it increasingly evident that both the Arctic and Antarctic play a vital role in shaping the climate and in influencing the global environment. Early signs of change that could be of critical global significance may be detected in these unique natural laboratories (Chaturvedi 1994:27, my emphasis; compare e.g. Stokke 1990a).

In this not atypical description, several features of contemporary discourse description on “the Arctic” are apparent: recent change (reflecting the sentiment that “something has happened”) into an environmental discourse. This environmental discourse is phrased as the “Arctic in harmony with nature” and has elsewhere been connected to the view of the Arctic as “vulnerable”; the “pristine” that is threatened and must be “preserved” (cf. Young 1999). Chaturvedi further compares the Arctic and Antarctic (despite the fact that Antarctica has no permanent population and is also environmentally dissimilar to an extended Arctic). The Arctic is also defined as a “natural laboratory.” All in all, the description is one in which the describer is not inhabitant but observer. 15. These conventions and agreements applied to the Arctic, but were as a rule not specific to the area. Examples are the multilateral 1971 London Convention on the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping of Waste and other Matter, which prohibit sea dumping of highly radioactive substances and the 1979 Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution, both of which include all the eight states that are now seen as having land areas in the Arctic, and the MARPOL 73/78 International Convention for the Prevention of Pollution from Ships (London, 1973, plus the 1978 Protocol). Two further agreements relate specifically to the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans north of latitude 36°N—the Oslo 1972 Convention for the Prevention of Marine Pollution by Dumping from Ship and Aircraft, and the Paris 1974 Convention for the Prevention of Marine Pollution from Land-Based Sources.

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Since 1992 these two have been negotiated into a single legal instrument, the 1992 OSPAR Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic. The “Arctic” states are also parties to a number of global and regional multilateral arms control regimes that apply inter alia to the region, such as the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty, the 1971 Seabed Treaty, and the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) (Hitchins and Liander 1991:304). In addition, parts of the Arctic are covered by other regional agreements, such as the Berne 1979 Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats (cf. e.g. AMAP 1998:2–3 for an overview of agreements). 16. The concept and connotation of “Arctic” is also used in a rather unproblematized and connotational sense in recent region-building. For example, in the preparatory work towards compiling an “Encyclopedia of the Arctic” the editor notes in his guide to contributors: The Encyclopedia of the Arctic will not impose a single definition of the Arctic on contributors Many contributors will also use ‘Arctic,’ ‘circumpolar North,’ and ‘the North’ as interchangeable terms. Rather than resulting in a confused definition of the Arctic, the material presented in the Encyclopedia will demonstrate the incredible diversity of the northern regions of our globe (Nuttall 2001, para. 4).

The problem with such a wide use of “Arctic” as a label is of course that a referent cannot be deduced from the use of the term (cf. also ch. 6). 17. Sejersen’s description of foci is not dissimilar to other descriptions of the Arctic (cf. ch. 2, e.g. Young and Osherenko 1993; Young 1987). Lyck, for instance, describes the features of Arctic societies as among others low population density, fragile nature and economic dependency on a single or few resources and additionally often on transfer incomes; a recent market orientation which demands transformation of the society; large number of indigenous peoples, heavy immigration often for a short period of time of people “from the South” resultant in immigrants being majorities in the areas; high infant mortality, low expected average lifetime, and special migration patterns (Lyck 1996: xv; cf. Osherenko and Young 1989; compare with Käkonen 1992, 1994a, 1994b). She however concurs that some social scientists argue that also “the lower 48” states of the US have structures similar to the Arctic societies (Lyck 1996). Notable, however, is that economic development is not a major focus of this literature despite the focus on peripherality. As Sejersen note above, a more general human perspective is marginalized (Sejersen 1999). The main foci on the environmental and the traditional or indigenous are however reproduced, even by those distancing themselves from some of these elements. For instance, from a northern European background, Hoel downplays the focus on indigenousness and recency of settlement. He retains the element of tradition without stating it as a dependence on local resources (the local environment), and notes that while the demographies of the various people in the region vary (i.e. not emphasising an indigenous-nonindigenous distinction), many live in sparsely populated areas, mostly settled hundreds of years ago. “The historical dimension of their occupations—be it fishing or hunting—is prominent, and represents a deep cultural tradition” (Hoel 1993:25–26). In what may be a less contentious point, he considers the Arctic a typical periphery, dependent on the export of few economic resources, investments often from outside the areas, and where exploitation of large deposits of natural resources as oil and gas is based on industrial settlement close to the natural resources. This, he notes, leads to a conflict between goals of the state system and the goals of the periphery,

Notes

18.

19.

20.

21.

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which argues for its right to utilise the region’s natural resources for the benefit of the region itself (Hoel 1993:25–26). Developed in the late 1800s, the frontier concept was the fruit of a view long promulgated in exploration: of the wilderness as a pure environment, where the only inhabitants were indigenous peoples living in traditional ways (cf. Turner 1976, King 2000). Of these, “the Arctic” has been seen as part of the mainland only of Canada and Russia, and has thereby only gained some impact on national policymaking and state identity there. Greenland, then, was up until the 1950s kept as a Danish colony with restricted access, and holds Home Rule from Denmark since 1979; and Alaska is one of the two non-contiguous states of the 50 US states, with related low impact on US policymaking. Cf. ch. 6. Figure 5.1 in AMAP (1998:142) provides the numbers for total populations by Arctic area of each country, calculable as 3 783 525 people in total for the Arctic. AMAP (1998:143–179) provides data on indigenous populations in Arctic areas for the US, Canada, Greenland, the Saami area and Russia calculable as an indigenous population of 285 615 people in total for the international Arctic region. The percentage of indigenous peoples in the Arctic, in AMAPs assessment, is thus 13, 25 percent. The view of “the Arctic” in this context is thus largely that of the environmental “wildlands” and traditional indigenous “homelands” (to compare with Sejersen 1999). Constrained by this frame, Jull, for example, views the Arctic as mainly indigenous: “[i]n this paper, the words ‘aboriginal,’ ‘native,’ ‘indigenous’ and, sometimes, ‘northern peoples’ and ‘northerners’ are used interchangeably” (Jull 1986: ii). At the same time, he notes that this is incorrect, even from a focus on ethnicity and origin: “…northern peoples are not all aboriginal. The Faroese, the Icelanders and the Shetlanders are all prominent” (Jull 1986:5, my emphasis). Jull, in some indication of what he sees as “northern” in Canada, also links the concept of “north” to a concept of need (which may be somewhat surprising if seen from outside discourse): In Canada, national special interest groups and government policy have often defined ‘the north’ as the Yukon and Northwest Territories, no matter that a much larger and poorer population lies in the northern areas of provinces from Labrador on the Atlantic to the Pacific northwest coast (Jull 1986:5, my emphasis; cf. also Lyck 1996).

22. Svalbard/Spitzbergen was first settled with a small mining group by Norway largely to gain jurisdiction, and is today mainly an area for research cooperation. 23. For example, a Norwegian research definition of the Norwegian Arctic is the Svalbard Archipelago and the island of Jan Mayen (Norwegian Polar Institute 2001). In Sweden, the definition of the Arctic in research has consistently been that of the climatically defined Arctic. In a collection of papers on Swedish polar research, Hedberg (1994) surveys Swedish polar research during ten years only from the point of land areas outside Sweden, including no parts of the Norwegian, Swedish or Finnish mainland, but Greenland, Svalbard, Franz Josef Land, and the Siberian coast. Accordingly, much of the increase in Arctic cooperation in the 1980s—perhaps here symptomatic of the overall increase in international organization—focused on the High Arctic instead of on a change in policy on the state’s own internal territory. For example, in 1984 Sweden established a Polar Research Secretariat that focused its efforts most closely on Svalbard (Spitzbergen) and launched a major research program for the Antarctic (SWEDARP) (Hoel 1993:14; cf. Hedberg 1994). Finland became

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an Antarctic Treaty Consultative Party (ATCP) during 1984 (cf. Young 1998). Publications on the “European Arctic” that take in any extent beyond these areas are only of a relatively recent date, i.e. part of and relating to a regionbuilding development. For example the European Environment Agency monograph State of the European Arctic Environment (1996) refers to the fact that “[s]everal international processes are underway producing detailed and well documented status reports on various aspects of the Arctic, such as—the AMAP Assessment under the Rovaniemi process [the AEPS]; a large scale arctic environment report produced in co-operation between the eight arctic countries” and “[t]he Nordic Council of Ministers” report on the Nordic Arctic Environment. The above reports are to be published in late 1996 or 1997” (EEA 1996:5). Similarly, Finnish Arctic research has become emphasised only in conjunction with these recent and international processes, e.g. Finland’s Arctic Research Strategy (Korhola 1998:1, cf. Saarnisto 1998) states that “[t]he Northern Dimension policy currently being prepared by the EU calls for international cooperation in research in northern areas” and that during the seminar which the strategy was based upon, the “general view was expressed that Finland needs an Arctic research strategy of its own.” 24. The new policy environment following Gorbachev’s speech was also reflected in bilateral cooperation and how this was focused. Several bilateral Arcticrelated agreements signed at the time concern environmental issues: a SovietNorwegian Agreement on cooperation in the field of environmental protection and including Arctic cooperation was signed in January 1988; and a Soviet Union—US agreement on pollution control in the Bering and Chukchi seas, including mutual assistance in cases of marine pollution emergencies, was signed in May 1989. Formal bilateral environmental agreements at both intergovernmental and interagency levels have been signed by, for example Canada and Denmark-Greenland as well as by the United States and Canada. Among these are the January 1988 United States-Canada agreement to facilitate icebreaker movement to increase understanding of the Arctic marine environment (Roginko 1990). Other examples of bilateral cooperation are the scientific-technological cooperation agreement between the USSR and Norway and the PorcupineCaribou Conservation Agreement between the USA and Canada (Heininen 1992a: 49–50). Furthermore, the 1984 Protocol on Canadian-Soviet Consultations was extended by the April 1988 CanadianSoviet protocol on atmospheric monitoring and environmental protection. As a response in 1988 to Gorbachev’s Murmansk speech, a 1972 US—USSR Agreement on Cooperation in Environmental Protection with a section covering Arctic and Sub-Arctic ecology was revived. Soviet also made similar agreements with Norway and Sweden in 1988–1989 and increased cooperation with Finland in the Kola region (Archer 1992:91ff). 25. As a preceding early initiative, the international independent multidisciplinary organization Comite Arctique International (CAI) had been established in 1979 by researchers and industrialists (Taagholt 1994:12), and the Arctic Ocean Sciences Board had been established in 1984, both focusing environmental cooperation and research. The 1982 Northern Scientific Network, part of UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere project, held a somewhat wider scope (Roginko 1990:109). 26. The International Polar Commission, created in 1879 as a body for polar research, had supported an introduction of polar research into the mainstream of international science especially through the 1957–1958 International Geophysical Year (IGY) conference. In relation, at the 1957 meeting of the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) in Brussels, a proposal was made for a Scientific Committee for Arctic and Antarctic Research. “As the

Notes

27.

28. 29. 30. 31.

32.

33.

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need for coordination of research seemed to be largest in the Antarctic,” ICSU in 1958 set up the Special Committee on Antarctic Research, later renamed the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) (Roots 1992:143). Purver further notes: “Primarily, some of the non-military aspects of the initiative have borne fruit. Gorbachev’s endorsement of a coordinating body for Arctic scientific research also boosted the ongoing efforts by other states to create such a body, the International Arctic Science Committee” (Purver 1988:153–154). Young continues: “the organization is likely to remain sensitive to the concerns of states due to the fact that states constitute the principal source of funding for scientific research in the polar regions” (Young 1992:40–41, draft). This is largely seen as the explanation of why the Nordic Council was set up in 1952 (cf. Simoulin Lereps 2000). This was probably one of the reasons that the more independent and open Arctic non-governmental scientific forum the Comite Arctique International was retained at the time, although with a low profile (Archer 1992:94–95). As has been noted, this is an extension of the Arctic beyond the polar, and largely the result of the recent political bargaining process. As an example of how it was stated as a new understanding, when President George Bush in this new policy environment reviewed a proposal towards aerial-inspection (with “quiet but effective” encouragement from the Canadian government), the Canadian Centre for Arms Control and Disarmament suggested that “the Arctic region, including even the pertinent territories of neutral Sweden and Finland, be covered by an open-skies arrangement” (Henrikson 1992:122–123, my emphasis). Similarly, changes in the conception of “the Arctic” came to influence the more traditional polar approach IASC had reverted to. For example does the IASC Project Catalogue presently include also work related to cultural change (IASC 2002). Gorbachev had stated: Secondly, we welcome the initiative of Finland’s President Mauno Koivisto on restricting naval activity in the seas washing the shores of Northern Europe. For its part, the Soviet Union proposes consultations between the Warsaw Treaty Organization and NATO on restricting military activity and scaling down naval and air force activities in the Baltic, Northern, Norwegian and Greenland Seas, and on the extension of confidence-building measures to these areas This could be an initial step in the extension of confidence-building measures to the entire Arctic and to the northern areas of both hemispheres (Gorbachev 1987, para. 37).

The interest in northern waters has also been a rather broad and continuous one among parties concerned not only with security but with shipping possibilities (those limited by security conflicts). For example the 1993– 1999 INSROP project, jointly Norwegian-Russian-Japan-led, focused on investigating the viability of commercial shipping along the North-West Passage north of Russia (INSROP 2002). 34. The work of Möttölä (1988), who edited an early volume where the Arctic was discussed as a region is also notable here: it however largely discusses the Arctic from a military security point of view, and includes large a large North American authorship. 35. In 1991 14 regions gathered in Anchorage, Alaska in 1991 to found The Northern Forum, an association of subregional governments. The first suggestion of such an organization was made in a conference in Hokkaido, Japan, in 1974, while the re-energisation took place through a conference

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Notes in Canada 1989, fifteen years later, followed by one in Alaska 1990. These provided meeting points for senior officials from a range of states, provinces, territories, counties, and autonomous regions (Hickel 1996; Young 1992, draft). Highlighting the relative definition of “the Arctic” or “northern,” the Northern Forum takes in an area that differs significantly from the region of the Arctic Eight in “Arctic” cooperation—it includes for example Hokkaido in Japan, the northern province of Heilongjiang in China, and the Dornod region of Mongolia (Young 1992, draft; Young 1993, draft).

CHAPTER 3: THE “ARCTIC” IN THE ARCTIC ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION STRATEGY AND ARCTIC COUNCIL 1. At the same time as developments related to this initiative proceeded, regionbuilding related to “the Arctic” took place in other fora as well. One notable new actor was created following a parliamentary conference that the Nordic Council, after having been called into Arctic cooperation organised in 1993 in Reykjavik, Iceland, on development and protection of the Arctic region (cf. Nordic Council 1993). The final document from the conference called for the establishment of a Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region to further the implementation of the Document and to take new initiatives (Haarde 1997:66). The body was then set up in September 1994 originally to support the establishment of the Arctic Council (cf. Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region 2002). In 1996, the Nordic Council then set up an Arctic research programme: the same year, a second conference of the Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region was held in Canada. The issues taken up at that occasion to a large degree reflected those discussed in the Arctic Council. Thus, for example the conference statement from the March 13–14, 1996, Second Conference of Parliamentarians of the Arctic region in Yellowknife, Canada, recommends support for the development and implementation of international and national activities arising out of Agenda 21 of UNCED in the Arctic regions, where appropriate (Climehaga 1996). Also, the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy was far from being detached from broader utilisation of the opened policy window: “the signing of the founding articles of the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC) in August 1990 and the launching of the Northern Forum in September 1990 helped to energize a process already well under way” (Young 1998:116). 2. Also in 1988, the Arctic Centre was established at the University of Lapland. While the motivations for setting up this centre might have been multifaceted, the WWF Arctic Bulletin notes, “[t]he centre’s activities should be seen as a logical extension of the Finnish initiative” (WWF Arctic Bulletin 1994:10). 3. Similarly, while Finland has through the AEPS-Arctic Council continued to maintain a special focus on forestry issues, for example in a special boreal forest initiative (cf. e.g. SAO Meeting Whitehorse, May 9–11, 1998), issues such as acidification also only had a limited role later in the main AEPSArctic Council processes. 4. From 1948–55, the Soviet view seems to have been that of Finland as part of the Soviet sphere. President Kekkonen however spoke of “a kind of neutrality” in 1952; then, in 1957 was the term “neutrality” first used, in a Fenno-Soviet Communique with reference to a “…peaceful and neutral foreign policy” (Fitzmaurice 1987:50).

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5. The 1944 Armistice, the 1947 Peace Treaty, and the 1948 FCMA Treaty all placed limitations on Finland’s freedom of action. Among other things, Finland was obliged not to enter into any coalition directed against the Soviet Union, oppose attacks on the Soviet Union through Finnish territory and inform the Soviet Union of any such attempt (Fitzmaurice 1987). 6. Finnish Secretary of State Valtasaari (1998, para. 2) describes: “The single most important achievement of the post war era was, without doubt, Finland’s ability to convince Moscow of the benefit of having a stable and prosperous Finland as its neighbour and trading partner.” 7. Quote in original: “Åren 1992 och 1993 avtog intresset for det nordliga i Finland, samtidigt som det internationella samarbetet ytterligare utvidgades inom de nordliga områdena. Eventuellt var det fråga om en synvilla, men det verkade som om de nordliga frågorna hade glömts bort i utrikespolitiken och även i dialogen med EG, efter att den arktiska miljöskyddsstrategin antagits” (Heininen 1999b: 31). 8. Heininen also writes in 1992: it is still possible that Arctic cooperation will become a significant dimension in Finnish foreign policy, both in the context of bilateral and multilateral cooperation; ongoing efforts in ‘environmental foreign policy’ set a good example However, in order to do that Finland needs a special development program and a comprehensive policy on Northern issues—a policy which would be a natural component of her European policy (Heininen 1992a: 54).

9. The term might first have been used by Finnish Foreign Minister Heikki Haavisto in February 1994 (Heininen 1999b: 34). Through its initiative on the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy, Finland introduced an “Arctic”-label discourse into international political organization on the European north. From the Norwegian side, a region-building initiative, the Barents Euro-Arctic Region (BEAR), was then developed as a counterpart to this Finnish initiative, and, similarly, as a step towards relations to Russia. In April 1992, the Norwegian Foreign Minister Thorvald Stoltenberg presented an initiative on multilateral cooperation that launched a Norwegian northern region-building development, the “Barents Euro-Arctic Region” (BEAR), which has largely been seen as an initiative directed towards Russia and Europe. Because of its sovereignty over Svalbard and large fishing and oil interests Norway had here an extensively developed policy in these areas of northern cooperation, and, for example, been in conflict with the Soviet Union over fishing zones in the Barents sea (similarly to CanadianUS conflicts in adjacent waters, cf. e.g. Bankes 1987; Østreng 1992:35; Hitchins and Liander 1991:310, Stålvant 1982), which is part of the background to such Norwegian northern initiatives. Finnish support for this Norwegian Barents Euro-Arctic Region initiative was only given after the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the shipping and machine industry expressed interest in international travel through the North East Passage north of the Russian coast. Despite, or perhaps because this was an Arctic- and European-related initiative on the Norwegian state level, Finland has not played a large role in the BEAR, and the BEAR has, also, been criticised as a largely topdown, Norwegian state initiative: it is described by Neumann as “a conglomerate of an Arctic region, a Baltic region, and North Sea region. Incidentally, the Northern region thus defined would have Norway as its pivotal axis” (Neumann 1999:138, cf. Østreng 1999a: 174; Heininen 1998a: 20; Hønneland 1995, 1998). In a comment recalling the discussion of the regional applicability of an “Arctic” model in ch. 2,

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Hønneland concludes: “it seems all the more appropriate to ask whether the new transnational northern identity relates only to a very limited group of entrepreneurial people with particular interests in developing contacts at the other side of the border” (Hønneland 1998:90). As with the Finnish motivation for the AEPS, the Barents Euro-Arctic Region can thus be seen to serve as an initiative for cooperation towards Russia and the EU which in that related to the Arctic region-building processes developed following Gorbachev’s 1987 speech (Svensson 1995a: 30, cf. Svensson 1995b). For Finland, then, when Finland applied for EC membership, “the northern was not placed high on the political agenda” [in original: “det nordliga fanns inte högt på den politiska agendan’] (Heininen 1999b: 32). What Finland would later emphasise as a Northern Dimension within the EU, and which finally came to centre on the Baltic area, was not, however, at the time expressed as a political initiative. This might indicate that it was not the northern or “Arctic” as such that was of primary interest—neither for Finland in the AEPS or later, or for Norway in its initiative—but the foreign policy leverage that could be gained through it. 10. The Finnish initiative towards a Northern Dimension of the EU is notable as a second post-AEPS development to deal with the Nordic north. Following its access to a less Soviet/Russia-constrained foreign policy arena, Finland utilised the northern focus developed in the AEPS in subsequent foreign policy initiatives. Following the 1991 AEPS development and its emphasis on foreign policy, the Northern Dimension provided another way for Finland to utilise and find a position in the new international situation (largely reminiscent of the way Canada launched a Northern Dimension development to deal with, amongst other, its relations to the US). Officially launched by Finland in 1997 (Lipponen 1997), the Northern Dimension had originally been suggested in 1994, a year after Norway’s launch of the BEAR regionbuilding initiative (which itself like Finland’s 1991 AEPS institutionalisation dealt, amongst other things, with relations to Russia and the EU). This emphasis on “the north” seems to largely have been a novel strategic choice. “Finland does not use to have her own northern policy as a part of her foreign policy” (Heininen 1997a: 371). Heininen notes: Neither did the programme of the Government of Mr. Lipponen [later proclaiming the Northern Dimension initiative] include any special, explicit mention of northern dimension inside the EU nor northern policy of Finland. At that time it seemed that a northern dimension and northern cooperation did not have a high status in the national priorities of Finland (Heininen 1997b: 237; cf. Heininen 1999a: 393).

