Environmental Security: Vulnerability and Risk Assessment

On 5 June 2008, IES Fellow Chad Briggs led a seminar on environmental security at the London School of Economics, sponsored by the LSE and Fulbright Academy of Science and Technology.

Chad presented an overview of environmental security issues and approaches, with an emphasis on the connections between environmental systems and social resilience/vulnerability. His comments were followed by responses from NATO and US Dept of Energy officials, and Mark Zeitoun from LSE.

A second presentation was made by Paul Berkman of Cambridge University, addressing Arctic Ocean geopolitics and the impact of climate change. The afternoon seminar was a closed event attended by thirty government officials and academics from the UK, France, and the US.

A summary report of the seminar is available here.

Chad Michael Briggs, Ph.D. is Assistant Professor, International Relations & Environmental Risk, Lehigh University, Pennsylvania, USA and Associate Research Fellow of the Institute for Environmental Security.

Publication website ( PDF - www.envirosecurity.org )

Related Organisation

• Institute for Environmental Security (IES)

Themes

1 - ES and foreign and security policy (Mainstreaming environmental factors into foreign and security policy including energy and food security, and security related to other resources such as land, water, living marine resources, terrestrial biodiversity)
2 - ES and development cooperation (Mainstreaming conflict prevention and livelihood protection into development cooperation especially in conflict prone and conflict affected countries, for example, through payment of ecological services and equitable benefit-sharing mechanisms)
3 - ES and peace building (Environmental cooperation for peace building such as through peace parks, river basin management initiatives and cooperation over degraded and environmentally-stressed resources in conflict-prone and conflict-affected zones)
4 - ES monitoring, mapping and early warning 
5 - ES risk and needs assessment and management 
6 - Environmental conflict prevention and resolution 
7- Post-conflict environmental rehabilitation and reconstruction 
8 - Natural disasters and climate change mitigation and adaptation 

Subjects

ENV ENVIRONMENT
PEA PEACE / SECURITY