Jeffrey McGee – författare

Anthropocene Antarctica offers new ways of thinking about the ‘Continent for Science and Peace’ in a time of planetary environmental change. In the Anthropocene, Antarctica has become central to the Earth’s future. Ice cores taken from its interior reveal the deep environmental history of the planet and warming ocean currents are ominously destabilising the glaciers around its edges, presaging sea-level rise in decades and centuries to come. At the same time, proliferating research stations and tourist numbers challenge stereotypes of the continent as the ‘last wilderness.’ The Anthropocene brings Antarctica nearer in thought, entangled with our everyday actions. If the Anthropocene signals the end of the idea of Nature as separate from humans, then the Antarctic, long considered the material embodiment of this idea, faces a radical reframing.

Understanding the southern polar region in the twenty-first century requires contributions across the disciplinary spectrum. This collection paves the way for researchers in the Environmental Humanities, Law and Social Sciences to engage critically with the Antarctic, fostering a community of scholars who can act with natural scientists to address the globally significant environmental issues that face this vitally important part of the planet.

Anthropocene Antarctica offers new ways of thinking about the ‘Continent for Science and Peace’ in a time of planetary environmental change. In the Anthropocene, Antarctica has become central to the Earth’s future. Ice cores taken from its interior reveal the deep environmental history of the planet and warming ocean currents are ominously destabilising the glaciers around its edges, presaging sea-level rise in decades and centuries to come. At the same time, proliferating research stations and tourist numbers challenge stereotypes of the continent as the ‘last wilderness.’ The Anthropocene brings Antarctica nearer in thought, entangled with our everyday actions. If the Anthropocene signals the end of the idea of Nature as separate from humans, then the Antarctic, long considered the material embodiment of this idea, faces a radical reframing.

Understanding the southern polar region in the twenty-first century requires contributions across the disciplinary spectrum. This collection paves the way for researchers in the Environmental Humanities, Law and Social Sciences to engage critically with the Antarctic, fostering a community of scholars who can act with natural scientists to address the globally significant environmental issues that face this vitally important part of the planet.

With contributions from scientists and lawyers, this comprehensive Research Handbook provides cutting edge analysis of the marine governance responses to climate change and how this will need to adapt in a rapidly changing world. It reflects on the interaction of climate change with regional marine governance regimes and analyses the likely impacts on maritime and national security. Illustrating the up-to-date treatment of interactions between climate and oceans regimes, this incisive Research Handbook examines the possible adaptation options to address specific issues for our oceans and coasts.

The Research Handbook on Climate Change, Oceans and Coasts will be a key resource for students, scholars and practitioners of climate change, water law and environmental law and policy, while also being of benefit to researchers in the cross-cutting fields of human rights and disaster law.

As global great power competition intensifies, there is growing concern about the geopolitical future of Antarctica. This book delves into the question of how can we anticipate, prepare for, and potentially even shape that future? Now in its 60th year, the Antarctic Treaty System has been comparatively resilient and successful in governing the Antarctic region. This book assesses how our ability to make accurate predictions about the future of the Antarctic Treaty System reduces rapidly in the face of political and biophysical complexity, uncertainty, and the passage of time. This poses a critical risk for organisations making long-range decisions about their policy, strategy, and investments in the frozen south.

Scenarios are useful planning tools for considering futures beyond the limits of standard prediction. This book explores how a multi-disciplinary focus of classical geopolitics might be applied systematically to create scenarios on Antarctic futures that are plausible, rigorous, and robust. This book illustrates a pragmatic, nine-step scenario development process, using the topical issue of military activities in Antarctica. Along the way, the authors make suggestions to augment current theory and practice of geopolitical scenario planning. In doing so, this book seeks to rediscover the importance of a classical (primarily state-centric) lens on Antarctic geopolitics, which in recent decades has been overshadowed by more critical perspectives.

This book is written for anyone with an interest in the rigorous assessment of geopolitical futures - in Antarctica and beyond.

This book explores how geopolitical tensions have shaped the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS) and offers insights into managing future challenges. The ATS, established with the 1959 Antarctic Treaty during the Cold War, has been a successful model of international governance, ensuring Antarctica''s peaceful use and environmental protection. However, the ATS now faces new pressures, including an expanded membership of 57 states, increased economic activities such as tourism, fishing, and bio-prospecting, and the impacts of climate change. These factors are exacerbating geopolitical tensions that could challenge the stability of the ATS.

The book examines key moments in the history of the ATS to understand how past tensions were managed and what lessons can be drawn for the future. The volume covers the creation of the CCAMLR marine conservation treaty in the late 1970s-1980s; the developing world''s opposition to the ATS in United Nations debates during the 1980s-1990s; the shift from permitting Antarctic mining to establishing the Madrid Protocol on Environmental Protection in the early 1990s; the formation of the International Association of Antarctic Tourism Operators; the management of Illegal, Unregulated, and Unreported (IUU) fishing in the 2000s; and the proposals for marine protected areas under the CCAMLR Convention in recent years. Several contributions also draw on critical and regional perspectives to make sense of geopolitical pressures on Antarctic governance and how they might play out over the years and decades ahead.

Through its attention both to critical turning points in the history of the ATS, and a broad range of conceptual approaches, the book provides an authoritative assessment of the ATS''s capacity to address emerging geopolitical stresses and provides strategies for future governance. It is a timely resource for understanding the evolving dynamics in Antarctica and ensuring the region remains a zone of peace and scientific collaboration.

This book is a companion volume to McGee, Edmiston and Haward, 2022, The Future of Antarctica: Scenarios form Classical Geopolitics, in the Springer Polar Sciences Series.