Similarly, “Arctic cooperation did not become a significant dimension in Finnish foreign policy in the early 1990s, even though there was the AEPS” (Heininen 1997b: 236). As Vaernø indicated already in 1993, it could however be beneficial especially for Finland to highlight Norden as a cooperation area within the EU. By making Norden the focus of European cooperation for Finland, potential Russian objections against Finnish EU membership may be avoided (Vaernø 1993:177). What the Northern Dimension thus seemed to serve to complete was the movement Finland had initiated with the AEPS to move away from Russia and towards the EU: By joining the European Union in 1995 Finland was home at last. As any outside observer will notice joining the European Union has set a lot of energy free in Finland (Valtasaari 1998 [Finnish Secretary of State], para. 2–3).

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The official launch of the Northern Dimension in 1997 then took place a mere two years after Finland with record speed had reoriented after the Cold War and become an EU member state. In another two years, in 1999, the Northern Dimension was accepted as a policy within the EU framework. In content, however, a Northern Dimension of the EU is still largely conceptual and under development. It is also a geographically dispersed “dimension,” which over time has attained a focus specifically on extra-EU relations to Russia. “The geographic focus is understood to be on the countries bordering the Baltic Sea and on the North-West Russian regions, as well as Kaliningrad”; Kaliningrad is here given extra importance “due to its future position as Russian enclave in the European Union” (European Commission Working Document of the Commission Services 2001:2, 47). The means by which this broad cooperation should be undertaken however reveal a rather low EU priority for the Northern Dimension, as implementation of the Northern Dimension concept is expected to take place within existing frameworks without extended budgetary resources (cf. European Commission Working Document of the Commission Services 2001:3). Further development of the broad Northern Dimension will, nevertheless, include consultation with regional bodies, among others the Arctic Council. This is something insisted upon especially by Greenland, which as has been discussed has a significant focus on the Arctic (Greenland Home Rule Government 2002). An “Arctic Window” has thereby been conceptualised as a Greenlandic initiative within the Northern Dimension, following Commission participation at a ministerial meeting of the Arctic Council, and with one aim being to identify specific EU interests in the Arctic (Stenlund 2002, Council of the European Union 11 June 2001:10, 17; Council of the European Union. 13 June 2000:7; European Commission Working Document of the Commission Services 2001). For other parts of northern Europe than Greenland, however, the focus on an “Arctic” approach has lessened, and the Northern Dimension more broadly has taken on other priorities, including international crime, security and Russia (cf. Council of the European Union 11 June 2001:5). 11. Huebert notes that while this participation was directed from specific indigenous organizations prominently the ICC, “[i]t is important to note that these three organizations do not represent, or claim to represent, all northern Indigenous peoples” (Huebert 1998:149). 12. Canada, the US (through Alaska), Greenland (and Denmark through the sovereignty it holds over Greenland), Norway through its long coastline and its sovereignty over Svalbard, and the Soviet Union. 13. In conclusion, Pharand justified this choice of delineation with a statement rather unspecific to the different situations in the areas: The area [above the 60th parallel of latitude] includes, of course, all of the Arctic Ocean and surrounding seas, as well as the southern limit of sea ice. By contrast, the Arctic Circle would have left out significant bodies of water, large areas of the tundra and of sea ice (Pharand 1991, para. 23, my emphasis).

14. As noted previously, the 1988–1991 informal meetings of the Working Group on Arctic International Relations gathered some of these researchers and policymakers. One of its co-chairs, Franklyn Griffiths in 1990 also co-chaired the Arctic Council Panel, which suggested the development of an Arctic Council, following upon his earlier two decades of work of advocating a Canadian northern foreign policy under the highly changing circumstances of this time. In a document from one of the Working Group on Arctic International Relations sessions, Griffiths and Young make a suggestion that foreshadows some of the Arctic Council Panel, as well as some later Arctic Council, suggestions:

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Notes In the interest of establishing an inventive partnership between the small communities of the Arctic and concerned persons to the south, we propose the creation of an international pilot project on sustainable development in the Arctic. …to explore and build on the cultural experience of small communities located throughout the Arctic in a search for effective responses to the corrosive forces now threatening their viability. …To avoid any bias from southern ethnocentrism, Arctic natives should form a majority on the panel charged with making the final selection of proposals to be founded (Griffiths and Young 1989:22–23, emphasis original).

15. Also, domestically, when Canada in 1991 announced its Arctic environmental strategy as a key component of the government’s nation-wide green plan, the ICC moved quickly to develop a 5-year work plan to assure its participation in the four programme areas of Arctic contaminants, waste, water quality, and the integration of environment and economy (Reimer 1993, Simon 1992:23). 16. The listing in the proposal of “potential arctic problems for identification, joint action, and standardization of performance,” is reproduced here: Arctic-specific Aboriginal self-determination; arts and cultural exchange; cessation of low-level flight training; cessation of ‘tickler’ flights by strategic bombers; codification and dissemination of aboriginal traditional science; cooperatives; creation of a central arctic data bank; cold regions technology development and transfer, education; environmental impact assessment procedures and techniques; fisheries research and management; regionally generated food contamination; habitat protection; health services delivery; housing; human resource development; hydrocarbon, hard mineral and other mega-projects; land-use planning; marine transportation; oil spill clean-up in arctic waters; parks creation; prohibition of amphibious landing exercises; removal of hazardous materials from active and decommissioned military sites; remote sensing; search and rescue; sewage disposal and water management; small business development; tourism; violation of aboriginal and other human rights; weather and ice forecasting; wildlife management and co-management. Arctic-external Amendment of international legal instruments to meet arctic requirements; arctic business cycle and counter-cyclical action; attack submarine limits; cruise missile testing; depressed fur prices; establishment of demilitarized zones; food contamination; high-latitude effects of global warming; long-range airborne and oceanic transport of pollutants; military data exchanges; naval deployment and exercise limitations; nuclear weapons testing; nuclear weapons reductions (Arctic Council Panel 1991a, Table 2).

17. Or, as Canadian Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Tom Siddon declared: Prime Minister Mulroney will be writing to the heads of government of the seven other nations inviting them to send representatives to Canada later this year. Together, they can begin exploring how such a permanent council might be constructed and what its mandate and responsibilities might be (quoted in AKS 1991, para. 8).

Subsequently, in 1992, President Boris Yeltsin and Prime Minister Brian Mulroney signed a Declaration of Friendship and Cooperation in Ottawa (February 1 1992). It states that “Canada and the Russian Federation, as major Arctic states, affirm their support for the creation of an international Arctic Council to protect the Arctic, its peoples and its resources, while fostering

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prosperity in the region through enhanced cooperation among circumpolar states” (quoted in Pharand 1992:168). In March, immediately follow ing the Canadian-Russian agreement to promote the Council, the ICC then hosted a Canadian aboriginal leaders roundtable discussion (Simon 1992:22). 18. In a later analysis, Heininen and Käkonen write: For the other Arctic countries, it is good to understand why Canada invented the North as an important element in its politics. Compared to the USA or the EU, Canada is a small and peripheral country. Its role in global politics has been rather limited. By establishing a dimension of its own, Canada can gain in international influence and avoid further peripheralization (Heininen and Käkonen 1998:9).

19. To this end, for example, a Northern Foreign Policy Conference was held in April 1994 in Ottawa (Simon 1995:48).

CHAPTER 4: SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN THE ARCTIC 1. Whaling has been especially contested as it has largely come to be seen as a conflict over values, both in Arctic discourse and more broadly. For instance, Freeman introduces an article on Arctic whaling with the following words: This essay discusses certain culturally based adverse impacts upon northern peoples’ socioeconomic and cultural ‘security’ which originate in distant urban centers where economic and political agendas often antagonistic to Northerners’ interests are aggressively pursued. In particular, anti-sealing and anti-whaling movements are addressed (Freeman 1997:7).

Similarly, under the heading “The new enemies,” Lynge states that While trying to settle the rights to non-renewable resources, our right to harvest renewable resources came under attack. Our culture and our very means of subsistence became a target for large southern nations Funded by industry and international concerns and under the cover of an organization for the protection of the environments the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) and Greenpeace launched a campaign against the hunting of seal cubs off the Newfoundland coasts (Lynge 1993:100).

Whaling was also one of the issues around which the Arctic Leaders’ Summit was organized; its priority areas included renewable resources harvesting and subsistence rights, traditional ecological knowledge, and the mandate and role of existing and future organizations relevant to the Arctic (Lynge 1993:114). 2. The purpose of the IWC, according to the Preamble to the Convention, which is still in force, is “‘to conserve whales in order to allow the orderly development of the whaling industry’…the IWC is [thereby] under its rules of procedure required to base its advice on ‘the best scientific advice’ [Article V para. 2] and ‘to take into account the needs and concerns of the users and consumers of whale products’ [Article V para. 2b]” (Freeman et al. 1998:101). Although formal structure remains the same, however, the character of the IWC as an organization largely differs from what it was in its early years (Andresen 1997, Mitchell 1998, Freeman et al. 1998). This change in practice has largely taken place through whaling acquiring the status of a symbol issue. To deal with the changing attitude, states that were still practising whaling withdrew or opted out of the IWC and/or concentrated their whaling on permitted scientific whaling. After the moratorium on commercial whaling was implemented, the number of scientific permits (almost non-existent before

200

3.

4. 5.

6.

7.

Notes the mid–1970s) proposed to the IWC’s scientific committee increased sharply. “By the early 1990s, however, a strong scientific consensus emerged that certain species of whales could be hunted at limited levels without threatening those species. This new consensus has brought into relief the fundamental conflict in the principles of whalers, conservationists, and preservationists” (Mitchell 1998:286). From a Norwegian point of view, Blichfeldt argues that “whaling and sealing has been a part of peoples basic sustenance as far back as traces of people can be found on the coast of Norway. …The Pilot whale hunt, in the Faroes, is a widespread tradition carried on for centuries” (Blichfeldt 1992:16). For Norway and Iceland, Sigurjonsson argues, “evidence of whaling activities in northern Norway reaches to the Stone Age” (Sigurjonsson 1997:19); “the utilization of whales in Iceland as a source of food is well documented in medieval manuscripts dating back to the 13th century” (ibid: 21). For example, after a 1996 US threat of sanctions against Canada, Canada claimed that any sanction would be in violation of GATT/WTO and that it would file a complaint if such were imposed (Petursdottir 1997:6). Following informal discussions among Icelandic, Norwegian, Greenlandic, and Faroe Islands delegation members to the IWC since 1986, the North Atlantic Committee for Cooperation on Research on Marine Mammals (NAC) was established in 1990. Canada, probably not wishing to become too closely associated with commercial whaling nations, did not sign at this time (Hoel 1993:118–119). In 1992, on the basis of NAC, Iceland, Norway, Greenland and the Faroe Islands established the North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission (NAMMCO). This organization was, among other things, to approve catch quotas to be set using IWC’s models (Hoel 1993:121). It was thus instituted as a complementary (or conflicting) organization to the IWC and the interpretation of marine mammals management in the IWC. The IPS was established in Copenhagen to act as a coordinating body for the three indigenous Permanent Participant organizations in the context of Arctic cooperation (Huebert 1998:144). Located on the premises of the Greenland Home Rule Denmark Office, it was funded for the three first years by the Danish Ministry of the Environment, and officially opened in February 1995 (WWF Arctic Bulletin 1995a: 8). Indigenous organization was also supported in other ways. At the Nuuk meeting, the ministers also agreed to arrange a seminar on implementation of the indigenous peoples’ knowledge into the work of the AEPS. This meeting was hosted by the Icelandic Government and took place in Reykjavik, Iceland, on September 20–23,1994. The three main subjects were indigenous peoples’ knowledge in relation to cooperation in the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program, the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna working group, and on Sustainable Development and Utilization (Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat 2002). There was also a growing interest in the role of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), especially indigenous peoples’ knowledge on the environment, in dealing with matters of environmental protection (Young 1998:108–109). This international cooperation is fairly recent. Some aspects of the beginnings of ICC are to be found in the invitations of not only academic but indigenous representatives to the Fondation Francaise d’Etudes Nordiques in Le Havre/ Rouen 1969, that is, to a conference on “northern studies” (Williamson 1986). The 1973 Arctic Peoples Conference was then held in Copenhagen (where the International Working Group on Indigenous Affairs had been located since 1968) on Greenland’s initiative (Stenbaek 1987). This Conference helped spawn the World Council of Indigenous Peoples, whose first conference was

Notes

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

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held in 1975 (Saladin d’Anglure and Morin 1992:14). Here, the late Eben Hopson, Sr., Mayor of the North Slope Borough, the Home Rule Government of Northern Alaska, took part. Hopson had been one of the leading politicians behind the establishment of aboriginal land claims agreements in Alaska and, among others things, had participated in negotiations for the 1971 Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA, a controversial act that came to inspire Canadian and Greenlandic Inuit self-determination). With this experience and given the broader political context and breeding ground of initiatives, Hopson came to be one of the driving parties in the 1977 founding of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference ICC (Lynge 1993, Williamson 1986). The ICC among other things initiated the Arctic indigenous leaders summit held in Denmark in 1991, bringing together leaders and representatives of governments and indigenous organizations towards sustainable development of the Arctic (Simon 1992, Faegteborg 1993). Also, since 1983 the ICC has held NGO status in the Economic and Social Council of the UN (ECOSOC) (Tennberg 1994). About a year after the Nuuk decision to establish the group, the first meeting of the TFSDU took place in Yellowknife, Canada, August 30–31,1994 (TFSDU April 24,1995). The main outcome was a schedule for subsequent work and the selection of a number of case studies and other tasks to yield recommendations to the ministers in 1996. (TFSDU Summary, March 13–14, 1995) Most of the activity leading up to the second meeting in Iqaluit, Canada, March 13–14 1995 then consisted of drafting suggestions for the different projects that had been suggested ad hoc (TFSDU, April 24, 1995). This meeting also discussed the evolution of the TFSDU into a working group on a par with the other AEPS working groups (TFSDU Summary, March 13–14,1995). A third meeting was then held in Toronto, Canada, November 27–28, 1995. Themes on Integrated Environment and Development in Decision-Making, Contaminants Management and Conservation of Biological Diversity were less controversial. With a somewhat critical perspective, the first of these, however, placed the focus on the need for people’s participation in policymaking, noting how decision making historically had been “fragmented, politically expedient and done with insufficient attention to the long term consequences for the environment or to the impact on people” (TFSDU Draft No 3, November 9, 1995, Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic, “Integrated Environment and Development in Decision-Making’). Reflecting this disagreement, it was recommended to the AEPS ministerial that the existing AEPS working groups remain under the AEPS pillar of the Arctic Council. New working groups related to economic, social and cultural issues would be established under the sustainable development pillar of the Arctic Council, where the existing task force on sustainable development and utilization would be integrated (AEPS, June 7, 1995). This development into an explicit pillar structure did not, however, take place. For example, observers of the process discussed the question of added value of the Council conceptually: Østreng note that its overall objective could be seen as providing a forum for “addressing and identifying Arctic-specific problems, rather than having to adapt to extra-territorial requirements” (Østreng 1997:36, emphasis in original), or “emphasize Arctic issues in global fora, e.g. to stress the role of the Arctic in global climate change. This would be a long-term positive impact of the Arctic Council” (Vidas 1997:135). Vidas however note that in a Nordic policy seminar discussing Arctic cooperation, the question of what the “Arctic area” was seen as was singled out as a priority issue: “Different participating countries may have different understanding of how that area can be more precisely determined.

202

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

Notes Moreover, this depends on the purpose of determination, such as geographical, environmental, or a geo-political one” (Vidas 1997:134–135). This group was included in 1998, when the SAOs in closed meetings decided on a fourth indigenous peoples’ organization, the Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association (later named the Aleut International Association), as had been suggested by the US (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11,1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). This decision was later verified in the ministerial. The references to “the Arctic” as a “region” increased over time. In contrast to the 1991 Declaration, there are several mentions of the Arctic as a region in the Nuuk Declaration (1993), such as “recognizing the importance of applying the results of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development to the Arctic region,” to “cooperate to strengthen the knowledge base and to develop information and monitoring systems for the Arctic region” and “undertake to consider the development of regional instruments concerned with the protection of the Arctic environment.” Also, the related Inuvik Declaration on Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development in the Arctic (1996) rather frequently speaks of the Arctic as a “region.” The Indigenous Peoples Secretariat (IPS) would also continue under the Council (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996; cf. Bloom 1999). Also, in 1997, the last AEPS ministerial separate from the Arctic Council was held in Alta in Norway. With it, the AEPS programs were also formally incorporated under the Council. The Alta Ministerial Declaration recommends sustainable development as an overriding concern for all activities and indigenous peoples’ traditional knowledge as “essential to sustainable development, including the use of natural resources and effective environmental protection of the Arctic” (Alta Declaration, June 13, 1997, cf. Meeting Summary, AEPS, Ministerial conference. June 12–13, 1997, Alta, Norway). The 1996 Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council notes that the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, the Saami Council and the Association of Indigenous Minorities in the Far North, Siberia, the Far East of the Russian Federation are Permanent Participants in the Arctic Council. Permanent participation is equally open to other Arctic organizations of indigenous peoples with majority Arctic indigenous constituency, if these represent either a single indigenous people resident in more than one Arctic state; or more than one Arctic indigenous people resident in a single Arctic state. However, the declaration offers no advice on how an applicant group should be evaluated or applicants be chosen between (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996; cf. Bloom 1999). At the meeting, observer status in the Council was also granted to non-Arctic states, international governmental organizations and interparliamentary organizations on the regional and global level, and non-governmental organizations (Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council, Ottawa, September 1996). All Observers are allowed to participate in all meetings of the Council and its subsidiary bodies. Those already existing as Observers under the AEPS remained so (as no decision to remove them was taken). Others may apply to the Council, and, if accepted, retain the status for the period between ministerial meetings. The highest level of interaction, then, within the Council occurs at bi-annual ministerial meetings. Between these occasions, Council work is directed by the SAOs in consultation with Permanent Participants, regularly in meetings several times a year as well as through the efforts of the biannually selected Host Country, which maintains the Arctic Council secretariat (Bloom 1999). These disagreements should also be seen in context of wider cooperation.

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In the aftermath of Canada’s allowing several bowhead whales to be taken in 1996 contrary to policies of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), the US asserted that this action diminished the effectiveness of the IWC’s conservation program. President Clinton concluded that Canadian whaling on endangered whales warrants action at this time. Accordingly, I have instructed the Department of State to oppose Canadian efforts to address takings of marine mammals within the newly formed Arctic Council. I have further instructed the Department of State to oppose Canadian efforts to address trade in marine mammal products within the Arctic Council (President’s Message to Congress on Canadian Whaling Activities, in I Pub. Papers: 144 [Feb. 10, 1997], quoted in Bloom 1999, footnote 32).

18. The depth of the problem of an overarching direction for the Council, and its relation to both the current indigenous and environmental foci and foreign policy considerations was clearly indicated at this time. In 1997 in an officially sanctioned assessment of the AEPS, Nilson concluded that “[i]ntegration should be based upon Sustainable Development as the core, or horizontal, concept” (Nilson 1997:9). In this, he refers to among others a proposal by Greenland at the SAO meeting in Kautokeino in March 1997. But despite suggesting the advancement of sustainable development as the main focus of “Arctic” cooperation, Nilson further notes that “if economic development is included in the Arctic Council agenda, this will mean a risk of internal conflicts between the environmental and development components of circumpolar cooperation” (Nilson 1997:7). This was also the viewpoint forwarded by Iceland at the same meeting in which Greenland suggested integration based on sustainable development: Iceland proposed that environmental protection be retained as the main issue in Arctic cooperation (Prokosch 1998a). 19. Norway’s compromise solution suggested amending the Canadian text to that “Environmental protection shall be fully integrated into all relevant activities related to sustainable development,” and that assessment of potential impacts will be an integral part of all the development activities of the sustainable development program (Norway 1997). For example, Norway stated this need for strategy as follows ‘I have nothing against the process involving the study, the working out and studying and adoption of concrete projects But I also do think that we are in a situation that might end in the almost absurd…Because anything by the way we are now started to work could be identified as a sustainable development project. Just anything. And a project to carry through football matches through the Circumpolar North on ice or dry land, I mean, would be sustainable development as far as we are now operating’ (Norway at SAO 9808—London meeting 17– 19 August. Ad verbum transcript, p. 48).

