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Knecht
and coastal environment
and its natural resources‘. Both examples resonate well with Steinberg‘s
argument on the social construction of ocean space (2001). The dialectical representation of the
Arctic as a common destiny, both in littoral state‘s Arctic strategies and Arctic Council documents,
paved the way for region-wide regulatory agreements, which seemed impossible in the competitive
setting that dominated Arctic affairs until the end of the 1980s.
Arctic Regionalism 25 Years Later
With the warming of the Arctic, so did
regional relations. Russian foreign minister Sergej Lavrov,
while on a visit to Kirkenes in 2008, put it in a nutshell when he proclaimed that ―the further North
you go, the better East-West relations‖ (Pettersen, 2010). The pressing issues resulting from climate
change more and more pushes the circumpolar North into the state of a
regional society
in the sense
that the current collaboration reveals a ‗move towards transcendence of national space, making use
of a more rule-based pattern of relations‘ (Hettne
and Söderbaum, 2000: 464). The year 2007 was a
turning point in this regard: the Arctic ice cover reached a new record low compared to previous
years and generated sudden public, political and academic salience of Arctic affairs. Additionally, the
well-known assessment of Arctic oil and gas deposits by the
U.S. Geological Survey
(USGS, 2008)
opened only one year later the (rhetorical) rush for the Arctic‘s black gold. That was why the
symbolic gesture of a Russian research expedition in August 2007 to plant a titanium flag into the
Arctic seabed right beneath the geographical North Pole caused an outcry among Western
politicians and the wider public. Yet, instead of discord and diplomatic tussle, the Arctic
states have
moved closer together and get engaged in region-wide regulatory arrangements and problem-solving
initiatives beyond their quest for territorial and domestic sovereignty in times of rising economic
stakes.
The Arctic Council, by contrast, is still generally considered a weak institution with ‗decision-
shaping‘, but no ‗decision-making power‘ (Young, 2012: 401-402). And without a doubt, the
organisation remains first and foremost a forum for mutual consultation between and scientific
assessment for otherwise
de jure
sovereign states. This, however, does not implicate that the Council
is a
de facto
non-influential body in northern politics. Quite the contrary, the organisation is currently
on the cusp of becoming an active and relevant regional player in its own right. Ordinarily,
international organisations acquire distinct agency through authoritative rights that member states
surrender to them. States, on the other hand, deem it purposive to delegate autonomy to
international organisations to manage collective action (problems) and to do so more effectively and
cost-efficiently (Bradley and Kelley, 2008). Sovereignty, however, is a sensitive good to the littoral
states, which instead strive to substantiate their claims to sovereign
jurisdiction
and have so far not
delegated any decision-making, legislative or regulatory authority to the AC.
The ongoing emphasis on national sovereignty, however, has in some instances prompted
a strong
civil society opposition. The
Inuit Circumpolar Council
(ICC), by way of example, emphasises that the
Inuit are ‗united as a single people‘ and claim their right to self-determination and a more active role
for indigenous organisations as opposed to governments (Inuit Circumpolar Council, 2009). Their
common sense of belonging and shared identity was demonstrated, for instance, during the