- Natural security
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Natural security is an area of study within the field of national security. Sharon Burke, a researcher who originated the concept at the Center for a New American Security, described natural security as follows:
In the 21st century, the security of nations will increasingly depend on the security of natural resources, or “natural security.” The modern global economy depends on access to energy, minerals, potable water, and arable land to meet the rising expectations of a growing world population, and that access is by no means assured. At the same time, increasing consumption of these resources has consequences, such as climate change and biodiversity loss, which will challenge the security of the United States and nations all over the world. Natural security ultimately means sufficient, reliable, affordable, and sustainable supplies of natural resources for the modern global economy. This will require the United States to both shape and respond to emerging natural resources challenges in a changing strategic environment.[1]
CNAS launched its Natural Security Program[2] to study this set of issues in 2009, in addition to the Natural Security Blog.[3] The natural security concept is closely related to a body of study described as "environmental security,[4]" which dates back to the late 1970s. A February 2008 book, Natural Security: A Darwinian Approach to a Dangerous World,[5] used the term in a different context, profiling the way in which fabricated defense systems echo or can draw lessons from defense systems found in natural organisms, systems and processes. The University of Arizona[6] also has an academic program based on the biological concept of natural security. As part of a series titled "Why We Might Fight," New York Times reporter Thom Shanker wrote a 2011 article called "A Need for Natural Security[7]," which profiled the link between natural resources and security challenges in China, the Horn of Africa, Yemen, the Niger Delta, the Arctic, and the Amazon rainforest.
Previous to the launch of the CNAS program, Hal Harvey, founder of ClimateWorks, authored a 1988 piece called "Natural Security" in the journal Nuclear Times.[8]
- ^ See Sharon Burke, "Natural Security," (Washington, D.C., Center for a New American Security, 2009), available at http://www.cnas.org/node/2712.
- ^ http://www.cnas.org/naturalsecurity
- ^ See the Natural Security Blog at http://www.cnas.org/blogs/naturalsecurity.
- ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_security
- ^ http://www.amazon.com/Natural-Security-Darwinian-Approach-Dangerous/dp/0520253477#_
- ^ http://www.naturalsecurity.arizona.edu
- ^ http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/12/12/weekinreview/12shanker.html
- ^ View commentary on Harvey's original article, and a copy of the piece, at http://www.cnas.org/blogs/naturalsecurity/2009/06/reading-old-magazines-natural-security.html. Also view the ClimateWorks website at http://www.climateworks.org/.
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