Finland speaks up in agreement with Norway, saying that “It is good that we have projects, but I think they are coming so many and different and wider projects and we might have an inundation of projects. So we need some order for this” (Finland at SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Ad verbum transcript, p. 49). Iceland agrees, saying that one needs a more focused framework since currently “sustainable development can include almost anything between heaven and earth”; “I really would say that we need to have some kind of a framework, but we certainly can also have a dual approach.” (Iceland at SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Ad verbum transcript, p. 50). Sweden states that the AEPS proceeded as a strategy for environmental protection and that it would be useful to proceed similarly with sustainable development (SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Ad verbum

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transcript). One may thus note that the agreement with the development of a strategy largely focused on principle, rather than on an explicit agreement with the particular projects suggested in connection with strategy development. 20. According to the Terms of Reference, the goal of the Sustainable Development Program of the Arctic Council is to propose and adopt steps to be taken by the Arctic States to advance sustainable development in the Arctic, including opportunities to protect and enhance the environment, and the economies, cultures and health of indigenous communities and of other inhabitants of the Arctic, as well as to improve the environmental, economic and social conditions of Arctic communities as a whole (Arctic Council Ad Referendum Terms of Reference for a Sustainable Development Program, February 5, 1998). The Terms of Reference further state that any proposal should provide for participation by more than one Arctic state, and describe the issues targeted, also in relation to activities currently underway in Arctic Council (such as the programs previously under the AEPS) or other relevant fora outside the Council. A proposal, including any comments received, should be taken up at a SAO meeting. The SAOs should evaluate the proposal, including the degree to which it is consistent with the Declaration and with decisions taken at ministerial meetings, regional applicability, level of sponsorship and sufficiency of any financial support required. The SAOs may call for revision of the proposal or forward it to a ministerial meeting for consideration and decision (Arctic Council Ad Referendum Terms of Reference for a Sustainable Development Program, February 5, 1998). That would mean that, continuously, projects need to be forwarded to ministerial meetings for consideration and decision, and the selection is made ad hoc, without clear specific reference to what constitutes a project on sustainable development. Already before the ministerial, where these Terms of Reference were adopted, the Arctic Council encountered problems with project choices based on the Terms. Prior to the ministerial meeting, ten projects on sustainable development were suggested (see Appendix 2.). If all were accepted, they would have taken up 37 per cent of the budget of the entire Arctic Council. However, there existed no method for choosing between them, since, as B. Funston of the Arctic Council Secretariat (that had been charged with compiling an overview of the proposals) states, “the Terms of Reference are largely procedural and the rules are largely procedural and they don’t make value judgements about what should move forward and what shouldn’t” (SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Ad verbum transcript, p. 44). There were also common gaps in the ten proposals, including costing, missing links between proposal and existing international of working group activities, descriptions of balance of the proposal according to the Arctic Council Declaration, and descriptions of resource allocation by Arctic states (SAO 9808—London meeting 17–19 August. Draft table of contents of SAO report to ministers). In a further continued discussion on a strategic framework for sustainable development, at this point, Canada, Denmark-Greenland, Finland, the Russian Federation, Sweden, Saami, RAIPON and Norway supported a strategic framework, while Norway and Iceland supported the need to also approve concrete projects. The US reiterated an interest in pursuing individual projects and opposition to the development of a strategic overview (SAO 9808—London meeting 17– 19 August. Ad verbum transcript). 21. This project further suggested that, as “children and youth represent over half of the total population of many circumpolar communities and a large and significant proportion of the circumpolar population as a whole,” it would empower children and youth on issues of sustainable development through capacity building, education, an emphasis on traditional knowledge

Notes

22. 23.

24.

25.

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and culture, increased employment opportunities, and the creation of a body of research on children and youth of the circumpolar region. Canada also suggested that the Council establish a working group on children and youth, and a virtual library for children and youth information. Showing some of the interconnections made between projects, Canada further suggested that “[s]hould the creation of an ‘Arctic University’ move forward” (as such a suggestion is presented at the meeting) “this ‘library’ could become a component of its database” (Canada 1998 Discussion Paper Children and Youth of the Arctic, “Support and Infrastructure”; cf. SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). In the full report (AMAP 1998), some of these differences of housing, health and occupational patterns are indicated but the focus retained. The descriptions of “the Arctic” in this cooperation has nevertheless had some influence in other fora. For example, the United Nations Environment Program defines the Arctic as an area in relation to the definitions in AEPSArctic Council working groups (UNEP 1997). As the Arctic Council went into its first ministerial in September 1998, the distinction discussed explicitly already in 1995 was maintained. “To ensure accountability for the achievement of sustainable development, the importance of maintaining structural distinctions between the ‘sustainable development’ and ‘environmental protection’ programs has been recognized” (First Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, Iqaluit, Sept 17–18 1998. Draft report to ministers). To this end, the SAOs identified the need for the Arctic Council to establish a Sustainable Development Working Group comprised of SAOs to guide and direct projects. The SAOs also suggested that “a) clarification of substantive issues of sustainability, and b) measurable progress towards sustainability objectives, should be a reported output of every approved project” (First Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, Iqaluit, Sept 17–18 1998. Draft report to ministers). SAOs were requested to coordinate, monitor and direct the work of the Arctic Council based on the involvement of Arctic residents and focusing on sustainable development, which is seen as including environmental protection with an emphasis on human health, social and cultural well-being with an emphasis on education and improved living conditions, and economic development with an emphasis on resource management and capacity-building (First Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, Iqaluit, Sept 17–18 1998. Draft report to ministers). Nevertheless, “[a]lthough existing working groups have their present mandates from AEPS, and directions from the ministerial meetings in 1991, 1993, 1996 and 1997, these will now have to be consistent with the Rules of Procedure and Terms of Reference on the Sustainable Development Program.” As regards the effective integration of both sustainable development and environmental protection objectives and the incorporation of both scientific advice and traditional knowledge, it was stated that “these principles will become the standard operating procedures in any activity undertaken by the Arctic Council” (First Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, Iqaluit, Sept 17–18 1998. Draft report to ministers). In relation to sustainable development, the only projects Finland led as a state were two studies entitled “Sustainable Use of Northern Timberland Forests including Reindeer Grazing” and “Environmental Impact Assessment” (cf. Appendix 1). Finland thus continued its focus on northern forests from the AEPS initiative. The forest study was linked to an UNCED process that, it was hoped, would result in the development of a forestry convention, and the sustainable timberline forestry component drew upon current international work on criteria and indications. The second Finnish

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project, taking up environmental impact assessment (EIA) in view of its importance in sustainable development, was largely developed as a freestanding effort. Only following the March 1995 meeting of the TFSDU was it agreed that EIA would be included as a sub-group of the TFSDU. The EIA work continued on a largely independent basis, however, and resulted in a publication on recommended practice for EIA in the Arctic (TFSDU, September 16, 1994; TFSDU April 3, 1995; TFSDU Summary, March 13– 14,1995; TFSDU November 9,1995; TFSDU November 30, 1995). The Finnish involvement in an extension of Arctic cooperation past an environmental approach was thus rather limited in comparison with Canada’s leading role in six TFSDU projects at this time. 26. The Barrow Chapeau focused on integration of economic, social and cultural considerations, capacity building, community development and local leadership. The Chapeau also took up special subject areas of particular concern for sustainable development. These included health and well-being, economic development, education and cultural heritage, children and youth, the management of natural, including living, resources, and infrastructure development (Arctic Council 2000). Additionally, Operating Guidelines for the Sustainable Development Working Group, to be read in conjunction with the Rules of Procedure of the Arctic Council, were approved by the Senior Arctic Officials (SAOs) in May 2002 but also remained rather procedural (Arctic Council Sustainable Development 2002).

CHAPTER 5. THE DEVELOPMENT OF A REGIONAL UNIVERSITY FOR THE ARCTIC 1. This building of a knowledge infrastructure is otherwise not unusual as a step towards regional development policy in domestic contexts (cf. e.g. Keane and Allison 1999). 2. The CUA is an international organization for cooperation between universities in the circumpolar north, an area rather loosely conceived and larger than the Arctic. The organization was set up following the organization of a 1989 conference on the role of universities in northern development held at Lakehead Centre for Northern Studies, Ontario, Canada. In the proceedings of this conference, Weller notes that “[t]he origins of the conference and of the Lakehead Centre for Northern Studies can be traced back to Lakehead University’s efforts to enhance its international and especially its northern presence” (Weller 1991: v). The CUA has subsequently held conferences roughly every second year and has a rotating secretariat. Following the 1991 conference in Russia, the 1992 conference was held in Finland at the University of Lapland, a relatively recently established university with some research and education focus on northern Finland. This was where the secretariat for the CUA was located at the time of the start of the UoA feasibility study. 3. It is notable that in 1971 Canada passed patent letters for a University of Canada North that would make the establishment of a northern university legally possible. This initiative failed in the idea development stage, however, on account of, among other things, poor support for the way it was developed within the regions (cf. Graham 1994). Showing that this idea remained topical over time, Coates remarked in 1991: “The vision of University of Canada North was premature, not naïve. The Canadian North requires a university, with all the attending economic, cultural and intellectual benefits” (Coates 1991:169). 4. At this time it however became clear that there were some problems with an

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initiative on international education in context of the Arctic Council, as the Council involves Ministers of Foreign Affairs and the Environment, not Ministers of Education. An added sensitivity was that the UoA could be seen as threatening to small indigenous colleges, as was indicated following a presentation by the CUA to Circumpolar North Ministers of Education at their 1997 meeting in Quebec, Canada. (The Circumpolar North Ministers of Education are a loose grouping established to facilitate cooperation between ministries of education in Alaska in the United States, the Yukon and Northwest territories, northern Quebec, Labrador and Newfoundland in Canada, Greenland, Finland, Norway, Sweden and Russia. Among other things, the group focuses on ways to improve the education of indigenous peoples in these areas. cf. Conference of the Circumpolar North Ministers of Education 2002). Also, indicating the large importance the Canadian context was awarded for the UoA, it was seen as a problem especially that the Canadian federal government in Ottawa, where the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND) and David Stone, an initiator of the UoA development are based, does not have jurisdiction over education. A political compromise was developed. One “way in which this initiative could still be developed but it would not be seen as an Ottawa initiative and therefore it could live” would be that “the SAOs… would not do a feasibility study themselves but they would ask an outside organization to do a feasibility study” (Outi Snellman, interview). Thus, following the welcoming of the UoA initiative at the October 7–9 SAO meeting in Ottawa, Canada, a letter (Stone 1997b) was sent out on 18 October 1997 by David Stone at DIAND to invite the CUA to organise a feasibility study, with a mandate from the three governments (Canada, Norway and Sweden) rather than from the Arctic Council. The Development Plan for the feasibility study describes this development as follows: The Senior Arctic Officials under the Arctic Council considered the Development Plan at their meeting in Ottawa, Canada, 7–9 October 1997. The SAOs…requested Canada, Norway and Sweden to ask the Circumpolar Universities Association to further develop the proposal in association with the Permanent Participant Indigenous Peoples Organizations. This approach was chosen in order to maintain the development of the proposal in the combined academic and indigenous peoples communities (Heal et al. 1997: i).

5. The Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies (ACUNS) is a voluntary association of thirty-five Canadian universities and northern colleges with especially northern-focused programmes and interests. It was founded at Churchill, Manitoba, in Canada, in 1978 (ACUNS 2002). 6. The possibilities to deal with these sorts of deep questions of access and educational focus were also limited by severe time constraints, as it was made clear that initial results of the UoA feasibility study would need to be presented at the Senior Arctic Officials meeting in Whitehorse in May 1998 in order to be placed on the agenda for the ministerial meeting in autumn 1998 and possibly gain ministerial approval (Young et al. 1998; Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). 7. However, the extent of consultation differed widely between regions and participants. Canadian consultation involved the Canadian Polar Commission and its programmes, research councils and all universities and university colleges in the country on the ACUNS council and northern MPs. Denmark-Greenland consulted a large selection of universities and policy bodies. Finland and Iceland had mid-range informal consultations centring on policy bodies. At the other end of the spectrum lay US north, Russian Yakutia and Sweden, whose consultations centred on the participant’s

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institution (Young et al.1998; Whitehorse WG meeting, ad verbum transcript). The consultation can be seen as being directed by which institutions the participants saw as relating to the “Arctic” label, reflecting interest as well as developed networks on a national level. 8. At the Ministry of Education the argument, according to the Swedish participant, was that the issue had not come through proper channels; she stated that she “does not want to use the word coup” but that this is not the usual way to work, and not part of the democratic process. [Extended quote in original: “utbildningsdepartementet…hade just argumentet att sådana har frågor måste komma den rätta vägen, ja jag vill inte kalla det kuppartat men att det kommer in en fråga utan att vara förankrad det är inte det vanliga sättet att arbeta och det vet jag ju från arbete i styrelser och nämnder att det ar ju något som vi undviker for det är aldrig någon demokrati…alla ska ha möjlighet och rättighet att ta ställning’] (Gunilla Johansson, interview). 9. Suggestions were that, as inclusion into the working group could make the group too large to be effective, stakeholders could be included in subgroups. The discussion stalled with the argument that this might, however, have required a more developed product (although it was recognized that stakeholders may need to be included to plan the product) (Whitehorse WG Meeting, ad verbum transcript). 10. The drafters for the declaration were finally appointed to be David Stone, the DIAND and AMAP participant who from the outset supported and had a role in the development of a UoA, and Oran Young, who had presented the development at the meeting. The resulting final declaration accepted at the ministerial states that the Arctic Council Ministers Welcome, and are pleased to announce, the establishment of a University of the Arctic, a university without walls, as proposed by a working group of the Circumpolar Universities Association. …We encourage the working group to continue its efforts and to consult with northern educational and indigenous authorities and colleges. We look forward to further reports on this issue and to seeking ways to promote the success of this initiative (The Iqaluit Declaration. The First Ministerial Meeting of the Arctic Council. Iqaluit, Canada, September 17–18, 1998, emphasis original).

11. In developments beyond the period of this study, then, the need for consultation would continue to be emphasised, and a trade-off was struck with a northern studies-focused programme on the Bachelor’s level (that is, an opportunity to study for a first university degree) as a first product designed under the University of the Arctic, as above. Additionally the University has been developing a central portal for online education, circumpolar mobility programmes and includes several field schools and events under its banner, such as the Northern Research Forum, which for example promotes researchpolicy interaction (cf. e.g. University of the Arctic 2002).

CHAPTER 6. VIEWS OF “THE ARCTIC” IN DIFFERENT STATES 1. Wondering “why is it necessary to define the limits of the North?,” Shields writes “The main standard of ‘isolation’ is distance from major cities. It is futile to draw further lines across the maps of the continent: ‘60 degrees north’ is at least a memorable phrase” (Shields 1991:171). “As each territorial government produces its own statistics, the task of assembling numerical data needed to bolster the text is greatly eased. Lastly, the territorial process of development is less complicated than that found in the northern provinces” (Bone 1993:183).

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2. Canada was early defined by its position north of the US, its delineation from the US along the 49th line of latitude, and the way in which the development of the Canadian federation has progressed with reference to the 60th parallel (cf. The National Atlas of Canada 2001). 3. At the time of the establishment of Canada as an independent state, the Arctic and Antarctic regions were largely discussed as similar from an American viewpoint: Gilpin (1873:162) speaks about the “the antarctic to the arctic extremities of America,” while DeBow (1854:526) notes that “The continent of America, unlike the continent of Asia and Europe, has its extreme length from north to south.” 4. The Canadian development also differed from that in other colonially developed areas where the frontier mythology has been considered relevant, such as Australia, South Africa and northern Russia; where the terrain and therefore the movement across territory in these areas differed from that in the United States and Canada (Encyclopaedia Brittannica 1999). The administration of the Canadian Arctic then became increasingly powerful because of the enhanced power of the twentieth-century state, the characteristics of resource-using industries, and the nature of the territories being settled (Zaslow 1988). 5. Both of the concepts of the wilderness and frontier can be seen as culturally determined and drawn from very specific understandings of nature and development, rather than given. The Anglo-American view of wilderness was related to a romantic conceptualisation but given emphasis in contrast to the cultural perhaps as a result of a longing for imagined easier times in an industrializing West. As Nash writes in his work on Wilderness and the American Mind, “[a]ppreciation of wilderness began in the cities” (Nash 1967:44). It was thus directly in relation to the disappearance of the frontier in the US, as lands gradually became developed and integrated, that popular interest in preserving parts of the US wilderness was born; Nash interprets the “popularity of primitivism” as one “manifestation of discontent and frustration at the end of the nineteenth century” (Nash 1967:160). To officially design relatively pristine, natural areas as wilderness is thus a twentieth-century phenomenon, born in North America following upon the growing conservation movement that established the world’s first national parks (Klein 1994). As an official land-use classification, wilderness became prominent when the Wilderness Act of 1964 was passed by the US Congress. Here, some supported preservation “because of the central role which the wilderness, the frontier, has played in our history” and its role in also continuously maintain a distinctive American national character (Kenneth B. Keating in the Congressional Record, 87th Congress, 1st Session, 107 [September 6, 1961], p. 18396, quoted in Nash 1967:223–224, my emphasis). The work towards wilderness conservation thus had its origins largely in a romantic longing related to the role of the frontier: As much a piece of poetry as an act of national policy—with such phrases as ‘community of life’; ‘untrammelled by man’; ‘where man himself is a visitor who does not remain’; and ‘where the imprint of man’s work is substantially unnoticed’ the Wilderness Act began a process that has led to an extensive, and still expanding, National Wilderness Preservation System (NWPS) (Martin 1995:8).

Similar acts, focused on wilderness or environmental protection, now exist in many countries (Martin 1995). 6. Historically and with effects into the present, the frontier myth thus resulted in a separation of “wilderness” and “city,” and into specific roles for the populations of such “wildernesses”: as indigenous, they became conceived of

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as different and through their relation to the environment. As the wilderness was not a place for non-indigenous everyday life until it had lost its frontier role, the conception of wilderness also invited boom-and-bust cycles where the “natural abundance” of the wilderness is harvested (cf. King 2000:29). 7. This was not a novel utilization of the “northern.” For instance, in 1923, Canadian-born explorer Vilhjamur Stefansson argued that the centers of the great empires had moved progressively northward over history. This argument he forwarded in his book The Northward Courses of Empire, as well as in subsequent lectures (Shields 1991). Shields notes: As Canada succeeded the Roman Empire, so Canada would succeed England. This tone continued in Canadian government publications even until the late 1950s: ‘It is a curious fact that civilization has been expanding northward ever since the dawn of history…converging from both sides of the world toward a common centre. That centre is the arctic’ (Department of Northern Affairs and Natural Resources 1958:35, quoted in Shields 1991:179).

8. For example, in 1965 the Yukon Council resolved that the Yukon should be gradually developed to reach provincial status in the ten or twenty years after 1967 (Zaslow 1988). Also, the Meech Lake Accord is a later, clear illustration of the continuous political strife and denial of the territories to gain increased independence in the Canadian federal system. In 1987, a First Ministers Conference held at Meech Lake reached an accord among the provincial premiers and the prime minister—that is, without the presence of territorial governments— on the terms for Quebec to enter the new Canadian constitution (Abele 1987). The Meech Lake Accord included an agreement to revise the process by which the constitution can be changed. According to this, the federal government and all ten provinces, rather than the previously demanded federal government and seven of the ten provinces (representing 50 percent of the Canadian population), need to agree on constitutional change (Abele 1987). As Coates notes, this would effectively veto the future evolution of the Yukon or Northwest Territories towards provincial status (Coates 1991), keeping them “forever colonies” (Coates and Powell 1989:77, quoted in Nord 1991:140). “Such exclusionary provisions have led many northerners to begin speaking of ‘being second class citizens or of being consciously discriminated against simply because of their place of residence’” (Whittington 1990:43, quoted in Nord 1991:141). At the same time, the Accord granted Quebec the status of a “distinct society” with constitutional language and culture protection, while this was not made the case for the main resident populations of northern Canada, i.e. the different indigenous groups (Nord 1991). The Meech Lake suggestion would thus further widen the gap between provinces and territories. The Accord was finally abandoned in June 1990, after protest in the territories and after Newfoundland and Manitoba withheld their support (Miller 2001; Nord 1991); the question of constitutional and political reform in Canada is thus an ongoing issue. 9. Eyre also notes, in this relation, that: To protect sovereignty in the North, the government adopted a policy strikingly analogous to the situation that existed in Canada at the time of the 1922 Eastern Arctic Expedition. In the 1920s, Canada established sover-eignty in the Arctic with a symbolic presence of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. In the 1970s, Canada prepared to protect that same sovereignty with a symbolic presence of the Canadian Armed Forces (Eyre 1987:297).

