“For Syria,” wrote the authors, “a country marked by poor governance and unsustainable agricultural and environmental policies, the drought had a catalytic effect, contributing to political unrest.” The central thesis is a daisy chain of cause and effect: Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s mismanagement of farm and fuel subsidies in the face of severe water shortages displaced an estimated 1.5 million Syrians, many of whom were the same farmers subsequently recruited into the Assad opposition. As the argument goes: If there had been no historically extreme drought, there would have been no civil war — at least not one beginning in 2011.
Of course, causality is a delicate beast. The link between climate change and the Syrian crisis is thus one of “threat multiplication” — of untimely, drastic amplification of a preexisting sociopolitical instability.
Now, a new independent report commissioned by the G7, the forum composed of the seven wealthiest developed countries and the E.U., argues that addressing the threat multiplier hypothesis needs to be a top foreign policy priority. The authors also contend that policymakers need to integrate their approaches to climate change adaptation, international development and resilience training, and peace building.
Titled “A New Climate for Peace: Taking Action on Climate and Fragility Risks,” the report also analyzes several climate-fragility case studies, including the Syrian case, in order to help paint a picture of the global nature of the trends at play. The picture isn’t pretty.
Above right is a map showing the nations where climate change is most likely to compound other security problems:
Read more at Climate Change Is a Security Threat. Make It a Foreign Policy Priority
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