Blogs & Opinions

Converging Risks: Demographic Trends, Gender Inequity, and Security Challenges in the Sahel

Apr 4, 2022

Security conditions in the Sahel are rapidly deteriorating. Since 2016, the region has witnessed a 16-fold increase in terrorist attacks. In Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania,…

Stolen Real Estate — Like Blood Diamonds — Is Funding Deadly Conflicts

Apr 3, 2022 | Jon Unruh

The use of conflict resources to finance wars is expanding into new commodities — with much more severe consequences. An example is the successful trafficking…

Gaza Coming Water Crisis Worse Than Anything Yet?

Apr 2, 2022 | Ramzy Baroud

It is important to keep in mind that the water crisis in Gaza has been ongoing for years, and every aspect of this protracted crisis…

The Key to Climate Action and Sustainable Peace? Women’s Full and Equal Participation

Mar 31, 2022

Climate change is not gender neutral, and for activist Fatima Muriel, this fact is all too real for thousands of women in her home country, Colombia. 

In…

A Closer Look at the Intersection of Gender and Security

Mar 31, 2022 | Deseri Tsepetis

While there has been progress in advancing civil rights and visibility for women and transgender folks, there is a long way to go to build…

Defence Diplomacy as a Tool to Cope with the Climate Crisis

Mar 31, 2022 | S. Nanthini

The recently published Sixth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has highlighted significant increases in extreme weather events, which are likely to lead to…

Iraq’s Climate Change Response: The Private Sector and Civil Society

Mar 29, 2022 | Maha Yassin

In recent years, Iraq has been severely affected by climate change, with heat waves of above 50˚ C increasing in regularity. Climate change has had…

Gaza’s Forthcoming Crisis Might Be Worse Than Anything We Have Ever Seen

Mar 29, 2022 | Ramzy Baroud

According to Amnesty International, Palestinians in the occupied West Bank consume, on average, 73 liters of water a day, per person. Compare this to an…

How Water Crisis Impacts the Ukraine Conflict

Mar 29, 2022 | Ashok Swain

Though the water war catchphrase is often used in public discourse to hype up the issue of water scarcity, the correlation between water and war…

What Do We Know about Climate Change, Peace and Conflict?

Mar 29, 2022 | Tobias Ide

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the world-leading body assessing scientific evidence on climate change. Researchers criticised the previous 2007 and 2014 versions of the…

Putin’s Environmental Crimes

Mar 28, 2022 | Natalia Boiarchuk and Kathleen Rogers

In the wake of thousands of deaths of civilians, including children, Russia’s ongoing environmental crimes in Ukraine may be viewed of minor importance given the enormity of…

Cold War Redux: How a Dam On The Nile Has Become an International Issue

Mar 28, 2022 | Richard Seifmanand and Claude Forthomme

The Nile has long been a point of contention between Ethiopia, Egypt, and Sudan, with a history of past and present superpowers shifting allegiances at…

Responses to Putin’s War Risk Impeding International Cooperation on Climate

Mar 28, 2022 | Andrew Newton

Less than a month after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the conflict which has so far caused thousands of military and civilian deaths and forced…

We’re in a Fossil Fuel War. Biden Should Say So.

Mar 24, 2022 | Farhad Manjoo

On one hand, it would seem uncontroversial to point out that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a war enabled and exacerbated by the world’s insatiable…

Is the World Making Enough Progress on Addressing Gender Equality Within Climate Action?

Mar 23, 2022 | Verania Chao

We can only transition to zero-carbon and climate resilient development to the extent that we transform our societies. One of the areas in which this…

Informal Spouses and Other “Invisible" Women: The Dark Underbelly of Land Rights Formalization

Mar 23, 2022 | Dr. Anne Hennings

As every year, the month of March has been packed with content and events around the globe related to women's land rights. The Land Portal…

Guns, Butter and Gold

Mar 23, 2022 | Rick Mills

Gold is among the safest of havens in times of war, or any other type of geopolitical instability.  After the US and the UK announced…

It’s Time to Defuse Oil as a Weapon of War

Mar 22, 2022 | Jeff Turrentine

Despite being the largest country on the planet, Russia doesn’t enjoy a diversified economy. Its economic health, in fact, depends almost entirely on its ability…

Climate Resilience for Whom? The Importance of Locally-Led Development in the Northern Triangle

Mar 21, 2022 | Claire Doyle

In the Northern Triangle countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, climate, conflict, and migration are interacting in complex ways, said Risi. It is the…

Is Climate Change a Gender Issue? Impact of Climate Change on Women and Children

Mar 18, 2022 | Azera Parveen Rahman

As the number of vagaries of climate extremes increases, so has the disproportionate burden on women and children, finds growing evidence. Policies, however, are yet…

Putting Women at the Centre of Forest Solutions to Climate Change

Mar 18, 2022 | Alexis Arthur and Elizabeth Eggerts

The role of gender equality in climate mitigation activities is critical to address both the climate crisis and support ‘gender equality today for a sustainable tomorrow’…

One Thing Nuclear Power Plants Weren’t Built to Survive: War

Mar 18, 2022 | Kate Brown, Susan Solomon

The day Russia invaded Ukraine, Russian forces took control of the decommissioned Chernobyl nuclear power plant. A week later, flares from Russian artillery lit up…

War in Ukraine Lengthens List of Violent Acts over Water

Mar 17, 2022 | Brett Walton

In late February, as Vladimir Putin’s war machine was beginning to uncoil, Russian forces destroyed a dam in Ukraine that was blocking water from a…

‘An Ounce of Prevention Is Worth a Pound of Cure’: US Conflict Prevention Policy in a World of Climate Change

Mar 17, 2022 | Cynthia Brady

The crisis in Ukraine is rightly at the centre of U.S. foreign policy attention but, even in the midst of that justified focus, the latest IPCC…

The Environmental and Health Dimensions of the Ukraine War

Mar 16, 2022 | Erika Weinthal, Jeannie Sowers,

As has unfolded before in Grozny, Aleppo, and Gaza City, war exacts a heavy cost on cities. Urban centers depend on systems of coupled infrastructure;…

Afghan Mineral Wealth Attracts Competitors

Mar 16, 2022 | Asad Mirza

Even when the American occupation of Afghanistan was in full steam and apart from the fighting there were mainly reports of the ongoing fighting, yet…

Environmental Change, Migration, and Peace in the Northern Triangle

Mar 14, 2022 | Jill Baggerman

Relative to the governance challenges, violence, and inequities, environmental pressures have historically played a more minor role in migration trends. However, Central America has been…

10 Ways War Harms Wildlife

Mar 11, 2022 | John R. Platt

Here are 10 of the most dangerous ways war affects the animals and plants around us — many of which also harm humans in the…

New Scenarios on Global Food Security Based on Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Mar 11, 2022 | Qu Dongyu

Over the past two years, COVID-19 has presented many challenges to global food security. Today, what is happening in Russia and Ukraine adds another significant…

Taking Stock of Environmental Peacemaking at 20

Mar 11, 2022 | Shruti Samala

Twenty years after the publication of Environmental Peacemaking, a foundational theoretical and case study volume on environmental peacebuilding, what has not changed is the thorny conceptual…