10. In 1969, the same year as the first Manhattan transgression, the Canadian government published the integrated northern policy document Canada’s North: 1970–1980, produced by the Department of Indian Affairs and

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Northern Development (DIAND). The document posited four northern goals: the provision of a higher standard of living for northern residents, the maintenance and enhancement of the northern environment, the encouragement of economic development and the maintenance of Canadian sovereignty and security in the North. Eyre notes: For the Department of National Defence, the last goal—maintenance of sovereignty and security—had strong overtones of possible military involvement. Even the first three goals could have been extended to encompass military effort were the government to decide to revive the dormant nationbuilding role of the Canadian forces (Eyre 1987:296).

11. An internal Canadian document notes that this Act was set up in response to a test voyage by the U.S. based Humble Oil Company’s S.S.Manhattan (Canada National Advisory Board on Science and Technology Committee on Oceans and Coasts 1994, Appendix A, para. 4). 12. The Act was rather curiously formulated, however—except from a sovereignty motivation—in establishing its 100-nautical mile pollution control zone adjacent only to the Arctic coast, that is to the 60 degrees north latitude delineation. As marine fish and mammals migrate with little regard for exact latitudinal delineations, the 60 degree demarcation (more than being a utilitarian choice) complicated the protection of marine mammals depending on whether they are above or below the demarcation (Canada National Advisory Board on Science and Technology Committee on Oceans and Coasts 1994). 13. Similarly, the Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations states: “The Canada-US Agreement on Arctic Cooperation, signed in Ottawa on 11 January 1988, contains no recognition by the US of Canadian sovereignty over the waters of the Canadian arctic archipelago” (Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations 1988:42). 14. Until the late sixties, with the confirmation of large oil and gas deposits in Alaska, the Manhattan incident and increased attention to other aspects of northern development as well, there had been “only a marginal [northernfocused] interest in issues even remotely related to national and international security” (Ørvik 1983:114). An exception, a mid-sixties Canadian Institute for International Affairs (CIIA)-sponsored collection of essays, The Arctic Frontier, discussed Canada’s North from the point of, among others, sovereignty questions such as the North-West Passage (Ørvik 1983:114–115). 15. There is also no doubt that this historicity is alive in present Canadian international thinking. “Nobody would suggest in 1987 that Canada’s sovereignty over the arctic mainland and archipelago was in any way open to question, but the precise nature of Canada’s sovereign rights over the archipelagic waters is still a matter of heated debate and the cause of significant differences of opinion between these two North American powers” (Bankes 1987:285). 16. Hicks and White note that northern Canada, as we see not at all unconnected to federal policy, is the area from which the comparison in some Arctic literature of “Arctic” or “north” to the “Third World” come. To put this sentiment into context, recent criticism points out, however, that comparisons with the Third World have been used more for valuation than for understanding. Critics observe that while it may be powerful rhetoric in a country fed by northern drama, it is quite inaccurate as the main causes of death and disability are very different, as are the nutritional status and the supply of health services (Hicks and White 2000:89). 17. The factors notable in creating this description could be systematized as firstly, a strongly disparate power basis (constitutionally, by population, by access to

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institutions of representation), which results in a large discrepancy in descriptive/ representative power. In this sense, political representative power is one aspect (and reflective as well as constitutive) of broader representative power. This is visible in Canada in that only some few percent of the population is resident in the “northern”/“Arctic” areas, while more than the absolute majority are concentrated within some 100 kilometres from the US border. It is also apparent in that the areas delineated north of the 60-degrees southern border of “the Arctic” do not enjoy full representation in the Canadian federal system. Secondly, one may cite low mutual integration culturally, ethnically, and economically between “northern” and other areas, related to a recency of these processes. With the late settlement that has taken place in Canada and the relatively recent establishment of the Canadian state, what has been characteristic of the Canadian north is not a long-term free (in the meaning of “not taking place under a state framework”) migration and immigration of peoples in the area but, rather, a rapid settlement during imposition of an already well-developed state system, and en masse in connection with mega-projects on resource development. Immigrants to the north (in effect a transitional system) then only integrate to a very low extent during the brief time spent in the areas. Thirdly, in relation to these recent processes, the north in Canada has been represented as the “frontier,” and connected to a frontier mythology of “civilisation” meeting “wilderness.” The peoples in “the north” have thereby been described through the eyes of “the other”: problematized as specific, mythologized, and with a focus on the ethnographic perspective that the frontier mythology allows (tradition and indigenousness). Together these three factors create the Canadian conceptualization of “the North” or “the Arctic” as a unit, definable by these characteristics of difference—of a predication on distance (to use the expression coined by Grant [1993:249, passim] in writing about Siberia). It is the actual existence of these factors, to higher or lesser degree that even allow the analysis of an area in terms of outside-determined identity: the assumption that “the North” is the correct focus of our studies (as, for example, Coates 1994 critically questions). 18. This has quite some history (to follow Graham 1990). In the late 1950s, Soviet researchers developed several definitions, which included both physical and economical factors. Among the influential ones was S.V.Slavin’s fourpoint definition which saw regions as “northern” if they were (1) geographically north of and distant from economically developed industrial centres regions; (2) sparsely populated and with a low level of development of industrial mass production; (3) characterized by relatively high construction costs; and (4) distinguished by a harsh physical environment which makes economic development more difficult. In 1967, Soviet engineer V.F. Burkhanov then presented a”climatic harshness” index. Designed for engineering purposes, it presented a rather limited selection of factors, but was nevertheless that which Hamelin (1979) most closely built his more extensive development on (Graham 1990). 19. This is the term Hamelin uses to denote what is more commonly called “northerness.” 20. Coates, in a quotation worth to reproduce at length, describes what has prominently come to be seen as the “Arctic” problem in this context: The North now has a variety of research stations…These stations are located with reference to specific biological or geographical conditions and cover most of the ecological zones in the subarctic and arctic. They are not designed to serve the needs of researchers interested in human relationships. The established patterns of research are not without limitations. Academic researchers have become like migratory birds, arriving in the late spring, spending much of the summer in the subarctic or arctic, and then returning south before the university year beings—

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213 and before winter sets in up North. Much of the work by scientists is self-contained and takes place in research camps and stations far removed from settlements. Little of the money and wages associated with these projects remains in the region, going instead to graduate students and research associates attached to the researchers’ universities. The research agenda also reflects the southern orientation of most scholars. Topics for investigation are typically determined by southern or national priorities (including government and business concerns) and only rarely by specific needs of northern communities (Coates 1991:171).

21. The journal Arctic is published by the Arctic Institute of North America, set up in 1945 in “recognition of the fact that only properly coordinated scientific study can furnish a sound basis for the thoughtful planning upon which the development of North America’s last frontier should be built” (Zaslow 1988:233, my emphasis). 22. Fienup-Riordan in 1995 published a study of Yup’ik (Alaska) Eskimo representation in film from early to current productions. She notes that the Alaskan Eskimos were frequently equated with their Canadian, “relatively impoverished” (Fienup-Riordan 1995: xii) counterparts. Since Alaska was not part of the “real Arctic” which early explorers experienced, it did not become publicised and was therefore not known. Lacking any real knowledge of Alaska Eskimos, non-natives tended to apply to them images of Eskimos derived from experiences in better-known arctic regions. That this environment differs dramatically from its Alaska counterpart was immaterial (ibid: 22).

Fienup-Riordan also notes that differences between native communities were collapsed in descriptions, despite the fact that their communication styles differed as much from each other as they did from non-native patterns. These representations have invariably influenced and become part of also the self-description of these groups, as parts of the world in which they orient themselves as group and as individuals, not the least politically: a “group of Yup’ik schoolchildren watching the Netsilik on film insisted that those were the ‘real Eskimos’” (Morrow and Hensel 1992:40, quoted in Fienup-Riordan 1995:153). Fienup-Riordan continues: “Once again the central Canadian Arctic provided Americans with a standard by which they could judge Alaska Eskimos” (Fienup-Riordan 1995:153). She concludes: “Even today debate too often collapses the complex history of adaptation, transformation, and invention that took place in Alaska into the catchphrase of conflict between ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’” (Fienup-Riordan 1995:28). 23. The population of Greenland is approximately 55,000, of whom about 80 percent are Inuit, and 14,000 live in the capital. The primary source of revenue in Greenland is the fisheries industry, which indicates the importance of sea resources (Johansen 1997a: 74–79). Greenland’s colonial background has exacerbated issues of peripherality and resource access. Denmark had a trading monopoly on Greenland between 1774 and 1950, under which neither foreigners nor Danish citizens could enter Greenland without special permission (Fristrup 1976). Until 1950, Greenland was financially selfsupporting, but the standard of living was very low. Since Greenland was made an integral part of Denmark, the Danish state has subsidized Greenland heavily. Social change has been rapid: until 1930 almost all Greenlanders were hunters; between 1930 and 1950 hunters and fishermen; since 1950 more and more Greenlanders have become employed in the building and construction industry (Royal Danish Embassy 2001). 24. Following the United Nations declaration on decolonisation, the Danish parliament in 1953 accepted a new constitution which made Greenland an

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integral part of the Danish Kingdom, gave it parliamentary representation, and ended its status as a closed colony (Stenbaek 1987). Modernization, however, made Greenland increasingly economically dependent on Denmark. An example is the “birth-place-criterion” passed in the mid-1960s in the Greenland Civil Servants Act. According to this act, civil servants born in Greenland received only 85 per cent of the basic Danish salary. While this was initially defended by trade unions, since the last half of the 1970s these have increasingly worked for lessening and finally abolishing the discrimination. With these developments, the colonised group increasingly changed from “Greenlanders” (mainly Inuit) to all people living in Greenland, including both those ethnically Inuit and ethnically Danish (Petersen 1995). Danish membership in the EU in 1972 (at the time including Greenland) played a large part in the establishment of Home Rule in Greenland, which provides another example of the large role resource conflicts have had in defining cooperation and interests in Arctic areas. In 1972, 70 percent of Greenlanders voted against entry into the EEC, but were included when Denmark entered into the EEC. Home Rule in Greenland was established in 1979, and areas of jurisdiction were gradually transferred up until the early 1990s. In a referendum after Home Rule, in 1982, Greenland voted to withdraw from the EEC, and did so in 1985 (Stenbaek 1987). One particular reason was the desire to obtain political control over fishing in Greenlandic waters. Greenland is now affiliated to the EEC through the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT) Agreement, combined with a special fishing agreement (Royal Danish Embassy 2001). Through the Home Rule Agreement, Greenland remains a part of the Danish Kingdom with defense, foreign affairs, police and the administration of justice governed by Denmark, but it gained extensive selfgoverning powers, including its own flag and the establishment of Greenlandic as an official language (Stenbaek 1987). 25. Alaska however bears large similarities to northern Canada along parameters of, for instance, late outside settlement and high short-term immigration mobility, some climatic and resource similarities, and problems of romanticization among the national majority that utilises the the Arctic as imagery. From a North American perspective, Lotz writes in 1972: There are significant differences between Alaska and northern Canada, but there are also remarkable similarities in the recent economic and social development in the two regions. These include patterns of boom and bust, the reliance on defense expenditures, the heavy seasoning of employment, the transient ‘outside’ labour force, the production of primary products for overseas markets, the reliance on ‘outside’ sources of money and power, the dominance of government spending in the economy, the focus on the material aims of development, and the emergence of a dual economy of affluent, transient whites and poor, resident Natives (Lotz 1972:229).

The historic development of Alaska in a state context is also remarkably recent. While for instance the history as colony and state of the US for Maryland spans over three hundred fifty years, Alaska’s history in the US is less than one hundred twenty-five years, the same time span as that of the Canadian state. “This recency deprives the political process of the restraint found in most other states, where the historical record is replete with failed experiments and incremental successes” (McBeath and Morehouse 1994:49– 50). However, at a formal constitutional level “[t]he constitution has not seriously hampered change in Alaska government and politics” (ibid: 134). In Alaskan history, important points comprise the granting of statehood of Alaska, the discussions over a Trans-Atlantic Pipeline System, and the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act. As in northern Canada, World War II had a

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large impact on Alaska. Since 1912, Alaska had been an official United States Territory, with an elected territorial legislature and a delegate in Congress. But petitions for better transportation and communication were ignored “until the bombing of Pearl Harbor in December 1941, made Congress look at the map and see how easy it would be for the Japanese to seize Alaska” (ibid: 125). Soon after the end of the War, Alaskans started to claim full statehood. A constitution was drawn up and accepted by the people of Alaska, and two senators and one representative were elected. These travelled to Congress in Washington to see if they would be accepted. Three years later, in 1959, Alaska assumed full statehood (Cheney 1980:133). 26. As in Canada, many of those reacting against the limited representation of the area were the permanent Alaskan residents, which organized into indigenous political movements. The discovery of oil in Alaska, coupled with the global oil crisis, focused attention on Alaska and forced the federal government to cooperate both with the native population and the oil industry throughout the oil boom of the seventies and early eighties. Given the eagerness of government and industry to start oil exploration, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) that had developed as an outcome of broader civil rights strife was promptly settled in 1971 (Stenbaek 1987). In exchange for 44 million acres of land and U.S. $962.5 million, the indigenous claim to aboriginal land and subsistence rights was relinquished. To handle the administration of funding and land rights resulting from this settlement, ANCSA established, among others, 12 regional corporations for the area of Alaska, and 200 village profit corporations. In relation, the closest analogue to major-party divisions in Alaska also presently may be the competition between urban and rural (often seen as indigenous) values, a distinction that was adopted (or reinforced) administratively (McBeath and Morehouse 1994:284). The settlement money, however, together with the oil boom money brought in during the building of the Alaska Pipeline and the subsequent oil production, made for temporary economic development, political power, and the election of indigenous leaders to state legislature. It also meant lobbying power in Washington, resulting in, for example, the U.S. Arctic Research and Policy Act (1984) as well as influence upon other bills (Stenbaek 1987). Many problems remained, however, largely related to economic standing and development. Notably, that the most stable components of the economy have been the highly seasonal, transitory commercial fishing and federal government worker (McBeath and Morehouse 1994:313). As land use in Alaska has been restricted by federal policy, such as the resolvance of indigenous claims and the Alaska National Interest Land’s Conservation Act, conflict inside Alaska between the indigenous and non-indigenous populations has increased because of the special status of the Alaska indigenous peoples under the federal Constitution (McBeath and Morehouse 1994:312). It also, as McBeath and Morehouse note, pushes the consensus of opinion in the US towards preservation, against the will of a majority of Alaskans who seek future economic security (McBeath and Morehouse 1994:1). 27. Development at some places have resulted in conditions similar to those in Canada: settled far away from nearest hunting/fishing sites, elders were closed off from their established way of living, and youth were alienated from families through a clear break in tradition (Slezkine 1994:342–343). This took place as the rates of industrial expansion continued to accelerate, by the late 1960s the traditional hunting and herding lands had become a main source of Soviet timber, oil, gas, and minerals. In the 1950s many local officials, effectively unchecked by outside agencies, had started implementing forced resettlement and “consolidation” (“ukrupnenie”) into large state-directed productionoriented settlements (Slezkine 1994:337, 340; this was not wholly dissimilar to northern Canadian centralization into villages at the time as a prerequisite for obtaining housing). The traditional economy, also, in parts remains significant,

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and social differences are notable. Unemployment rates are high, and 55 per cent of the adult indigenous population are engaged in the traditional economy. Only about half of the indigenous population over the age of 15 in the area have only elementary or incomplete secondary education. Northern Russian indigenous groups have a birth rate 2.5 higher than average, large families but with a gradually falling birth rate, a suicide rate 3–4 times higher than the Russian average, a life expectancy ten years lower than in Russia at large and sixteen years lower than in northern Europe and North America, and, for some of the groups, a higher death rate than the average for the general Russian population. Here, the death rate can be directly attributed to the deterioration of everyday sanitary-hygienic and ecological conditions (Batyanova et al. 1999:11–12). There are, however, large differences across northern Russia. For example, in regard to the focus on climate in much Arctic literature, “[s]tatements regarding the unpleasantness of the natural environment are often overgeneralisations which take little account of the way that environment often varies locally” (Shaw 1987:9). With regard to socio-economic factors, then, for example do the largest settlement centers in “the Arctic” area exist on the Kola Peninsula together with small-scale indigenous communities. In northwestern Russia, the most industrially developed and urbanized region, hundreds of enterprises are situated in areas which have been growing increasingly since the First World War: in Baerenholt’s (1994) estimation, Murmansk (430,000 inhabitants), Apatity (100,000), Kirovsk (50,000), Monchegorsk (50,000) and Olenegorsk (50,000). Russians have lived in this area since the 15th century, and it was earlier inhabited by Saami, of whom a very small minority of a few thousand people still live in the area (Baerenholdt 1994). The Kola Peninsula also has the largest northern harbour, a nuclear fleet, a nuclear power station and hydroelectric power stations, all poorly maintained, however, on account of the present Russian financial situation (Kalabin 1993:75). The social situation of transition after the fall of the Soviet Union is of course significant in the description of any problem, and unmatched outside the earlier East Bloc (cf. Granberg and Riabova 1998). Here, the transitional difficulties are legion in a country that had no real traditions of federalism before the federation agreement came into force in 1992 (Svensson 1995a: 24; cf. Kirkow 1998:3–4, 84ff). 28. In Russia in general, inflation rose to an average 86 percent in 1999, while wages fell by roughly 30 percent and pensions by 45 percent for the average person. Many investors, both domestic and international, remain deterred by Russia’s long-standing problems, which include widespread corruption and organized crime (CIA 2000). 29. During the Stalin era, the Siberian north became one of the major areas where a labor force of political prisoners was widely used in construction, mining and other labor industry. During the Soviet period, northern areas retained a specialization in raw materials, despite the construction of several large manufacturing enterprises (primarily part of the military-industrial complex), the establishment of new industrial centers and the relatively quickly growing population (Vartanov et al 1999). 30. In a collection of papers on Arctic issues, Vartanov el al. ask: “what does the term ‘North’ mean for Russia?” In some similarity to the Canadian situation, the authors conclude that Russia is more “northern” than many other countries, and that its boundaries are often drawn by using physicalgeographical criteria; nevertheless, administrative boundaries remain especially important, delimiting “the Far North and regions equated to it” from the rest of the country (Vartanov et al. 1999:67). The variation in both scope and population of an area like “northern Russia,” however, largely differs from the situation found in Canada. Shaw compares Siberia

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with Canada as follows: while “approximately one and one-third times the size of Canada” (Shaw 1987:10), much of Siberia is situated above 50 degrees N, which puts it in similar latitudes to Canada. The southern and more settled portion, however, is not especially far to the north when compared to Western Europe. Thus Novosibirsk is only marginally south of Copenhagen or Edinburgh…well to the north by Canadian standards…just south of Thompson, Manitoba (Shaw 1987:24).

31. The greatest similarity to a Canadian “northerness” discourse can be traced in the presence of a discourse on a vast and dreamed land, which despite its simplified characterization continues to impact problem (including research and policy) formulations today. In 1993, Slezkine writes: “Siberia has not been a single administrative unit since the 1820s… And yet, in some very important sense, the elusive country ‘behind the Urals’ is the most real and the most durable part of the Russian landscape” (Slezkine 1993:1, cf. Watrous 1993:114). Like in Canadian Arctic imagery, some of the romanticizations of bygone days can be traced in this literature: On the surface, it may appear that the great ‘Romance’ of Siberia is largely over. After all, busy skies and freer borders have made the place much more accessible— and therefore less exotic—than it was even twenty years ago [in the 1970s] And yet the myth of Siberia will, in all probability, continue. Like the American West, the region may never totally outlive its Romantic past of exciting new frontiers, legendary outlaws, and exotic ‘barbarians’ (Diment 1993:10, my emphasis).

32. So has for example the indigenous political organization in relation to international cooperation also reflected the post-Soviet changes. Around the time of the fall of the Soviet Union, several indigenous organizations concerned with the Russian north were established almost simultaneously: The Association of the Small Peoples of the North (1990), which organised the first congress of the small peoples of the north in Moscow in March 1990; the Deputy Assembly of the Small Peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East (1991); and The International League of Small Peoples and Ethnic Groups (1991) (Murashko 1996:10). The cooperative organ for these 26 peoples is currently called The Association of the Indigenous Minorities of the North, Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation—commonly known by its Russian acronym, AIPON (alternatively RAIPON) (Funk and Sillanpää 1999: ix-x). As soon as (R)AIPON was established, it began to participate actively in the socio-political life of the Russian Federation on both federal and regional level, taking part for instance in elections to local and regional assemblies as well as numerous executive organs. As a result, a number of the laws of the Russian Federation on for instance national languages, legal status, family land plots, and territories for traditional use have been amended (Batyanova et al. 1999:10–13). RAIPON has also become one of the permanent participants within later Arctic cooperation. 33. In their Meeting of Frontiers project, the US Library of Congress notes: Americans tend to see their expansion westward as a process of free settlement. In contrast, Russians readily use the phrase ‘the conquest of Siberia’ and have in their language no precise equivalent to the word ‘frontier’ as used in American history, with its connotations of openness, freedom, and opportunity. Nonetheless, both countries share an experience of continent-wide exploration, settlement, and development that was unrivalled elsewhere in the world. For both countries, much of their identity derives from their frontier experience (US Library of Congress 2002, para. 2).

