Environmental Security

Topics
Experts
Programs
- Transnational Threats
- Regional Security
- Effective Institutions

Expanding populations, shifting consumption patterns, growing energy use, and mounting resource demands are imposing potentially unsustainable strains on the global environment. Stimson research and analysis on environmental security explores how rising stresses on global ecosystems and shared natural resources could compromise economic development, fuel social conflicts, and undermine political stability in key areas of the world. Stimson’s work encompasses issues including threats to water security in transboundary river basins and aquifers; the interplay of socio-economic, political, and environmental trends affecting marine resources, coastal communities, and maritime security in the Indian Ocean region; the implications of increasing urbanization for global climate change, freshwater supplies, food security, and energy use; and the possibilities for collective institutions to enable cooperative environmental governance.

Current Research

Connecting the Drops: An Indus Basin Roadmap for Cross-Border Water Research and Policy Coordination

Download the full report here. Soaring demand, mounting climate pressures, and unsustainable management patterns increasingly imperil the waters of the Indus River Basin on which some 300 million people across both India and Pakistan depend. Between 2011 and 2013, the Stimson Center, in coordination with the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (Pakistan) and the Observer
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Maritime Security and Policy Challenges

In 2012, the Environmental Security Program released Indian Ocean Rising: Maritime Security and Policy Challenges, a wide-ranging report exploring how the Indian Ocean and South China Sea are emerging as increasingly significant avenues for global trade and arenas for global security. In 2013, our research will continue to focus on the Indian Ocean and the South China Sea, but
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Global Security and the Urban Future

Over half of all people on earth - some 3.5 billion human beings - now live in cities. By 2050, over six billion people will live in urban areas. Recognizing that sound management of global urbanization processes will prove critical in shaping the twenty-first century world, the Environmental Security Program in 2013 will explore how urbanization intersects with multiple
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Fresh Water Resources

Policymakers face a host of overlapping demographic, socioeconomic, and environmental challenges as they strive to fulfill the world's growing water needs. Global climate change threatens to exacerbate these strains, generating both chronic pressures on water availability, such as shifting precipitation patterns, and acute crises, such as floods and droughts. In 2013, we will
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Regional Capacity Building and the Global Commons

Environmental security challenges frequently concern spaces extending beyond the sovereign jurisdiction of nation states, including areas such as the Arctic, the atmosphere, and the oceans. Stimson's work on the global commons analyzes the national and international policies and institutions that have evolved to address these issues, and considers alternative possible
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