For several years now researchers and organizations the world over have analyzed the relationship between foreseeable climate change impacts and the geostrategic issues they raise. At the 1992 Earth Summit 178 governments signed the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, Principle 25 of which states that “peace, development and environmental protection are interdependent and indivisible.” Later on in the 90s, the US military took up the issue of climate change, and just a few years later, in 2003 the Pentagon confirmed the existence of a link between national security and climate change, which it described as a “threat multiplier.” In a world in which security is of ever-greater importance, all parameters must be taken into account to analyze problems and come up with the most effective responses. The first requirement is to recognize that climate change and the risks it poses are a threat to stability and security. An environmentally unsustainable system produces instability, which inevitably leads to insecurity.

This problem concerns all areas of the world, though naturally some are more vulnerable than others. For example, certain parts of Africa and Asia are already suffering from the effects of weather events, and several current conflicts have discernible environmental roots. The most notorious example is the war in the Darfur region of Sudan. As United Nations Secretary General Ban-Ki Moon wrote in 2007, “amid the diverse social and political causes, the Darfur conflict began as an ecological crisis, arising at least in part from climate change.” The growing number of areas destabilized by climate change makes it imperative for governmental and nongovernmental organizations to meet the challenge head on, and begin to find solutions.

The present report, — “Sustainability, Stability, Security” — is an analysis of concrete situations based on existing sources. Drawing on the most recent IPCC report on climate change, it highlights the many consequences of climate change: rising sea levels, extreme weather events, water stress, land degradation and desertification, increased competition for resources, health hazards, and increased migrations. These hazards have historically destabilized entire regions, and will in the future continue to weaken the most vulnerable areas of the globe.