One should, however, note that in both these countries this frontier

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35.

36.

37. 38.

39.

Notes experience developed at an earlier date than in Canada, notably the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (cf. e.g. ibid.), which explains the contrast with Canada and current conceptions of “northerness.” For instance, Arctic research programs in Finland, Sweden and Norway previous to current region-building take in do not include any parts of the mainlands (cf. Norwegian Polar Institute 2001, Hedberg 1994) but the Svalbard Archipelago and the island of Jan Mayen, Greenland, Franz Josef Land, and the Siberian coast. Similarly, while there, for example, in Finland exists biological research stations concerned with the north, the northernmost research station in Kilpisjärvi may more accurately be described as alpine. This station lies in the highest situated village in Finland, on the very border with Norway and on the Scandinavian mountain range but belongs to the sub-alpine birch forest zone (Kilpisjärvi Biological Station 2002). Cf. also ch. 2. For instance, Jukarainen in an analysis of the Nord Revy journal (later North, published by the Nordic Council of Ministers regional policy institute NordREFO) concludes that for at least three decades, the dominant spatial representation of “northernness” here was “Norden” (Jukarainen 1998). As noted earlier, the Nordic area is here discussed with the exception of Greenland, which is historically and climatically “Arctic” and seen as such in Denmark. The Nordic Council was set up in 1952 as a broad but not regulative parliamentary cooperation, and was in 1971 complemented with a Nordic Council of Ministers (Simoulin Lereps 2000:7–9). Differing security affiliations of the states prohibited the launch of projects for possible higher integration, for instance, as foreign policy was excluded from the remit of the Nordic Council (largely at Finnish request prompted by the Soviet Union) (Simoulin Lereps 2000:7–9). The Nordic Council remained a broad but not regulative mechanism, which in its developed state organized some fifty Nordic institutions across almost all fields. These were each intended to enhance Nordic networking and cooperation in their respective field (Simoulin Lereps 2000:7–9). The basis of “Nordic” has however differed through time, as Neumann critically observes: One example of [external factors seen as characteristic of a region]…was widespread during the eighteenth century, when the cold climate of the North, with its allegedly beneficial effects on cultural life, was used as a defining trait for a Northern region. However, more than other criteria, this one proved to be notoriously slippery and to melt away as one tried to fix the border to the south. Since the time of German romanticism, language has [instead] been held forth as the central cultural criterion by which to delineate human collectives (Neumann 1999:117, emphasis original).

40. When Joenniemi criticises this view of Norden as a particularly modern area, he does so from the perspective that there is much in nordicity that is better categorized as postmodern in essence. Therewith Norden appears to be less at odds with the Europe of today and the neo-regional formations that also label the politico-cultural-economic landscape in the northern parts of the continent, although the Nordic configuration remains ontologically detained by its image as the ultimate in modernity (Joenniemi 2000:1, my emphasis).

41. AMAP (1997:62, figure on page; see also the electronic version at http:// www.amap.no/maps-gra/jpeg/s05062-l.jpg) calculates the percent of Saami in Finland and Sweden as 2 per cent and in Norway differing between 30 per cent (in the northernmost sparsely populated Finnmark county) to 2 per cent (Nordland county). The full AMAP report (AMAP 1998:162) notes

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that in the northernmost parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia where Saami traditionally have lived, Saami now make up 50,000 people of approximately 2 million, that is, 2.5 percent. 42. Nevertheless, in this areas, as early Arctic-related work already describes, there are a number of relatively large towns within a relatively small compass: Luleå, Bodo, Tromsø, Kiruna, and Rovaniemi (with populations now ranging between roughly 30,000–70,000 each). Three are coastal, but Rovaniemi, the capital of Finnish Lapland, and the mining and space center Kiruna, are both well inland. Tromsø acquired a university in 1960, Luleå a research institute (university college in 1971) (cf. Armstrong et al 1978:216–218). 43. Quote in original: “Bristen på arbetstillfällen, befolkningsminskning, ogynnsam åldersfordelning, långa avstånd till tätort, forsämrad samhällsservice mm är några av de problem som brukar inkluderas i begreppet glesbygd. Tornedalen uppfyller alla dessa kriterier” (Muotka 1978:20). 44. Quote in original: “inte räckt till for att lösa sysselsättningsproblemen eller trygga Nordkalottens framtid” (Groth and Lassinantti 1982:144). Similarly, work on the northernmost areas of Sweden and Finland note three defining characteristics: peripherality, sparse population, and a regional economy largely based on the exploitation of natural resources (Oscarsson 1989:3). The report of Oscarsson is also, in contrast to the focal points in Canadian work, structured into sections on the relationship between economic change and regional structure, dynamic elements in the economy, the competence of the firm as a means of accommodating innovations in products and production, and population (out-migration and the lowering fertility rates) (ibid.). Additional examples can be drawn from a broad array of literature. For example the project “Social utvecklingplanering i Norrbottens län” (“Social development planning in Norrbotten county”) 1976–1980 concludes that the differences in living standards of inhabitants in comparison to the capital areas are in most cases negligible; the strong exception concerns work (Social utvecklings-planering i Norrbottens län 1981): A general observation is that the average life situation for people in Norrbotten in many areas is similar to that of other inhabitants in the country. In one field—work—situations are clearly negative in Norrbotten [northern-most Sweden]. In Norrbotten there are according to the project’s research on life situations more people than in the nation as a whole who do not have paid work, have difficult working hours, have experience of unemployment, have jobs requiring hard physical work, have contact with dangerous substances, and are not active in the unemployment market. Among those who have work are included people with safe and secure work, who do not feel threatened by the ‘ghost of emigration.’ These people perceive themselves as having a good life, especially as their life quality resources are often even better (Social utvecklingsplanering i Norrbottens län 1981:52, my translation) [Quote in original: En allmän iakttagelse är att den genomsnittliga livssituationen for norrbottningar på många områden liknar den som gäller for andra invånare i landet. På ett område—arbete—är förhållandena klart negativa for Norrbotten. I Norrbotten är det enligt projektets levnadsnivåundersökning fler an i riket som: inte förvärvsarbetar, har obekväm arbetstid, har erfarenhet av arbetslöshet, har hårt fysiskt arbete, har kontakt med farliga ämnen, är utslagna från arbetsmarknaden. Bland de norrbottningar som har jobb finns sådana som har trygga och säkra jobb, och inte känner sig hotade av ‘flyttningsspöket.’ Dessa människor upplever sig ha det bra, i synnerhet som deras välfärdsresurser ofta är ännu bättre (Social utvecklingsplanering i Norrbottens län 1981:52)].

Criteria are thus not prevalently essentialized into any “northerness,” but placed in relation to the national policies that have created these situations

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(cf. Muotka 1978). Similarly, in Finland, no distinction can also be made based purely on the north separate from, e.g., the east of Finland, as an area of low economic growth (Huotari 2001). The differences between the GNP of regions are smaller in the Nordic area than in other European countries, largely the result of redistribution of funds through governmental means (SOU 2000:207). 45. The Faroes are 17 islands, covering an area of 1400 square km with a population of about 50,000 (Debes 1995). There are about a hundred towns and villages, of which the largest is the capital Tórshavn, with a population of 15,000 (AMAP 1997). Similarly to Iceland, have the Faroes been inhabited by a people of Nordic origin since the time of the Vikings. Also similarly to Iceland, the origin of the Faroese Parliament (the Løgting) can be traced back more than one thousand years (Logtinget 2001), though both states have resided both under Norwegian and Danish rule throughout the centuries. Also the Faroes can be characterized by a strong development of social and political institutions, maintaining for example a Latin school in Torshavn (mentioned for the first time in 1547) and a high level of general education (Debes 1995:66–68). Again, as in Iceland, in the Second World War, a majority of the Faroese voted for independence from Denmark in a national plebiscite. But no Faroese state was established; instead the Faroes in 1948 accepted a home-rule status as a “self-governing community within the Danish state” (Debes 1995:63). 46. Settled since the Viking raids in the late ninth and early tenth century, and later under Norwegian and then Danish rule, (AMAP 1997) Iceland gained Home Rule from Denmark and parliamentary democracy in 1904, and thet status of a sovereign state in personal union with Denmark in 1918. When Denmark was occupied by Nazi Germany on April 9, 1940 the union with Iceland was effectively severed, whereby the Althingi pursued full sovereignty. The Republic of Iceland was established on June 17, 1944 (Althingi 2001). 47. In 1976, Wonders writes: “it is really only through the agency of elevation that Finland and Sweden can be said to include portions of the ‘arctic,’ while Iceland, in comparable latitudes, in entirely unforested” (Wonders 1976:2). Equally early work deals with some of the relations that make an “international northern” perspective on Scandinavia relevant: that the Nordic area was seen as lying in “the focal point” (brennpunktet) of USUSSR tension and the risk of war across an “Arctic Mediterranean,” the shortest distance for missiles. Here, the author wonders: How are the Scandinavian countries to be placed in this frame of development? …Even if Norway stretches north of 70, Northern Norway is to be seen as a temperate climatic area and not as a polar, arctic area. Iceland is also a temperate area. Greenland is in a wholly special situation and stretches the polar, arctic area far south, while Svalbard, which is a clearly arctic area, nevetheless has icefree waters a few miles from the coast year round’ (Sollie 1979:13, my translation). [Quote in original: Hvor plasseres sa de skandinaviske land i dette utviklingsbilde? …Selv om Norge strekker seg nord for 70, er Nord-Norge a betrakte som et temperert klimatisk område og ikke som et polart, arktisk strøk. Island er også et temperert område. Grønland er i en helt spesiell situasjon og trekker den polare, arktiske sone langt mot syd, mens Svalbard, som er et klart arktisk område, likevel har isfritt farvann noen få mil fra kysten året rundt (Sollie 1979:13)].

The observation is thus that Nordic areas (Scandinavia) were mainly included in “the Arctic” context as they related to superpower conflict; it was following inclusion on a security background that other characteristics were considered. As Sollie notes, Scandinavia is here viewed as a geographical

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location between superpower tension, in transport areas and as an area for potential resource development: “the need for resources…makes not only the northern states themselves but a full industrialized world start viewing the northern areas as potential development areas with a special emphasis on energy requirements” (Sollie 1979:14, my translation). [Quote in original: “behovet for ressurser…gjør at ikke bare de nordlige stater selv, men en hel industrialisert verden nå begynner a se på nordområdene som potensielt utviklingsom-råde med saerlig betydning for energiforsyningen” (Sollie 1979:14)]. 48. Also, for instance, one rather peculiar comparison of ethnic characteristics encompasses the Nordic countries, North America, Australia and New Zealand (Dow and Gardiner-Garden 1997). In the work, it is noted that in United States and Canada the indigenous population is younger and increasing at a greater rate than the general population: “Indigenous people in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the United States of America are worse off by almost any socio-economic indicator than their nonindigenous compatriots” (Dow and Gardiner-Garden 1997, para. 7). One might note that all of these are areas have relation to a frontier development. The authors subsequently note that Norway and Sweden do not hold much specific ethnic socio-economic data (for Sami), but that levels of living conditions in remote areas are similar to those enjoyed in the south (Dow and Gardiner-Garden, 1997). 49. In one of the very few works which discuss northern Europe or parts of it under a “northerness” label comparable in content to that of Canada (Sörlin 1989), Sörlin offers a rather ironic and cautionary conclusion, warning against features of what has here been seen as a predication of “the north” on distance. Sörlin also relates this “northerness” to Canadian discourse (indicating that the work may have been prompted by knowledge of this discourse rather than any “internal” features of a “north” as such). He notes that the dream of the “northern” can be seen as an embodiment of the international need for a space in which to place hopes and dreams, even quite literally… The fundamental reason behind most of these dreams of the future…is probably a straight-forward lack of real knowledge about the actual conditions (Sörlin 1989:24).

Rather than seeing these sorts of descriptions as related to any actual land area, he notes that they are a space in thought, a measure of relation that should not be assumed to describe reality. In this, Sörlin’s warning is one that the northern should not be assumed to be describable through its imagined “northern” characteristics. Rather, reality is too important and too multifaceted for such a limited representation: From an European point of view, it seems as though the purity-motif is the strongest aspect in its appreciation of the northern. But a new sort of exoticism, a harmful one to say the least, can grow out of that. On the continent, forests are rapidly dying out, the statuary of Rome is crumbling away, and with it, our classical heritage. If the unthinkable happens, it is the people of continental Europe who, once again, will be forced to make the first sacrifices. Scandinavia, with its wide-open spaces, has always been able to offer an alternative. Here, forests thrive as part of a robust ecosystem. Here, one can find a greater number of square kilometres per person than anywhere else on the continent. In the Promised Land of environmentalism and peace conferences (comparable to the Switzerland of cantons and cuckoo clocks), we remain the Far Northerners, slightly mystical bearers of an eternally elu sive innocence.

222

Notes …[however:] While our neutrality is undeniable, so is our weapons export (Sörlin 1989:27–28).

50. Quote in original: “Rejering og storting uttalte i 1848 at Finnmark tidligere hadde vaert en koloni” (Pedersen 1999:37). 51. Quote in orignal: “I och med freden i Knäred [1613] får man anse att Norrbotten definitivt blev en del av Sverige” (Lundmark 1971:25). 52. The Saami populations—originally living in the area of what is now northern Norway, Sweden and Finland, and with a small minority (currently about 2000 persons) on the Russian Kola Peninsula—make up a relatively small (about 50,000 people) and “rather heterogeneous community, culturally, linguistically and religiously” (Eriksson 1997a: 163). The Saami are also a generally largely hetereogenous population occupationally. Only 15 percent of the Saami are engaged in reindeer herding, with the rest in occupations similar to the population at large. There are a total of 523 reindeer owners among the Saami of the entire Saami region, of whom about half are engaged in reindeer breeding (AMAP 1997). For instance, among a total of about 17,000 persons (in one estimation) in Sweden, only among 2500 are active in reindeer management: about as many are resident south of Dalarna and Gästrikland (Wängberg 1997). In Finland, according to the figures provided by the Saami Parliament in 1995, the number of people who fulfil the definition of a Saami is about 7,000. Of these, some 4,000 still live in their native area; thus, 3,000 reside in more southern parts of the country or elsewhere. Only about 10 percent of Saami families make their living from reindeer herding. In contrast to Norway and Sweden, reindeer herding in Finland is also not an exclusive right of the Saami but is available to anyone who lives in the special Reindeer Herding Area. About 900 Saami and Finnish households obtain their main income, and some 1,500 other households a sizeable part of their income, from reindeer herding. Large-scale reindeer herding is more common among the North Saami, whereas Inari Saami and Skolt Saami have traditionally earned their living from a mixed form of subsistence livelihood comprising, for example, fishing, hunting and small-scale animal husbandry and reindeer herding. These are also general rights: in the Province of Lapland and parts of the Province of Oulu, Saami and nonSaami alike may hunt free of charge on state-owned land in the municipality in which they reside. Fishing privileges in state-owned waters are also a traditional usufruct right of the entire population (local Saami and non-Saami) (Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland 2001 a). General usufruct rights of the entire population are applicable also in Sweden. Thus, “traditional” occupations are generally relied upon only by a small minority, and some of these are considered “traditional” not only to Saami. Rather, to hunt, fish and pick wild berries are rights of the community at large. 53. For the development of a Saami political presence, resource conflicts on legislative or national levels have been influential. The idea that the Saami were an indigenous people was largely relatively foreign to Nordic authorities, the public in general and the large majority of Saami up until the 1980s, though a Nordic Saami Council under the Nordic Council was initiated in 1956 following that nationalization attempts in the beginning of the century, in which Saami and all others were to assume the imagined identity of the state they happened to live in. These attempts of nationalization took place in response to fears of a Russian/Soviet invasion, in Norway and Sweden of Finland, in Finland after gaining independence in 1917, and in Norway in distinguishing itself from Sweden after the peaceful separation of the states in 1905, as well as in the general climate of emphasis on race that pertained in Europe of the time. These were to impact all local populations in areas where people had migrated relatively

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freely, intermingled and intermarried. With its strong national undertones, the Saami movement in north Norway initiated around that time was a reaction to the assimilation policy pursued by the authorities in the newly instituted free state. “Paradoxically the Sami activists were inspired by the very same Norwegian nationalistic movement which was itself the source of the increased pressure for assimilation” (Salvesen 1995:130). Norwegian assimilation policies were directed at the Saami and the Kven, earlier Finnish immigrants, in equal measure, with the accusation of “turning the country over to the Russians” (ibid: 133). From about 1700 onwards, there had been a steady influx to the coasts of Finnmark and northern Troms of Finnish-speaking people, now called Kvens, from the Torne Valley (the later Swedish/Finnish border valley where Finnishspeaking groups had lived probably already before the Middle Ages; Lagrådsremiss 1999), and later from the north of Finland. In some areas they intermingled and intermarried with Norwegians as well as Saami, formed the core of what became the sedentary River Saami (Elvesamer) in the interior of Finnmark and adjacent Finnish areas, while some groups of Saami (Bufinner) assimilated and disappeared as a separate Saami group early in the nineteenth century (Zorgdrager 1999). Some of the Saami from Sweden then started making a living along the Norwegian coast (in accordance with the names with which the areas are identified today; one should recall that today’s Sweden and Norway were in union 1814–1905 and Finland was a Russian duchy 1809–1917, as well as that 1809 was the time when a border was put in place between today’s Finland and Sweden, when Finland was lost to Russia). While ethno-political consciousness either in the states or among peoples was not particularly high in the post-war time, the broad protests of both Saami and others over the building of a dam in Alta in northern Norway in 1979–1981 provided a turning point. These events created for many—for Saami as well as Norwegians—the rather surprising recognition that the conflict was not just about the construction of a dam in Norway, but that it also had to be seen as a Saami concern and an indigenous peoples’ concern (perhaps notably so as Norway is the country where around half of all Saami live). The immediate consequence, in an ethno-political sense, was that the Norwegian government appointed two important commissions, one to investigate the Saami’s overall situation, including the legal aspects and the other to investigate more specifically cultural and linguistic concerns (Eidheim 1997). Following public investigations, the conclusion was that the Saami population could be seen as an indigenous people—which then became a central reference in the debate about Alta and Saami questions in general (Minde 1999:66–69). In Sweden, the “tax mountain case” (Skattefjällsmålet) concerning ownership or land use rights resulted in rejected ownership claims but the recognition that the Saami had a strongly protected user right. “The ‘tax mountain case’ was, in truth, a dilemma for both the Sami and the Swedish state” (Salvesen 1995:141). Broader formalization of cooperation along ethnic lines has followed, continuously disputed, most prominently in Saami cooperation and during more recent times also along Kven and Torne Valley Finn delineations. In response to resource use questions, among others, the Saami Parliaments, as ethnically elected consultative bodies of the state, have been instituted in all three states. In 1994, the Saami Parliaments were granted status as observers in the Nordic Council, and the joint boards of the three Nordic Saami Parliaments formally became the Saami Parliamentary Council (Sámi Parlamentáralas Ráddi) in 1996 (cf. e.g. Eriksson 1997b). 54. Quote in original: “de flesta har frågat: Får jag rösta i Sametingsvalet? Och så har de berättat om sin samiska bakgrund. Men det är också många icke-samer

224

55.

57. 58.

59.

Notes som ringt och vill vara med och rösta for att hjälpa samerna. En sa: Ska dom släppa avfall och skit upp i fjällen så vill jag också vara same och kämpa mot miljöförstöringen” (Andersson 1993:11, quoted in Olofsson 1995:21). Quote in original: “Ae e irritert over at når min mor er finsk og min far samisk og hans far norsk, hvorfor skal samisk vinne over det andre?” (Kramvig 1999:117 quotes an interview in Finnmark radio Finnmarkssendningen 25.8.1997). Quotes in original: “det er ikke kategorierne i seg selv som utøver vold, men abstraheringene som skjer med utgangspunkt i kategoriene, som gjør at de ikke oppleves a romme folks spesifike erfaringer” (Kramvig 1999:137). Quote in original: “Det som skaper dilemmaer for folk i den pågående debatten om retten til land og vann, er at det ikke eksisterer en offentlig kulturell kategori som samsvarer med disse erfaringene, i det politiske bildet i dag” (Kramvig 1999:119). As Saami have organized during recent times and not apart from broader ethnic and indigenous ideologicalization in international society, in the mid-1970s there appeared the first official report with recommendations on Kven conditions in north Norway. The background concerning this group is that there are different interpretations involving the Finnish language and the local dialects in this part of Norway and, similarly, for Torne Valley Finns in parts of Sweden. One of the main questions is whether these local dialects are to be seen as variants of the Finnish language or considered as belonging to an independent language. In sum, the issue revolves around how minority status can be defined. The arrival in the 1960s and 1970s of new Finnish immigrants coincided with the global “ethnic awakening” or “ethnic revival,” which started simultaneously in many parts of the Western world in that time. This ethnic awakening resulted in various activities among the Finnish and Kven minorities as well, most of them initiated during a rather intensive period in the 1970s and 1980s. The Saami and Kven situations have been compared and the same privileges have been demanded for the Kven by using e.g. the arguments that [t]he cultures can be fully compared with each other as the starting points are similar: the historical tradition is longer than that of a nation state, both groups have been Norwegianized and the demolition of their cultures has been systematic and organised. If the Saami have obtained their aboriginal rights, there can’t be any reason for the Kvens not to get them. Starting from the assumption that the Saami and the Kvens have the same forefathers historically, the Kvens are just as much an indigenous population as the Saami (Johansen 1992, in Anttonen 1998:49).

