Blogs & Opinions

A Decade in Review: What It Means to Be a Woman in South Africa

Aug 9, 2021 | Victoria O’Regan and Sandisiwe Shoba

Researchers say not much has changed in the past decade regarding land rights for South African women. According to Dr Thandi Ngcobo, CEO and founder…

New Global Initiative: Transforming Gender Norms in Land and Resource Rights

Aug 9, 2021 | Arwen Bailey

When Rosario’s husband died, her life was turned upside down. Not only did she lose her life and business partner and the father of her…

Women in Rural Agriculture Stricken by Climate Change Effects

Aug 9, 2021 | Onke Ngcuka

Climate change is not gender neutral. As developing countries bear the brunt of climate change in the form of extreme weather conditions such as droughts…

UK to Adapt Military to Changing Climate, but Does It Have the Funds and Backing of Troops?

Aug 9, 2021 | Brig. Ben Barry

The United Kingdom has legislated for the country to meet the target of the Paris Agreement on climate change, reducing national greenhouse gas emissions to…

How Uganda Has Helped Turn DRC’s Vast Gold Reserves into a Nightmare

Aug 6, 2021 | Vava Tampa

Congolese gold has become a profitable source of foreign currency for Kampala, with devastating and bloody consequences for the people of DRC.

The EU Conflict Minerals Regulation – A Trial Run for Responsible Sourcing of Raw Materials?

Aug 4, 2021 | Karin Küblböck

On 1 January 2021 the EU Conflict Minerals Regulation entered into force. From now on, companies importing certain minerals into the EU must ensure that…

Mining and Green New Deals

Aug 4, 2021 | Sebastian Ordoñez Muñoz

The recent mainstreaming of the Green New Deal framework has intensified scrutiny on oil majors.

However, the same cannot be said of global extractivist power -…

Women, Peace and Security Agenda in Mali: Birthday Blues or Renewed Hope?

Aug 2, 2021 | Maelle Salzinger

Mali’s past efforts to implement the Women, Peace and Security Agenda have been criticized for their lack of implementation and failure to reach women in…

These 550 Kenyan Women Are Saving a Forest

Jul 30, 2021 | Peyton Fleming

One of around a half-dozen semi-nomadic tribes in the vast drylands of northern Kenya, the family spent years shifting locations to find water and grazing…

Water Disputes Will Compound Instability in the Middle East

Jul 28, 2021 | Amin Saikal

The Middle East is one of the driest regions in the world. The scarcity of water has often been touted as a source of national…

Don’t Blame Men for the Climate Crisis – We Should Point the Finger at Corporations

Jul 27, 2021 | Arwa Mahdawi

Sorry, boys, but it’s all your fault. Melting ice caps, flash floods, rising sea levels: men are to blame for the lot of it. Please don’t drown the…

US and Australia Must Deepen Defence Cooperation on Climate Security

Jul 27, 2021 | Robert Glasser and Erin Sikorsky

US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has just arrived in Singapore, where he’ll deliver a major address on Indo-Pacific security. He’s the first member of…

Deadly Water Conflict a Warning for the World

Jul 26, 2021 | Donna Miles

For thousands of years, Iran, which lies in a semi-arid part of the world, had remarkable success in sustainable water management. Ancient Iranians devised innovative…

A Water Crisis Is Creating Nightmare Conditions across the Middle East

Jul 25, 2021 | Bel Trew

That the wars of the future will be fought over water rather than oil is an adage that feels like an increasingly terrifyingly reality as…

Climate and Conflict: A Look at Environmental Peacebuilding

Jul 25, 2021 | Laureen Fagan

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) has focused on global conflict and peacemaking strategies for more than 50 years, but over time the focus…

Conflict Brews over the Nile

Jul 24, 2021 | Deepak Vohra

Sudan and Egypt are extremely wary of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam which, they believe, will limit their access to the life-giving waters of the…

Women, Peace, and Security: Moving Implementation Forward

Jul 23, 2021 | War on the Rocks

What will it take for the key national security agencies in Washington to prioritize the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) framework, rather than just pay…

Women, Peace, and Security: Moving Implementation Forward

Jul 23, 2021 | Joan Johnson-Freese

What will it take for the key national security agencies in Washington to prioritize the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) framework, rather than just pay…

The UK Has Been Linked to Congo’s ‘Conflict Minerals’ – Where Are the Criminal Charges?

Jul 21, 2021 | Vava Tampa

According to the Swiss federal criminal court last week, the corruption destroying the Democratic Republic of the Congo – where devastating conflicts over minerals used…

Reconciliation through Ecological Collaboration

Jul 14, 2021 | William F. Laurance

Last fall, Azerbaijan and Armenia fought the Nagorno-Karabakh war, which claimed several thousand lives in an escalation of a long-running territorial conflict between the two…

Explaining the Kyrgyz-Tajik Border Clash: Hypotheses in Search of Corroboration

Jul 14, 2021 | Richard Weitz

In late April 2021, fighting broke out along the frontier between Kyrgyzstan’s Batken province and Tajikistan’s Sughd province. The immediate dispute arose over management of…

At the UN, Climate Change & Security Must Be Tackled Together

Jul 13, 2021 | Beatrice Mosello and Adam Day

Could the next wars be triggered by climate change?

Until recently, the question might have seemed like science fiction, but now it is very real. Ethiopia…

Taking Action to Address Wildlife Crime’s Environmental, Health, and Security Risks

Jul 12, 2021 | Alice Chang

“This COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us, albeit in a devastating way, of the interconnected nature of things, most particularly between economies, the environment, human and…

The Climate Crisis Is Driving Global Conflict – Cop26 Is a Chance for Leaders to Rethink Security Threats

Jul 7, 2021 | Peter Laederach

It’s now established that one of the triggers of the Syrian conflict is related to the scarcity of natural resources, primarily pastoral land. New research…

The Irrefutable Link Between Climate Change and Conflict

Jul 7, 2021 | Global Risk Insights

The Notre Dame Global Adaptation Initiative Index measures a country’s climate change vulnerability against its capacity for resilience. War-torn states like Yemen, Mali, the Central…

One of Libya’s Power and Desalination Plants Keeps Leaking Oil into the Sea

Jul 7, 2021 | Eoghan Darbyshire

Following recent reports of coastal oil spills near the city of Derna in eastern Libya, Eoghan Darbyshire identifies the timeline and scale of the spills,…

At the Nexus of Participation and Protection: Risks and Barriers to Women’s Participation in Northern Ireland

Jun 28, 2021 | Aisling Swaine and Catherine Turner

Of its four pillars, participation and protection arguably predominate the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda.  Growing gaps in women’s leadership across all spheres, exacerbated by…

Local Environmental Governance to Reduce Conflict and Deforestation in Afghanistan

Jun 28, 2021 | Mishkat Al Moumin and Anna Kasradze

How should the international community support the stabilization of Afghanistan after U.S. and NATO troops withdraw? Answers from President Biden, high ranking U.S. administration officials,…

The National Security Risks of the US Drought

Jun 26, 2021 | Erin Sikorsky

Each new report about this year’s western drought reveals another record-breaking development: Hoover Dam’s Lake Mead is at its lowest level ever. More acres have already…

Cultivating Cronyism: The Collapse of Agriculture in Post-War Iraq and Syria

Jun 24, 2021 | Chloé Bernadaux

Historically, Iraq enjoyed some of the world’s most productive soils. Agriculture represented more than 18 percent of the country’s economic output in 1995, but over the last…