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Moved by the State - the reality of modern day human migration in the northern Polar Regions
April 06, 2007Seasonal nomadism, migration, and resettlement have always been important for the people living in the northern Polar Regions as these movements are key for their survival. In the past, such movements were usually triggered by the local conditions which their continued existence is affected by activities such as aggregation in temporary winter villages near the sea ice for seal hunting and summer dispersal inland looking for wild reindeer.
Population movements and concentration have, since the 20th century, been more affected by outside factors such as the changes in policies reflecting market or state policies without a local character. The shift is causing damage to the social fabric of these societies.
To address this problem, the European Science Foundation (ESF) launched the EUROCORES BOREAS Collaborative Research Project "Moved by the State: Perspectives on Relocation and Resettlement in the Circumpolar North (MOVE)" in November 2006.
"As the regions of the circumpolar north are more tightly integrated into the global economy, and the interests of the state come to bear more heavily on the organisation of settlement in the north, the answer to the question of where people live in the north, or whether they live there at all, is increasingly out of local hands", said Professor Yvon Csonka, of the University of Greenland, who is in charge of the MOVE programme.
"About half of the approximately 4 million people of the circumpolar Arctic live in northern European countries and the European Russian North," said Csonka at the European International Polar Year (IPY) Launch on 26 February in Strasbourg, France. "They are all influenced by environmental and societal changes, such as permafrost melting, changes in vegetation and fauna, exploitation of natural resources, pollution, flows of population to and from the South, and fluctuating redistribution of riches under the control of far away governments."
According to him, some of the forced relocations and de-nomadisation since the 1940s were aimed at improving health care, education, housing and welfare. Despite these good intentions, the initiatives were carried out through 'Social engineering' and State paternalism, which eventually led to an increase in social problems.
Understanding past state-driven relocations and developing the capacity to anticipate adapt to the consequences of future relocations, as well as anticipating future scenarios for northern European development is crucial for the survival of the northern societies and their way of life.
"The results will become increasingly relevant in the ongoing negotiations between states and communities about relocation in the face of increasing social and climatic change", Csonka added.
MOVE will examine State induced resettlements, from the time of World War II until the present time, and their consequences, in a diversity of sites across the circumpolar north, from a ground-up perspective in order to address questions of community sustainability, social fabric and sense of belonging.
Mobilising an interdisciplinary team of anthropologists, demographers, historians and community-based researchers from Greenland, the USA, Finland, Canada and Russia, MOVE will for the first time consider in a single research framework, Russian/Soviet and Western modes of relocation, as well as indigenous and settler histories of migration.
Over a four-year project lifespan, field research involving five teams of researchers and local collaborators will be conducted in Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland and regions of the Russian far North (Chukotka, Magadan, Yamal).
Csonka expects that the outcome of the collaborative research project could be useful in mitigating the adverse social consequences of future relocations.
"The knowledge gained of the project will also aid in finding solutions for how northern experiences of resettlement contribute to our general understanding of similar phenomena worldwide," he said.
European Science Foundation
"As the regions of the circumpolar north are more tightly integrated into the global economy, and the interests of the state come to bear more heavily on the organisation of settlement in the north, the answer to the question of where people live in the north, or whether they live there at all, is increasingly out of local hands", said Professor Yvon Csonka, of the University of Greenland, who is in charge of the MOVE programme.
"About half of the approximately 4 million people of the circumpolar Arctic live in northern European countries and the European Russian North," said Csonka at the European International Polar Year (IPY) Launch on 26 February in Strasbourg, France. "They are all influenced by environmental and societal changes, such as permafrost melting, changes in vegetation and fauna, exploitation of natural resources, pollution, flows of population to and from the South, and fluctuating redistribution of riches under the control of far away governments."
According to him, some of the forced relocations and de-nomadisation since the 1940s were aimed at improving health care, education, housing and welfare. Despite these good intentions, the initiatives were carried out through 'Social engineering' and State paternalism, which eventually led to an increase in social problems.
Understanding past state-driven relocations and developing the capacity to anticipate adapt to the consequences of future relocations, as well as anticipating future scenarios for northern European development is crucial for the survival of the northern societies and their way of life.
"The results will become increasingly relevant in the ongoing negotiations between states and communities about relocation in the face of increasing social and climatic change", Csonka added.
MOVE will examine State induced resettlements, from the time of World War II until the present time, and their consequences, in a diversity of sites across the circumpolar north, from a ground-up perspective in order to address questions of community sustainability, social fabric and sense of belonging.
Mobilising an interdisciplinary team of anthropologists, demographers, historians and community-based researchers from Greenland, the USA, Finland, Canada and Russia, MOVE will for the first time consider in a single research framework, Russian/Soviet and Western modes of relocation, as well as indigenous and settler histories of migration.
Over a four-year project lifespan, field research involving five teams of researchers and local collaborators will be conducted in Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland and regions of the Russian far North (Chukotka, Magadan, Yamal).
Csonka expects that the outcome of the collaborative research project could be useful in mitigating the adverse social consequences of future relocations.
"The knowledge gained of the project will also aid in finding solutions for how northern experiences of resettlement contribute to our general understanding of similar phenomena worldwide," he said.
European Science Foundation
Polar Region Current Events and Polar Region News RSSCaltech scientists explain puzzling lake asymmetry on Titan
Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) suggest that the eccentricity of Saturn's orbit around the sun may be responsible for the unusually uneven distribution of lakes over the northern and southern polar regions of the planet's largest moon, Titan.
Cave Study Links Climate Change to California Droughts
California experienced centuries-long droughts in the past 20,000 years that coincided with the thawing of ice caps in the Arctic.
NASA flies to Antarctica for largest airborne polar ice survey
NASA begins a series of flights Oct. 15 to study changes to Antarctica's sea ice, glaciers and ice sheets. The flights are part of Operation Ice Bridge, a six-year campaign that is the largest airborne survey ever made of ice at Earth's polar regions.
Magnetic Tremors Pinpoint the Impact Epicenter of Earthbound Space Storms
Using data from NASA's THEMIS mission, a team of University of Alberta researchers has pinpointed the impact epicenter of an earthbound space storm as it crashes into the atmosphere, and given an advance warning of its arrival.
New technique could find water on Earth-like planets orbiting distant suns
Since the early 1990s astronomers have discovered more than 300 planets orbiting stars other than our sun, nearly all of them gas giants like Jupiter.
Arctic Map plots new 'gold rush'
Researchers at Durham University have drawn up the first ever 'Arctic Map' to show the disputed territories that states might lay claim to in the future.
Unique fossil discovery shows Antarctic was once much warmer
A new fossil discovery- the first of its kind from the whole of the Antarctic continent- provides scientists with new evidence to support the theory that the polar region was once much warmer.
Wilkins Ice Shelf hanging by its last thread
The Wilkins Ice Shelf is experiencing further disintegration that is threatening the collapse of the ice bridge connecting the shelf to Charcot Island. Since the connection to the island in the image centre helps to stabilise the ice shelf, it is likely the break-up of the bridge will put the remainder of the ice shelf at risk.
Northern lights glimmer with unexpected trait
An international team of scientists has detected that some of the glow of Earth's aurora is polarized, an unexpected state for such emissions.
Ozone hole recovery may reshape southern hemisphere climate change
A full recovery of the stratospheric ozone hole could modify climate change in the Southern Hemisphere and even amplify Antarctic warming, according to scientists from the University of Colorado at Boulder, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA.
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