In the Kven debate, it has been pointed out several times that there was a permanent Kven settlement in Norway before the state borders were drawn in 1751 and 1826 (Anttonen 1998:45, 49). After a long debate, Finnish was then recognized as an optional subject in primary schools and as a choice of foreign language in the Grammar Schools. Norske Kveners Forbund (the Association of the Norwegian Kvens) was set up in 1987, and Finnish was recognized by the Norwegian Ministry of Education as an alternative to the second Norwegian official language, nynorsk (rooted in the old Norwegian rural dialects), for use in the primary schools in areas of Kven settlement. In 1987 in Sweden, the approximately 50,000 Torne Valley Finns, together with the Saami and the Gypsies of Sweden, were given “partial minority status” (Niemi 1995:171–174). 60. Quote in original: “Jeg vet at jeg har minst syv røtter som jeg stammer fra” (FiN 16.02.1995, in Hovland 1999:176).

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61. Quote in original: “[d]et etniskt, kulturellt og definisjonsmessig uklare Kåfjord vil ha blitt erstattet med et Kåfjord som enten lukker deg inne eller stenger deg ute” (Hovland 1999:183–4). 62. Asked to define Saami identity, “Jernsletten seems tired of being asked a question nobody thinks of asking a Norwegian and somewhat unhappy with his answer” (Zorgdrager 1999:206): linking it to nature and silence. Similarly, Zorgdrager asks, how should a Norwegian deal with the Sami claim that being out there in nature is an element of Sami culture, when attachment to locality and to Norwegian nature…are of central Norwegian identity feelings? …Thinking about ‘we’ and ‘they’ was, and probably still is for most people connected to the assumption that ‘others’ are culturally radically different, a way of thinking some scholars see as typically western (Zorgdrager 1999:205–206).

CHAPTER 7. ARCTIC DISCOURSE DOMINANCE 1. Thus, where polar history is concerned, regardless of whether the actors speaking on the Arctic have an established Arctic approach and whether they connote inhabited parts of their mainland by the term Arctic, the Arctic is always seen as an environmental entity. Similarly is also a common polar description rather prevalent in present Arctic discourse. In early Arctic region-building, the development of IASC was seen as motivated by a desire to set up an organization for the Arctic similar to that for the Antarctic. The model of the Antarctic Treaty System was generally discussed as a model for an Arctic system and rejected only as late as in 1993. Also, CAFF and PAME show considerable similarities to the Antarctic approach (the Agreed Measures for the Conservation of Antarctic Fauna and Flora, and the Convention for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources), and, for instance, the Nordic Council involvement in the Arctic Council early evidenced more of a focus on the High Arctic, i.e., the area comparable to the Antarctic and much smaller and further north than the present “Arctic” delineation. 2. According to frontier mythology, the frontier is the meeting point between civilization and untrammelled land, between the pristine and the jaded, between the traditional indigenous and the modern (cf. Turner 1976). It thereby erects a large differentiation between the wilderness areas with traditional indigenous habitation that are seen as beyond the frontier (here, in the Arctic) and the (here, more southern) “civilization” that is seen as cultural and non-indigenous. While this is the crude expression of the discourse, it is also the underlying metaphor through which Arctic discourse is seen here as having taken form historically. 3. What is discussed is thus not any sort of hegemony of the sort traditionally viewed in IR, as the ability to control sources of capital, markets, and production (cf. Haas 1990:40), but the ability to set an agenda and thereby costs in terms of interaction, e.g., in practice forcing other actors to act on the issue agenda set by a hegemonic state to be able to act on a set of issues at all. 4. A focus on Russia, which is indeed conceivable from a historically and climatically developed Arctic studies perspective, was here impeded by the long-term relative inaccessibility of Russian research and interaction due to East-West conflict. 5. For instance, where “hegemony is limited to one or only a few issues…the scope of cooperation will be correspondingly narrow” (Haas 1990:43).

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6. Like region-building, the epistemic communities approach “confers great influence on those deemed to be authorities” (Haas 1990:53, cf. Haas 1990:54ff). However, it argues that an authority group from a knowledge perspective can primarily be defined as an epistemic community: a professional group including members of different scientific disciplines that believe in the “same cause-and-effect relationships, truth tests to assess them, and shares common values” (Haas 1990:55). They also share the “acceptance of a common body of facts,” “common interpretative framework,” vocabulary, and a common network (ibid.). Even if they do not share an exact disciplinary context (oceanography, paleoecology, environmental physics) they would thereby assemble around, for example, area interest (such as the Arctic) or problem (environmental pollution); this reflects the suggestions forwarded in this work of discourse as the selecting agent. Haas, however, developed the epistemic community approach to describe the way science communities interacted on the problem of environmental protection in the Mediterranean (Haas 1990); he described the epistemic community as a largely scientific group. This would not seem to directly relate to Arctic region-building, where researchers come from broader knowledge areas, including social science and policy studies. Nevertheless, the description of how this more limited scientific grouping influences policy is noteworthy. The epistemic community exerts influence upon broader policymaking by, among other things, “delimit[ing] the dimensions of policy at international conferences by establishing the boundaries within which actual policies would be considered and the range of discourse” (Haas 1990:56). It thus works to decide what is a salient issue and what can be taken up in discourse (cf. Sebenius 1992:355). It “exert[s] influence on policy innovation by (1) framing the range of political controversy surrounding an issue, (2) defining state interests, and (3) setting standards” (Adler and Haas 1992:375). Recognising that there are some points in which epistemic community studies can be made useful to discourse studies of environmental policy, Litfin is one author who has refined “the concept of epistemic communities, which neglects the extent to which knowledge, once produced, becomes something of a collective good available to all who employ it skillfully” (Litfin 1994:49). She developed the concept of “knowledge brokers’ to adapt epistemic community theory to a “discursive approach, based on a knowledge-based conception of power and oriented toward a rhetorical conception of science, [which] is necessary for a fuller understanding” (Litfin 1994:49). As these concepts of “epistemic communities” and “knowledge brokers” rather narrowly focus on the boundary area of science and policy or directly on knowledge communities, they are however only of relevance to the present study in discussing the practical organization of knowledge, as above. 7. F o r i n s t a n c e , p e r h a p s b e c a u s e H a a s d e v e l o p e d t h e “ e p i s t e m i c communities” approach on the basis of hard science, which in modernism was largely conceived of as “objective,” the perspective is retained that epistemic communities gain their role through access to better knowledge, which is thus not understood as developed or selected by or in relation to policy; knowledge is therefore not conceptualised as political (cf. Haas 1990). This understanding of epistemic community knowledge as apolitical has been one of the main points of criticism of the approach, and also one that does distinguish its understanding of knowledge from that in discourse. As Yee quotes John Odell, politicians, such as the state, commonly “shape scientific agendas” as well as “use science selectively to legitimate policies chosen independently of scientific criteria” (Odell 1988:311, quoted in Yee 1996:88). This is not least because states often

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control funding agencies and set the research programs for them (cf. Zürn 1998). As Litfin notes, Epistemic communities in the social sciences tend to be coupled with the dominant political institutions, whether they be nation-states, classes, or interest groups. Their knowledge may be a form of ideology, and their power may be an epiphenomenal expression of conventional forms of political power (Litfin 1994:48).

8. Also for hard science, Susskind suggests that “a review of most of the international treaties negotiated since the 1972 Stockholm conference shows that scientific evidence has played a surprisingly small role in issue definition, factfinding, bargaining, and regime strengthening” (Susskind 1994:62). This would mean that epistemic communities are not able to drive the processes independently, nor work politically in a way defined by shared beliefs separable from political organization. Therefore, political decision makers and epistemic communities can be expected to influence each other (ibid., cf. Young 1994). “Independent scientific investigations play a role in environmental treaty making, but they are intertwined with, not separate from, political considerations” (Susskind 1994:62). In the Arctic case, the discourse and knowledge in question also extends beyond hard science— the focus in many studies of environmental cooperation—and into identity characteristics. It thus also explicitly includes an element of interpretation. 9. For the purpose of discussing how such a socialisation may practically take place, one may recall Adler and Haas’ description of how knowledge is naturalised. Adler and Haas write: if an epistemic [knowledge] community acquires power in only one country or in only one international body, then its international influence is merely the function of that country’s or body’s influence over others. If, however, the community can simultaneously influence several governments through its transnational membership, then it can more directly contribute to informal convergence of policy preferences (Adler and Haas 1992:379–380)

Similarly, this embeddedness in a certain context is, as similar to Adler and Haas’ perspective in this relation, the key to extended influence: [I]f an epistemic [knowledge] community’s ideas become strongly embedded in the regulatory agencies of an individual country, they can directly influence the setting of standards and development of policies in that country. Again, if influence is exerted on the agencies of numerous countries, informal convergence is fostered [if] community members succeed in capturing parties that play a major role in negotiations over specific issues…they can have a direct impact on agenda setting and negotiations and an indirect impact on the behavior of smaller countries and manufacturers via the pressures exerted by the hegemon (Adler and Haas 1992:379–380).

10. While the direct application of the Antarctic situation and organizational context to “the Arctic” has been refuted in processes (after originally being suggested as a model), the “Arctic” approach continues to correspond strongly to Antarctic organization. In relation, the relevance of Antarctic work and “Arctic / northern studies” of a limited conception—but nevertheless made relevant to all of “the Arctic”—continue to be discussed (cf. Adams 2000). 11. Similarly, the Murmansk speech that suggested an environmental protection strategy for the Arctic was an application of broader Gorbachev policy towards regional initiatives connected to the Soviet Union, and the AEPS constitution borrowed some of its elements from the European pollutionmonitoring program LRTAP.

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12. In other words, Arctic discourse thus not only selects the “traditional” problems and actors (such as whaling and indigenous issues) into “the Arctic,” but requires these to stay inside a non-modern spectrum. This is an image that indigenous groups to a higher or lesser degree have contributed to, as it prioritises an indigenous voice. The benefits come at a cost, however: of not being able, as illustrated e.g. in the sustainable development discourse, to freely argue for economic utilization of resources beyond the traditional. 13. As Tennberg notes in her 1998 work, developments in Arctic cooperation have been followed by several writers (such as Heininen, e.g., 1992a; Stokke 1990a, 1990b, 1992; Roginko 1990, 1992; Archer 1992; Scrivener 1996; added to by especially Tennberg 1998, 2000, Young 1998). Development in the Arctic Council and AEPS have also been evaluated internally by, e.g., Nilson (1997) and critiqued by Young in several papers presented in relation to the process (e.g., Young 1999, 2000). 15. To compare, the image of the countryside conserved in rural tourism can similarly be an obstacle to its industrial development and the effective management of cultural heritage. As Nilsson notes, “[t]ourism and regional development are issues that are dependent on each other: industrial development is the background which the rural lifestyle, promoted by the tour operators, must be projected upon in order to make it attractive” (Nilsson 1999:162). He continues: “[i]f there is no connection between the real modern lifestyle and the old lifestyle, the tourists will either see the old lifestyle as a non-existent and historical lifestyle and the whole countryside as a museum, or may feel cheated or annoyed by the discrepance between what s/he has been promised and the not very exiting reality” (ibid.). 16. Stenbaek illustrates this from a Canadian perspective: Inuit culture is not the same now as it was 40 years ago, but neither is the white man’s culture, nor should it be. The myth of the grand old Inuk bravely facing the elements alone in an igloo on a storm-tossed ice floe is a wonderfully romantic and nostalgic myth, but it is just that—an old myth when the present and the future are too scary to be faced head-on, then we retreat into the past, which seems so much more manageable and less scary; we retreat to the igloo or to the Little House on the Prairie (Stenbaek 1987:309).

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Interviews and personal observation: Brekke, A. (1998) Interview. 27 October, 1998. Fairbanks, Alaska, US. Ericson, K. (1998) Interview, 29 October 1998. Fairbanks, Alaska, US. Heal, O.W. (1998) Interview, 23 October 1998. Fairbanks, Alaska, US. Hukkinen, J. (1998) Interview, 9 October 1998. Rovaniemi, Finland. Johansson, G. (1998) Interview, 5 November 1998. Rovaniemi, Finland. Johnson, P. (1998) Interview, 27 October 1998. Fairbanks, Alaska, US. Snellman, O. (1998) Interview, 12 October 1998. Rovaniemi, Finland. Skryabin, R.M. (1998). Interview, 16 October 1998. Rovaniemi, Finland. Translation Russian-English by Tuula Tuisku. Rovaniemi WG meeting, detailed field notes. University of the Arctic Working Group meeting, 27–29 January 1998, Rovaniemi. On file with author. Whitehorse WG meeting. Ad verbum transcript. University of the Arctic Working Group meeting, 14–16 May 1998, Whitehorse. On file with author.

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APPENDIX 1

An Overview of Projects Suggested for the Task Force on Sustainable Development and Utilization 1994–1995

(Names of the projects differ limitedly between different stages of the projects) TRADE (WORKING GROUP 1): • Trade policies, opportunities and barriers related to sea mammal products. Lead Denmark. Taken up at the first task force meeting. Written comments to Denmark were to be supplied in the weeks after the second meeting to complete the second draft report. Some of the areas identified include legislative barriers, such as the Marine Mammals Protection Act and regulations of the European Union: psycho-sociological and “cultural lifestyle” barriers on the part of consumers; socio-economic barriers; international and national barriers between different jurisdictions; and attitudes among the public. A November 30, 1995, draft states that this project is not supported by the US. • Collapse of the Arctic Seal Skin Market: Retrospective Study and Sustainable Options) Lead Canada and ICC. Taken up at the first task force meeting. For the second meeting, ICC prepared and distributed a first draft that covers a retrospective analysis, and proposed a second draft to include future needs towards creating a “sustainable seal industry.” At the second meeting a draft is decided to be finished in June 1995, and a revised draft was subsequently submitted to the task force members in September 1995 for comments to be reviewed prior to the meeting. A part on future needs was anticipated to be largely completed by March 1996, to include possible options for revitalising the seal skin market. A November 30, 1995, draft states that the paper has been developed. • Limitations of Infrastructure to Trade and Sustainable Development. Lead USA (to consider). Taken up at the first task force meeting, the project

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was to consider sea routes, air transportation and satellite communication. At the second meeting, the group agreed that there will be time to study this topic in the period following the next ministerial meeting, on the assumption that the sustainable development task force will be reconstituted as an AEPS working group at some point. • Ministerial letters of intervention to the EEC/EU, concerning fur trade restrictions. Lead Canada (as AEPS host). At the first meeting, Canada took on the role to draft and distribute letters of intervention to the EU. At the second meeting no precise deadlines were given, and there were several ongoing commitments on the part of individual nations. A draft is decided to be finished in July 1995, with a revised draft to be submitted to the task force members in September/October 1995 for comments to be reviewed prior to the next meeting. The possibility to send further letters was taken into consideration by for example the Arctic Network and IUCN; Denmark stated that it will support Canada in its approach to EU, and Finland suggested to work inside the EU to this aim. In the November 9 1995 draft, Canada in addition to the studies agreed to draft and distribute letters of intervention to the EU concerning fur trade restrictions. A Note Verbale was sent by Canada to the EU and the 15 EU nations as well as to ministers in AEPS countries. Given the relative importance of trapping in their nations, USA and Russia agreed to draft their own Note Verbale to support the Canadian initiative. The November 30, 1995, draft states this part of the work to be resolved. • Education and Information. Lead Canada. Taken up at the first task force meeting. At the third working group meeting, this project was placed under working group 1 together with the trade projects. At the second meeting, the project was called “Communication and Education Strategy for Arctic Sustainable Development,” and USA joined Canada as a lead country for the work which was intended to focus education, communication and information-sharing on matters related to among others, and notably, subsistence and broader indigenous hunting, trapping and fishing. An initial outline was discussed in Iqaluit in March 1995, and a second draft was distributed to Task Eorce heads of delegation in November. In the November 30 draft, the statement was that the communication and education paper was still being worked upon and the “importance of the issues emphasized.” CASE STUDIES (WORKING GROUP 2): • Historical study of the Prudhoe Bay oilfields through the lens of sustainable development. Lead USA. Taken up at the first task force meeting; the second meeting determined May 1 as deadline for comments/questions to be

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submitted to state of Alaska, and September 1995 for the completion of the draft study. The study was intended to provide a vehicle for promoting best management practices for technologies for non-renewable resource extraction in the Arctic. In October 1995, before the third meeting, this work was discontinued by the USA because of administrative changes, which meant that no work on non-renewable resources was undertaken by the group. • 1973 Polar Bear Convention. Lead Norway. Taken up at the first task force meeting. At the second meeting the work was discussed to reach draft study form by September 1995, so that a recommendation to Ministers may focus on the Polar Bear Convention as a guideline for future legal instruments that protect flora and fauna. It was agreed that the study should include short descriptions of management regimes that are not normally thought of as governmental organisations such as the Alaskan Commission made up of villages close to polar bear populations. For the third meeting, conclusions of the study were that the Polar Bear Agreement is most important single influence on research and management towards polar bear conservation, and that similar agreements for other species should be recommended. A draft was discussed in March in Iqaluit, and a second version was distributed in November 1995. The November 30, 1995, draft stated that the document would be ready for the ministerial conference in March. Additionally, other case studies were suggested at the first task force meeting (dependent on leadership and financing), concerning: • • • •

Sustainable fisheries National Parks incorporating traditional reindeer herding and ecotourism Industrial complexes including mining Economic rent from non-renewable resources to Arctic communities to support renewable resource economies

GOALS AND PRINCIPLES (WORKING GROUP 3): The work in this group largely proceeded from a ICC study of Agenda 21, suggested by Canada to be used to underbuild an approach towards a regional strategic framework. The work progressed through several stages. Comments on revised ICC draft study of Agenda 21. Lead All. Taken up at the first task force meeting, Decision—on its use as the basis of AEPS document. Lead Canada with all. Taken up at the first task force meeting; at the second meeting a schedule for draft writing on Arctic applications of Agenda 21 was suggested so

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that September 1995, a final draft was to be distributed in preparation for work at a November 1995 third task force meeting. In the November 9, 1995, draft for the third meeting, Regional Application of Agenda 21 in the Arctic (lead: Canada) was stated as a strategy that will provide a long-term regional framework, with the Ministerial meeting providing the first milestone. Existing work items will be short term (two year) deliverables. Two drafts have been distributed to SAAOs, Secretariats of Working Groups, Chairs of Working Groups, and Special Observer Groups. The recommendations in the Regional Application of Agenda 21 are based on the work of the AEPS Working Groups and the Task Force.

Additional projects (working group divisions are not continuously adhered to): • Arctic Ecosystem framework for sustainable resource use and management. Lead Canada (to consider). Taken up at the first task force meeting, at the second meeting Canada withdrew from the initiative. • Opportunities and problems associated with the development of Arctic tourism. Lead Norway with Alaska, Denmark and others. Taken up at the first task force meeting. At the second meeting, a deadline for comments on the draft was set to September, to be completed in time for discussion at the next meeting. At the second meeting, the group agreed that Norway, as lead country should complete its original work on Svalbard. It was recommended that other aspects of eco-tourism be proposed as a followup, and that other areas with indigenous populations be viewed subsequently. At the third meeting, the study was called “Opportunities and Problems with the Development of Arctic Tourism: a case study from Svalbard in the Norwegian Arctic.” The November 30, 1995, draft states that the study has been finalized. • Sustainable use of Northern Timberline forests including reindeer grazing. Lead Finland. At the first task force meeting, case studies of sustainable forestry as well as reindeer grazing were suggested. Taken up at the second meeting, it was suggested that Finland who has already at its own initiative initiated a study should complete its work and that Russia would contribute additional information to broaden the study. Sustainable timberline forestry and reindeer husbandry were here combined as sustainable forestry could include various uses of the land, from reindeer grazing to berry-picking and tourism. The study was also linked to an UNCED process that could result in the development of a forestry convention, and the sustainable timberline forestry part additionally drew on current international work

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on criteria and indications (the Montreal and Helsinki processes). A set of draft recommendations was to be presented at the third task force meeting, with a view to bringing the criteria forward to ministers for the Yellowknife declaration. For the third meeting, a revised draft was distributed in November in preparation for a meeting of experts on November 26, 1995. Additionally, at the second meeting, a proposal from Finland for on Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) in view of its importance in sustainable development was reviewed. The topic was to be discussed at the SAAO meeting later in the week, and at the March 1995 meeting of the SAAOs it was decided to make EIA a sub-group of the TFSDU. Cooperation with UN Economic Commission for Europe (UN-ECE), carrying out work along these lines, had been initiated and would continue. The November 30,1995, document stated that drafting on the project is in progress, for presentation at the 1998 ministerial conference. References: For the first task force meeting, TFSDU, September 16,1994; for the second meeting TFSDU April 3, 1995; TFSDU Summary, March 13–14, 1995; for the third meeting, TFSDU November 9, 1995; TFSDU November 30, 1995.

APPENDIX 2

Sustainable Development Projects Suggested to the Ad Hoc Task Force in Preparation for the 1998 Ministerial Meeting

SAAMI COUNCIL PROJECT SUGGESTIONS: The Saami Council tabled proposals on a Comparative Analysis of Coastal Fishery management systems in Norway, Greenland and Canada with reference to Sea Saami, co-management and traditional ecological knowledge, and also suggests a focus on the Saami tradition of freshwater fishing (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings). New and slightly rearranged versions of these were presented at a subsequent meeting under the titles • Freshwater fishery management (Saami Council) • Comparative analysis of coastal fisheries management systems (Saami Council) From the outset, the Saami Council had in total recommended eight projects, which besides these two included foci on • administrative and management reindeer herding systems, • examination of existing barriers to trade of animal and marine mammalrelated products, • examination of sustainable forests harvest practices as affecting Saami traditional land use, • projects to ensure benefits for Saami and indigenous peoples of northern Russia from tourism, • development of indigenous youth programs, • projects to ensure future of traditional Saami child rearing (Saami Council, fax March 14,1997. Recommendations of the Saami Council on the SD Agenda for the Arctic Council).

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PROJECT CONCEPTS SUBMITTED BY ALASKA GOVERNORS OFFICE NOVEMBER 12,1996: • sanitation, • assessment of intra-Arctic telecommunications and communications mechanisms, • assessment on telemedicine use, • technology transfer of sustainable energy systems in the Arctic, • technology sharing, • assessment of Arctic eco-tourism programs, • conditions for Arctic small business, • cultural marketing, • the integration of indigenous knowledge into Arctic research projects, and • Arctic building technology transfer and skill transfer The office of the Governor of Alaska described the papers as an outgrowth of AEPS initiatives on human health and environmental health, noting that the selection of topics had been based on feedback following a November, 1996, meeting in Oslo. Alaska stated that the proposals would show Arctic residents that the Arctic Council had relevance to them as individuals and communities. Among these, projects on Arctic telemedicine, Arctic culture and eco-tourism, and technology transfer to improve Arctic sanitation and energy systems were further invited comments upon, and USA suggested to circulate a second paper on the initiatives in mid-June, incorporating comments from countries that want to participate in any of the three initiatives (SAO meeting Whitehorse May 9–11, 1998. Proposals and transcript from meetings) ICC STATEMENT ON ARCTIC COUNCIL PROJECTS FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM, SEPTEMBER 20,1996: • The Arctic in national sustainable development strategies (ICC Canada). To examine how the Arctic is discussed in each nation (with each nation suggested to prepare a separate report), the project proposed to hold a circumpolar workshop to compare and contrast strategies, report on experiences, successes and potential means to communicate these were suggested to be circulated and placed on the Arctic Council web site. • Economic rent from Resource Development (ICC Canada). The project was suggested to be carried out by an ad hoc committee to the proposed sustainable development working group, to assess levels and use of for instance royalties, bonus payments, licence and permit fees, and personal and corporate taxation to generate economic rent from natural resource development in the Arctic.

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• Indigenous Peoples and Natural Resource Use and Management (ICC Canada). The project was suggested for development as a major theme within the sustainable development programme, by for instance looking at hunter income support programs. The study was suggested to be undertaken through the establishment of an indigenous land use and occupancy committee to report to the sustainable development working group; the holding of a workshop to examine interview methods and data compilation and analysis; and two land use and occupancy studies in the Russian Federation. Additionally, projects were suggested on • support for aboriginal people’s hunting fishing trapping gathering and herding, and • environmental change and traditional ecological knowledge CANADIAN PROJECT SUGGESTIONS • Project proposal on the follow-up to recommendations from the Circumpolar Conference and Workshop on Sustainable Development in the Arctic: Lessons Learned and Ways Ahead (Canada). This project suggested to set priorities that reflect the values, beliefs and priorities of a wide variety of circumpolar stakeholders, to develop a strategic approach to help the Arctic Council advance in its commitment to sustainable development. “A strategic approach would allow for the implementation of specific sustainable development projects on a timely, systemic basis.” • The Future of Children and Youth of the Arctic (Canada). This project suggested a development to deal with increasing proportion of young people in the Arctic and their specific problems. Additionally, projects not directly associated with the Arctic Council sustainable development initiative but focusing sustainable development were presented in this time period, among others: THE CIRCUMPOLAR UNIVERSITIES ASSOCIATION: “With Shared Voices: Launching the University of the Arctic.” The report towards the establishment of a University of the Arctic requested the Arctic Council to among others accept the report, call on bodies to support the establishment of a multi-center University of the Arctic, and recommend the project for support to among others Ministers of Education.

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THE SAAMI COUNCIL, ICC AND RAIPON: • Arctic Indigenous Fellowship program Suggested in a proposal to the SAO meeting in Ottawa, October 7–9, 1997 (earlier planned for Yellowknife), the program was intended to deal with the difficulty for indigenous groups to attain formal education, and select fellows to work as interns of IPS, of indigenous peoples organizations, of administrations, and undertaking curricular courses. The degree suggested was to give the same status as a Master’s Degree. Presented in London, a Finnish non-paper also called for the formation of two ad hoc working groups—a commission on Arctic sustainable development, and a task force on governance issues. References: Saami Council, fax March 14, 1997. Recommendations of the Saami Council on the SD Agenda for the Arctic Council; Whitehorse SAO meeting May 9–11, ad verbum transcript; SAO 9808—London meeting 17– 19 August, ad verbum transcript; Canada 1998 Discussion Paper Children and Youth of the Arctic; Arctic Council Secretariat 1998, “Elements that should be taken into consideration when developing the sustainable development program.”

Index

aboriginal subsistence whaling, 79 aboriginalization, 153 acidification, 54, 57, 161 actors in Arctic discourse, 162 AEPS Seminar on indigenous peoples’ knowledge, 84 AEPS Third Ministerial Conference on the Protection of the Arctic Environment, 89 “Age of the Arctic”, 36, 166 Agenda 21, 76, 84, 85, 194n.1 Agreed Measures for the Conservation of Antarctic Fauna and Flora, 63, 225n.l Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act(ANCSA), 201n.7, 215n.26 Alaska: and Canada, differences and similarities, 214n.25 constitution, 142 description, 214n.25–215n.25, 215n.26 Indian, 142 Inuit, 142 role of frontier development for, 126 wilderness, 142 Aleut International Association. See Aleut Aleut, 98, 142, 202n.13 Aleutian/Pribilof Islands Association. See Aleut. Alta Ministerial Declaration, 202n.15

Alta, building of dam in, 223n.53 Ambassador for Arctic Affairs. See Canadian Arctic Circumpolar Ambassador American Wilderness Act of 1964, 209n.5 Analysis of Agenda 21 in the Context of Sustainable Development, 85–86 animal rights groups, 85, 199n.1 Antarctic Treaty, 29, 72, 187n.5, 188n.5 Antarctic, comparison to the Arctic of, 26, 28, 32, 53, 54–55, 62, 63, 71, 72, 74, 161, 175, 188n.11, 225n.1 anthropology, 28, 29, 38, 105, 157 archaeology, 10, 16, 182 Arctic and Antarctic Institute, 67 Arctic Anthropology, journal, 29, 105 Arctic Basin Council, 44, 66, 159 Arctic Basin states. See Arctic Rim states Arctic Basin Treaty suggestion, 66 “Arctic Boom”, 36, 50 Arctic Circle. See Arctic, definition of, Arctic Circle Arctic cooperation: authors on, 228n.13 conflict over focus of, 75 factors impacting development of, 35 gains for actors in, 173–175

267

268 Arctic Council, 53, 65, 69–70, 158, 159 Canadian initiative of, 65 discussion of direction and value, 203n.18, 201n.12 domestic alliances on, 172 focus on in present work, 3 issue areas for, 198n.16 observersin, 99, 202n.16 organization of, 91 planned pillar structure of, 201n.11 region-centred focus of, 69 representation in, 107, 162 role of knowledge actors in, 170 Rules of Procedure of, 93. See also sustainable development: Rules of Procedure. suggested attributes of, 69–70 use of definitions of the Arctic, 33 Arctic Council Panel, 71, 81, 159, 166, 170; disagreements with states on Arcti Council focus, 71; Framework Reports of, 68 sponsorship and inception of, 67 Arctic description, generalized from Canadian conditions, 137–140 Arctic Eight, 44 Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS), 53, 54, 56, 62–63, 194n.1 background of, 44 participation in, 63 role of knowledge actors in, 170 Arctic fisheries, 78 Arctic history, 176 Arctic in crisis. See Arctic: as social and cultural crisis area Arctic issues, extended beyond nvironmental factors in cooperation, 77 Arctic Leaders’ Summit, 64, 199n.1 Arctic Mediterranean, 34, 50 Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP), 57, 63, 95, 100, 205n.22

Index Arctic Ocean Sciences Board, 192n.25 Arctic Peoples Conference, 200n.7 Arctic Policy Review, 88 Arctic research programmes, in Finland, Sweden and Norway, 218n.35 Arctic Rim states, 45, 66, 78, 197n.12 Arctic studies, 108, 112, 117, 118, 121, 165. See also Polar studies. Arctic Sustainable Development conference. See Sustainable Development in the Arctic conference Arctic Sustainable Development Strategy, 62, 77 Arctic Terrestrial Ecosystems Research Initiative, 104 Arctic Waters Pollution Act. See Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act, 66, 134 Arctic: agreements on previous to regionbuilding period, 25, 35, 188n.13, 189n.15–190n.15 as Canadian national identity, 127, 158 as distinctive region, 36, 47, 48, 66, 106, 107, 119, 166, 176, 193n.34, 202n.13 as periphery, 178, 190n.17 as symbol, 171 bilateral agreements on, 192n.24 bracketing of term, 2–3 Canadian definition of areas in, 67 connotational character of, 38–39, 190n.16 definition of, 2, 32, 185n.2, 188nn.7, 8 Arctic Circle, 32, 95 discussions of, 201n.12–202n.12 ecosystem characteristics, 31 eight-state, 46 geographical delimitation, 25 High Arctic, 25, 26, 187n.3

Index marine, 31 permafrost, 31 political, 43 60 degrees northen latitude, 32-33 social, 38, 95, 106, 190n.17 temperature, 31 tree line, 30 United Nations Environment Program, 205n.23 differences across, 146-147, 149, 150, 155, 154 discourse focus on problems, 143 hegemonic discourse on, 167-168 representations in film, 139, 213n.22 strategic understanding of, 34 see also Discourse: on the Arctic; Environmental: view of the Arctic as; Traditional indigenous: view of Arctic as Arctic, journal, 29, 105, 139,170, 213n.21 area studies, 1, 179 area, focus on understanding of point of view of inhabitants, 183 Association of Canadian Universities for Northern Studies (ACUNS), 107, 111, 207n.5, 207n.7 Association of Indigenous Minorities in the Far North, Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation (RAIPON), 64, 107, 202n.16, 217n.32 view on strategic framework for sustainable development, 204n.20 Association of the Small Peoples of the North, 217n.32 Bangay, Garth, 62 Barents Euro-Arctic Region, 195n.9, 196n.9 Barents Sea, 58 Barrow Chapeau, 98-99, 206n.26

269 boom-and-bust-cycles, 209n.6–210n.6 Brox, Ottar, 150 Brundlandt Commission, 76 Bufinner, 223n.53 Bush, George (Sr.) (American President), 193n.31 Canada: Arctic area of, 127-137, 199n.18 and Arctic Council background, 135 and the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC), 64, 98, 162 Arctic studies research in, 165, 212n.20–213n.20 determining role for Arctic cooperation and discourse, 4, 44, 53, 62, 65-66, 70, 125, 126, 158, 159-162, 168-170, 172 definition of Arctic as 60 degrees northern latitude, 33, 208n.1-209n.1 consultation in the University of the Arctic, 109, 114, 207n.7 governance questions, 133 and indigenous peoples of the North, 112 importance of historical development for Arctic interest, 168 institutionalization as federal state, 129 interpretation of “indigenous”, 131 interpretation of “wilderness”, 127, 131, 132 Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, 162 nationalistic discourse, 127, 158 and Norden, differences, 219n.44-220n.44, 47, 221n.48 and Northern Forum, 160 and Northern Studies, 160 northern security as research theme, 135 role in whaling and sealing, 79,174

270 role of frontier development for, 126, 127 self-determination of territories, 136 sovereignty in the north, 210n. 9, 210nn.10, 211nn.10, 12, 13, 14, 15. See also security: Canadian focus on in Arctic cooperation southern descriptionary bias, 139 and sustainable development, 159 terrotories and provinces, 129, 136, 138, 210n.8 and the US: conflict between, 88–89, 98, 133–135, 168, 174 comparison of view of frontier, 129–131; views on sustainable development work, 90, 94, 100, 204n.20 See also North America Canada’s North: 1970–1980, 210n.10–211n.10 Canadian Arctic Circumpolar Ambassador, 71, 81, 104, 120, 162 Canadian Arctic Resources Committee (CARC), 67, 81 Canadian Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act, 211n.12 Canadian Arms Control Center, 67 Canadian Center for Foreign Policy Development, 109, 160 Canadian Centre for Arms Control and Disarmament, 193n.31 Canadian Circumpolar Ambassador. See Canadian Arctic Circumpolar Ambassador Canadian Department of External Affairs, 62, 68, 162 Canadian initiative. See Arctic Council: Canadian initiative of Canadian Institute of International Affairs, National Capital Branch of, 66, 68,166

Index Canadian Polar Commission, 71, 207n.7 Canadian Polar Research Committee, 47 Canadian Wildlife Service of Environment Canada, 62 categorization, 23, 153 Chernobyl, 37 Children and Youth of the Arctic, 94, 204n.21 Circumpolar North Ministers of Education, 207n.4 Circumpolar North, 34, 188n.12 Circumpolar Universities Association (CUA), 105, 107, 160, 206n.2 feasibility study of, 107 Working Group of, 107, 120 civilian sphere, 37 Clark, Joe (Secretary of State for External Affairs, Canada), 67 Clinton, Bill (American President), 87–88, 203n.17 Cohen, Maxwell, 66 Cold War, 3, 34, 35, 46, 111, 119, 132 colonialism, 136 colonies, historical, 151 colonization, 119, 148 Comite Arctique International (CAI), 192n.25, 193n.30 commonsensical. See Hegemonic discourse: commonsensical factors of community, of people, 21 Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), 59–60, 69, 71 connotational character. See Arctic, connotational character of Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF), 62, 77, 83, 88, 225n.1 as result of Canadian action, 159, 163 conservation, see environmental conservation constructedness, 3, 18, 19

Index constructivism, 23 constructivist social science, 18 Convention for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR), 63, 225n.1 Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution (LRTAP), 58–59, 228n.11 crisis, the Arctic seen as in, 95, 97, 137, 147, 178 critique in Foucault and critical theory, 186n.15. See also Foucault: critique Danish Polar Center, 47 Declaration on the Environment and Development in the Arctic, 76 Declaration on the Establishment of the Arctic Council. See Ottawa Declaration Declaration on the Protection of the Arctic Environment. See Rovaniemi Declaration democratic representation, 92, 100, 122, 133, 167, 175 and participation, 70 and legitimacy. See legitimacy Denmark-Greenland, 162, 207n.7 role in the University of the Arctic, 107, 109, 111, 120 views on sustainable development work, 89, 90, 94,100, 204n.20 See Also Greenland, Norden, Nordic states Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND), 166, 207n.4, 210n.10–211n.10 Deputy Assembly of the Small Peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East, 217n.32 descriptive power, 23 Diefenbaker, J.G. (Canadian Prime Minister), 132

271 difference between states, 1–2, 4–5, 32, 90, 95, 99–100, 112, 126, 157–158 in views of the northern/Arctic, 40–42, 94, 96–97, 99–100 discourse, 2, 9, 166, 169, 186n.11 analysis, 9, 15–16, 19 on the Arctic, 15,50,103,123,140, 147, 157, 161, 162, 176, 177 hegemony, 14, 130, 185n.10, 186n.10, 225n.3, 225n.5–226n.5. See also hegemonic discourse importance in region-building, 7 and language, 10–11, 21 and power, 170 silences in, 73, 83, 87, 97, 100, 103, 155, 158, 73 as structure of delimitation, 10, 11, 12, 14 “Draft Arctic Treaty”, 68 Draft Declaration on the Establishment of an Arctic Council, 68 Draft for an International Arctic Council, 71 EC/EU, Finland’s relation to northern dimension of. See Northern Dimension of the European Union; Northern Dimension, Finland’s initiative for effective history. See genealogy Emergency Prevention, Preparedness and Response (EPPR), 63 environmental: view of the Arctic as, 27, 36, 116, 119, 122–123, 142, 143, 157, 161, 164–165, 176, 177, 190n.17 awareness, 54 conservation, 72, 100, 161 movement, 37, 79 politics, 24 Environmental Impact Assessment, 205n.25–206n.25

272 Environmental Monitoring and Evaluation Programme (EMEP), 58 epistemic community approach, 169–170, 226n.6 critique of, 226n.7, 227nn.7,8 Eskimos, 28, 134, 140 essentialism, 20, 179 essentializing descriptions, 182 European Community (EC), 61, 80 European Union (EU), 61, 84, 110 Exclusive Economic Zone, 134 exploration, 26, 112, 129, 187n.1, 191n.18 explorers, 27 Faeroes, 147, 220n.45 whaling in, 200n.3 Field notes, 22 Finland, 146–147 as Antarctic Treaty Consultative Party, 191n.23 Arctic research of, 192n.23, 218n.35 and Canada compared, 220n.47, 220n.44 consultation in the University of the Arctic, 109, 110, 207n.7 forests and forestry, 98 foreign policy, 58, 64 limitations on freedom of action, 195n.5 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 58, 195n.9 Ministry of the Environment, 58, 110 Ministry of Trade, 110 neutrality, 194n.4 role of in Arctic cooperation, 4, 44, 47, 53–59, 157–158, 160, 205n.25–206n.25 role of frontier development for, 126 and Russia, 59, 161 University of Lapland, 110

Index University of Oulu, 110 view on north, 4, 42 view on strategic framework for sustainable development, 204n.20 See Also Norden, North Calotte, Nordic states Finland’s Polar Commission, 110 Finnmark, 149, 151 First Arctic Council Ministerial Meeting, 92 foreign policy, 58, 64, 79, 142 in University of the Arctic development, 109, 113 role in establishing Arctic discourse, 175 forests and forestry, 56–57, 98, 106, 194n.3 Foucauldian framework, 12 Foucault, 9, 11, 15, 166, 171, 186n.12 critique, 20 regimes of truth, 18, 19 Foucault’s interpretative analytics, 16 fragile, Arctic seen as, 64, 86, 190n.17 framing, 11–12, 24 of the Arctic, 100, 122, 176 frontier, 4, 124, 131, 144, 191n.18, 217nn.31, 33 Arctic as, 39–40, 125, 126, 128–131, 140, 155, 167, 175 Nordic history as, contested, 149–151 as separation between wilderness and civilization, 131, 209n.5, 209n.6–210n.5, 212n.17 mythology of, 209n.5, 225n.2 GATT/WTO, 200n.4 genealogy, 15, 16, 19, 20, 125 and critique, 20 as method for study of regions, 182 glesbygd, 146

Index global problems, 38 globalization, 3, 6 Gorbachev, Mikhail, 170 broadening of Arctic definition, 43 Murmansk speech, 4, 42–44, 46, 47, 50, 54, 56, 58, 227n.11–228n.11 governance, 21, 70, 177, 186n.16 green party formations, 54, 56 Greenland, 140–141, 149 as colony, 141 description of, 213n.23, 213n.24–214n.24 Home Rule, 79, 141 Inuit, 141 role of frontier development for, 126 seal hunting, 80, 141, 174 social change, 141 University of Greenland, 111 whaling, 141, 174 See Also Denmark-Greenland, Norden, Nordic states Greenlandic situation, focus on in Arctic work, 168 Greenpeace, 199n.1 Griffiths, Franklyn, 47–48, 67, 68, 135, 166, 197n.14 Haavisto, Hekki (Finnish Foreign Minister), 195n.9 Hamelin, Louis-Edmond (Canadian geographer), 137, 170 Heal, Bill, 104, 105,113 hegemonic discourse, 12, 13, 155, 167–168 commonsensical factors of, 12, 13, 27 See also discourse: hegemony hegemony. See hegemonic discourse Heininen, Lassi, 48, 166 Helsinki Process. See Conferance on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE)

273 High Arctic. See Arctic: definitions of, High Arctic “High level forum”, Arctic Council as, 90, 173 historical scope of labels, 14 historicity, 1, 13, 15 homeland, Arctic as, 40, 119, 165, 191n.21 Hopson, Eben (Sr.) (Mayor of the North Slope Borough, the Home Rule Government of Northern Alaska), 200n.7–201n.7 Hudson’s Bay fur trading company, 129 Iceland, 146, 147 and Canada, compared, 220n.47 description of, 220n.46 consultation in the University of the Arctic, 109, 110, 115, 207n.7 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 110 whaling and sealing in, 78, 79, 174, 200n.3 role of frontier development for, 126 view on north, 4, 42 views on sustainable development work, 89, 93, 94, 100, 204n.20 See Also Norden, Nordic states Icelandic Joint Committee of Arctic Affairs, 110 Icelandic Polar Commission, 110 Identity: area-based, 8 Finnish, 151, 153 Kven, 151, 153 frameworks, 182 in the North Calotte, 151 local, 153 Norwegian, 151, 153 place-based, 153–154 Saami, 151, 152–153

274 subregional, 153 Swedish, 151 Torne Valley Finnish, 151 imagined communities, 182 Indian, 131, 142, 148 indigenous peoples, 38, 84, 106, 120, 126, 162 and delineations to nonindigenous people, 152, 154, 119, 154 as focus in AMAP, 96 and local peoples, 83, 86, 87, 100, 101, 167, 116, 117, 118, 122, 146 in non-traditional occupations, 151 in the Arctic, calculation of, 191n.20 land claims, 133 and “other” peoples, 69, 87, 90, 115–118, 158, 162, 167 as term under international law, 90 of the Canadian North, 65, 160 in different states, 221n.48 indigenous: view of the Arctic as, 126, 162–163 Canadian interpretation of, 131 See also traditional indigenous: view of the Arctic as Indigenous Peoples’ Organizations (IPOs), 81 Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat (IPS), 80, 163, 200n.6, 202n.15 indigenous terms of argumentation, 90 indigenousness, 154 INSROP (International Northern Sea Route Programme), 193n.33 institutional response to change, 24 institutionalization of region, 7–8, 9, 17, 158 institutions: analysis of, 18 international, 19

Index International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), 45, 46, 47, 50, 166, 175, 193n.27, 193n.32 International Arctic Social Science Committee (IASSA), 47 international cooperation, formulation of; 14 International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU), 192n.26 International Court of Justice, 135 International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), 93, 99, 199n.1 International Geophysical Year (IGY), 28–30, 187n.5, 192n.26 International League of Small Peoples and Ethnic Groups, 217n.32 international organization, 2 as term under international law, 90 International Polar Commission, 28, 192n.26 International Polar Years (IPY), 28–30 International Relations, practices of analysis in, 18–19 International Whaling Commission (IWC), 79, 80, 163, 164, 202n.17–203n.17 convention and aim, 79, 199n.2–200n.2 interpretative analytics. See Foucault’s interpretative analytics intertextual. See texts, intertextual perspective interviews, 23 themes structured around, 187n.18 Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC), 68, 81, 82, 107, 109, 111, 115, 120, 140, 141 background of, 200n.7–201n.7, 201n.8 consultation in the University of the Arctic, 111, 115, 120 General Assembly of, 109 involvement in Arctic discourse development, 162–163

Index as Permanent Participant, 202n.16 relation to Canada and in regionbuilding, 64, 67, 77, 80, 125, 159, 162 understanding of Arctic concept, 95 view on sustainable development work, 88, 90, 93, 94, 100 Inuit Circumpolar Youth Council, 109 Inuit Taprissat of Canada, 81 Inuit, 28, 109, 140, 141, 142 traditional whaling and sealing, 78 See also under Greenland; Alaska IPS. See Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat. Japan, threatened with US sanctions for whaling, 79 Joenniemi, Pertti, 48 Johansen, Lars Emil (Greenland Home Rule Prime Minister), 79 Kåfjord, 154 Käkönen, Jyrki, 48 Kekkonen, Urho (Finnish President), 60, 194n.4 knowledge brokers, 226n.6 knowledge community, 17 knowledge, 18, 21 as political, 170 naturalization of, 227n.9 role of in determining state interests, 169 knowledge/power, 17, 181, 172 Koivisto, Mauno (Finnish President), 43, 47, 60, 193n.33 Kola Peninsula, 42, 143 Kuhmo Summer Academy, 48, 61, 166 Kuptana, Rosemarie, 67, 72, 80, 162 Kven: background of, 223n.53 organization, 224n.59 and Saami comparisons, 224n.59 label, of the Arctic, 5, 14, 25, 73, 100,

275 126, 139, 147, 176, 178, 180, 190n.16, 208n.7 laboratory, Arctic as, 34, 41, 189n. 14 language. See discourse: and language Law of the Sea Convention, 134 legitimacy, 13, 18, 117, 167, 169–171, 178, 182 Liljelund, Lars-Erik (Swedish SAO), 104, 105 local people. See indigenous peoples: and local peoples; Nordic states: local community discourse; identity: local MacArthur Foundation, 47 Mackinder, Halford, 34 Manhattan tanker incident, 134, 135, 210n.10, 211n.10, 11, 14 marine mammals conflict, 72, 84, 85, 87, 93, 99 perceptions of hunting of, 87 role of trade barriers in, 84, 85, 86, 87 US–Canadian confrontation over, 88–89 Meech Lake Accord, 210n.8 method, of study, 21–23 Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, 71, 94, 162–163, 198n.17. See also Siddon, Tom Mulroney, Brian (Canadian Prime Minister), 67, 198n.17 NAMMCO (North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission), 80, 200n.5 narrative, geographical, 7 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), 88 nationalism, 8 nationalization in northern Europe, 222n.53–223n.53

276 nation-building, definition of; 7 “National Forum”, 109 “New World”, 40, 146 NGO knowledge perspectives, 170 non-Arctic states, 70, 107 Norden. See Nordic states Nordic Council, 59–60, 110, 145, 193n.29, 194n.1, 218n.38 Arctic Research programme of, 194n.1 Cold War background of, 145 involvement in Arctic work, 72 Nordic Nuclear Free Zone, 43, 60 Nordic, as concept, 145–146, 149 Nordic states, 145–155, 185n.1 applicability of indigenous view of northern areas, 147–148 definition of in this work, 218n.37 difference to Canada and other states, 145–155, 219n.44–220n.44, 47, 221n.48 inclusion in Arctic cooperation of, 46 local community discourse, 151 northerness in, 145–146, 218n.36, 39, 40; 221n.49 periphery description of, 146–147, 155 resistance to indigenous Arctic delineation, 149 resistance to frontier concept, 149–151 social situations in, 146, 147, 149 tradition and modernity, 146, 147, 150, 218n.40–219n.40 nordicity, 138 Norrbotten, 219n.44 North America: Arctic studies researchers in, 165 compared with other states, 221n.48 focus on in Arctic work, 168 native policy, 148

Index North Atlantic Committee for Cooperation on Research on Marine Mammals (NAC), 200n.5 North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission. See NAMMCO North Calotte, 147, 219n.42 resistance to Arctic discourse delineations, 152 See Also under Nordic states North East Passage. See Northern Sea Route. North Pole, 26 north, as linked to a concept of need, 191n.21 Northern Contaminants Programme (NCP), 64 Northern Dimension of the European Union, 61, 98. See also Northern Dimension, Finland’s initiative for Northern Dimension, Canada’s initiative for, 71, 135, 196n.10 Northern Dimension, Finland’s initiative for, 61, 110, 192n.23, 196n.10–197n.10 background of 195n.9 Arctic Window of, 197n.10 Northern Europe, definition of, 145. See also under Nordic states Northern Foreign Policy Conference, 199n.19 Northern Forum, 49, 70, 73, 114, 160 background of, 193n.35–194n.35 critique of Arctic Council organization, 91–92 Northern Scientific Network, 192n.25 Northern Sea Route, 26, 43, 48, 195n.9 Northern Studies, 105, 121, 138, 139, 160, 172, 173, 175, 180, 200n.7, 206n.2 as Canadian tradition, 103

Index in University of the Arctic, 107, 108, 117, 118 “Northern Vision”, 132 northerness, 137, 138, 170 historical definition of regions through, 143, 144, 212n.18 in northern Europe, 143–146, 179, 218nn.36, 39, 40; 221n.49 Northwest Passage, 26, 134–135 Northwest Territories Council, 133 Northwest Territories (NWT), 133, 136 Norway, 146–147 Arctic research programme of, 218n.35 Arctic research definition of, 191n.23 Barents Euro-Arctic Region initiative of, 195n.9 compared with other states, 220n.47, 221n.48 Ministry of Education, 111 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 111 whaling and sealing in, 78, 79, 174, 200n.3 role in the University of the Arctic, 107, 110, 111, 112 role of frontier development for, 126 view on north, 4, 42 view on sustainable development work, 89, 93, 94, 100, 203n.19, 204n.20 See also Norden, North Calotte, Nordic states Nunavut, 136, 149 observers, in the Arctic Council, 99, 202n.16 oil exploration. See petroleum exploration Oinas, Asko (Governor of Lapland), 57 “Old World”, 40, 146 Orientalism, 179–180

277 Ottawa Declaration, 90, 91, 202n.15 Our Common Future, 76 people: community of, 21 participation in policy-making, 201n.10 self-description of, 8 periphery: Arctic as, 178, 190n.17 northern Nordic areas as, 146–147, 155 permafrost. See Arctic, definition of, permafrost Permanent Participants, 63, 91, 100, 107, 163, 202n.16 petroleum exploration, 35 and Mackenzie Valley pipeline, 133 in Prudhoe Bay, 133 Pharand, Donat, 66, 68 polar bear protection, 45, 189n.13 polar science, 28, 65 change in, 38 See Also Arctic studies Polar Sea icebreaker, 135 polar studies. See polar science; Arctic studies political, 10, 18, 19, 154 pollutants, 64 pollution, 152, 161 air, 36 ocean, 37 transboundary, 54, 56 power/knowledge, 17, 181, 172 predication on distance, 131, 140, 141 definition of in this work, 211n.17–212n.17 “primitive”, 28, 29 understanding of term, 187n.4 and its relation as concept to “wilderness”, 131, 209n.5 pristine, Arctic as, 36, 189n.14, 209n.5

278 Protection of Arctic Marine Environment (PAME), 63, 77, 225n.1 Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty on Environmental Protection, 188n.6 Radioactivity in the Arctic Region, 57 RAIPON. See Association of Indigenous Minorities in the Far North, Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation Rajakoski, Esko (Finland’s consultative ambassador for environmental, Arctic and Antarctic affairs), 55–56, 161 Reagan, Ronald (American President), 44 recording of material, 22 reflexivity, 19 region: as Arctic Council focus, 69 construction of in discourse, 2, 7 implications for the study of, 180–183 institutionalization of, 7–8, 9, 17, 158 international political focus of, 121 symbolic shape of, 158, 171 Regional Application of A21 in the Arctic, 85 regional geography, 15 regionalism, 6 regionalization, 6, 48 region-building, 2, 7, 100, 169, 177, 185n.5, 186n.14 actors in, 17, 165–166, 169, 181, 186n.13 reindeer herding, 106, 151, 152, 222n.52 reindeer husbandry organizations, 152 Renner, George T., 34 representation, 23, 106, 117 of groups in Arctic cooperation, 73 of peoples and areas, 14, 20–21 in the Nordic countries, 146

Index research and researchers as actors in Arctic region-building, 17, 165, 181 Rio Conference. See United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) Rio Declaration, 84 Rio Summit. See United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) River Saami (Elvesamer), 223n.53 romanticisation: of countryside, 228n.15 of wilderness, 177 of peoples and areas, 1, 9 of the Arctic, 36, 143, 217n.30, 31; 228n.16 Rovaniemi Declaration, 62, 63, 64, 76, 91 Russia: applicability of indigenous view of Arctic in, 144 and Canada, differences and similiarities, 215n.27–216n.27 differences across, 143 economic problems of, 216n.28 extent of consultation in the University of the Arctic, 207n.7 as frontier-developed country, 144 northerness, 143, 144, 216n.30–217n.30 reasons for diminished role in Arctic work, 225n.4–226n.4 role in whaling and sealing, 79, 174 role of frontier development for, 126 romanticization of Arctic, 143, 217nn.30, 31 views on sustainable development work, 90, 94, 100, 204n.20 Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the Far North. See

Index

279 Association of Indigenous Minorities in the Far North, Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation

Saami Council, 64, 88, 107, 111, 113, 115, 120, 202n.16 consultation in the University of the Arctic, 111, 113, 115, 120 view on strategic framework for sustainable development, 204n.20 Saami, 148, 149 and Kven comparisons, 224n.59 movement, 152 percentage of in northern areas, 219n.41 Saami Parliaments, 152, 154, 222n.52, 223n.53–224n.53 Saami Parliamentary Council, 224n.53 Said, Edward, 179–180 Samefolket, journal, 152 “savage”, 177 Scandinavia, 149. See also North Calotte; Nordic states science, role in relation to policy, 227n.8 Scientific Committee for Arctic and Antarctic Research (SCAR), 45, 192n.26–193n.26 sea sovereignty, conflicts between states, 27 sea resources, foreign policy conflict on, 79 seal hunting, 78, 79, 80, 141, 174 movements against, 199n.1 sealing. See seal hunting. Second World War, American security offensive during, 132 sector principle, 27 security, 34 and Arctic waters, 27, 35, 47 Canadian focus on in Arctic cooperation, 126, 132,

133–135. See also Canada: sovereignty in the north cooperation used to limit tension of, 37 excluded from Arctic Council focus, 71 military, 173 self-determination, 90. See also Canada: self-determination of territories Senior Arctic Affairs Officials (SAAOs), 63 Senior Arctic Officials (SAOs), 63, 89, 91, 110, 202n.16 comment on University of the Arctic feasibility study, 120 Siberia: as frontier, 217nn.31, 33 conquest of, 217n.33–218n.33 romanticization of, 217n.31 history of, 216n.29 See also under Russia Siddon, Tom (Canada’s Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development), 69, 198n.17 silences. See discourse, silences in Simon, Mary, 17, 81, 104. See also Canadian Arctic Circumpolar Ambassador 60 degrees northern latitude, 30, 32–33, 95, 159, 166, 188n.9, 197n.13 as lowest delineation of the Arctic, 66 as delineation of Arctic in Canada, 127 See also Arctic: definition of, 60 degrees northern latitude Skattefjällsmålet. See Tax mountain case snowball sampling method, 22 social change, 41, 94, 140, 141 in Alaska, 142 the Arctic seen as in, 137,164, 165

280 socialization: of actor into discourse, 171, 172 state as context of, 171 socially constructed boundary, 32 Southern: as category, 154, 167 peoples, 122 sovereignty, 139 as exercised though discourse, 174–175 as reason for abandoning Arctic Treaty model, 72 Canadian focus on in Arctic cooperation, 126 See also Canada: sovereignty in the north; security: Canadian focus on in Arctic cooperation, Soviet State Committee for Arctic Affairs, 47 Soviet Union: agreement on inclusion of non-rim states in Arctic cooperation, 46 changes in post fall, 217n.32 See also under Russia Special Joint Committee of the Senate and the House of Commons on Canada’s International Relations, 135, 140 Spitzbergen. See Svalbard Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Religion, 109, 194n.1 state: as contexy of socialization, 171 as principal source of funding for scientific research in the Arctic 193n.28 Stefansson, Vilhjamur, 34, 210n.7 Stoltenberg, Thorvald (Norwegian Foreign Minister), 195n.9 Stone, David (AMAP chair, Canadian Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development

Index representative), 104, 105, 160, 207n.4, 208n.10 Strategy for Communication and Education on Arctic Sustainable Development, 84, 159, 164 “strategy”, the formation of AEPS as, 56, 65 Struggle of man against nature, 27 subarctic, definition of, 188n.8 sublime, 27, 28 subsistence, 41, 79, 99, 106, 140, 163, 164 Sustainable Development Framework Document. See Barrow Chapeau. Sustainable Development in the Arctic conference, 94, 100, 109, 159–160, 166 Sustainable Development Program of the Arctic Council, 204n.20 SAO assessment of projects for, 204n.20 Terms of Reference, 89, 92–93, 204n.20, 205n.24 Rules of Procedure, 92, 205n.24 sustainable developmenty: and environmental protection, structural distinction, 205n.24 concept definition and history, 75, 76 concept development, 81 differentviews on in states, 92–93 international pilot project on in the Arctic, 197n.14–198n.14 project selection disagreements on, 77, 83, 91, 92, 93, 97 Rules of Procedure, 92, 205n.24 strategic approach and states views on, 92, 94, 203n.19 Terms of Reference, 92–93, 204n.20, 205n.24 University of the Arctic relation to Arctic Council on, 105

Index Sustainable Use of Northern Timberland Forests including Reindeer Grazing, 205n.25 sustainable utilization, 75, 84, 100, 161 Svalbard, 42, 107, 141, 191n.22, 195n.9 Sweden, 146–147 Arctic research of, 191n.23, 218n.35 compared to other states, 220n.47, 221n.48, 219n.44 consultation in the University of the Arctic, 110, 111, 120, 207n.7 Ministry of Education, 110, 208n.8 research definition of the Arctic, 191n.23 role of frontier development for, 126 University of Luleå, 110 view on north, 4, 42, 191n.23 views on sustainable development work, 89, 94, 100, 204n.20 See also Norden, North Calotte, Nordic states Swedish Polar Research Secretariat, 191n.23 symbolic capital, 9 symbol: importance of in region-building, 8, 50, 158 Arctic as, 171 Tampere Peace Research Institute (TAPRI), 47 Task Force on Sustainable Development and Utilization (TFSDU), 81, 82, 83, 88–89, 163, 201n.9 Tax mountain case, 223n.53 territorial imagination, 178 texts: definition of, 21 intertextual perspective, 22 Third World, comparison of Canadian Arctic to, 211n.16

281 Torne Valley Finnish, 151 Trade Barriers, Opportunities and Barriers Related to Sea Mammals, 87, 100 tradition and modernity, 41, 146, 147, 150, 164 traditional: argumentation, 84, 85 country food, 84, 106 traditional knowledge, 84, 86, 100, 116, 119, 122, 164 traditional indigenous, view of Arctic as, 28, 29, 78, 82, 96–97, 99, 119, 122–123, 142, 143, 154, 157, 163–165, 167, 176, 177, 190n.17, 191n.18, 228n.12 Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance, 59 tree line. See Arctic, definition of, tree line True North Strong and Free, 127 truth. See Foucault: regimes of truth Turner, Frederic Jackson, 131, 150 UNESCO Man and the Biosphere project, 192n.25 United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN-ECE), 48, 58 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), 76, 81, 85, 174 United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development, see Brundtland Commission. University of Canada North, 206n.3 University of the Arctic (UoA), 103 Arctic Council feedback on, 111, 120 Associated Centers of Higher Education of, 120 consultation on, 108–113, 207n.7–208n.7 Development Plan of, 105, 164 feasibility study of, 105

282 foreign policy focus in development of, 109, 113 indigenous focus in, 163 northern studies in, 105, 107, 117 Provisional Board of Trustees of, 120 region-building aims of, 108 selection of participants in, 107 southern universities, 116 target groups for, 108,116,117–118 values and aims of, 113–115 US Committee on Arctic Social Sciences, 41, 142 US Marine Mammals Protection Act (MMPA), 79, 87 US Research and Policy Act, 41 US: and Canada, conflicts. See Canada: and the US, conflicts between compared to other states, 221n.48 consultation and representation in the University of the Arctic, 107, 207n.7 resistance to Arctic Council establishment, 72–73 foreign policy role of the north, 142 role in whaling and sealing, 174 views on sustainable development work, 87–89, 93, 94, 100, 204n.20 See also North America utilization, 75, 78, 84, 98, 100, 161 Valtasaari, Jukka (Finnish Secretary of State), 195n.6, 196n.10 vulnerability, of the Arctic, 31, 37, 95, 189n.14 Waldsterben, 57 Wärtsilä Oy, 48

Index Watt-Cloutier, Sheila, 82, 89–90, 95 whaling, 78, 79, 80, 141, 163, 164, 174, 199n.1, 228n.12 conflicts between states, 79 anti-whaling movements, 199n.1 in the Faroes, 200n.3 in Iceland, 78, 200n.3 Norwegian, 78, 200n.3 wilderness, 40, 78,127,131,132,142, 177, 191n.18, 191n.21, 209n.5 Anglo-American understandings of, 131, 177, 209n.5 difference between in North American and Nordic conceptions, 151 frontier relation to, 131, 209n.5, 209n.6–210n.6, 212n.17 understanding of Arctic as, 27, 36, 126, 157, 178, 179 Working Group on Arctic International Relations, 47–48, 170, 197n.14 Working Group on Sustainable Development and Utilization (SDU), 89. See also under Task Force on Sustainable Development and Utilization; sustainable development Working Group on the North and Canada’s International Relations, 44, 67, 135, 136, 138, 159, 166 World Council of Indigenous Peoples, 200n.7 World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), 63 Yeltsin, Boris (Russian President), 198n.17 Young, Oran R., 36, 47, 166, 208n.10 Yukon, 136, 210n.8 Zwischeneuropa, 59