Geopolitics of the Arctic Region

The Arctic has emerged as a focal point of international strategic competition, driven by rapidly receding sea ice, untapped hydrocarbon and mineral reserves, and newly navigable maritime corridors. Key Arctic and non-Arctic states are recalibrating their foreign and security policies to safeguard national interests and to shape evolving governance regimes. The Arctic Council remains the primary intergovernmental forum, but its consensus-based approach is increasingly tested by differing priorities on resource exploitation, environmental protection and military presence. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea underpins maritime jurisdiction, yet interpretations of baselines and continental shelves give rise to overlapping claims. Meanwhile, indigenous peoples—through permanent participant status in regional bodies—assert rights to self-determination and stewardship, injecting a people-centred dimension into high-level diplomacy. Security discourse has oscillated between “securitisation” of the region, marked by naval deployments and strategic posturing, and phases of “desecuritisation” when cooperative scientific research and search-and-rescue exercises prevail. A nascent trend towards “re-securitisation” reflects broader geopolitical tensions, compelling scholars to envisage governance frameworks that are both resilient to crisis and sufficiently flexible to accommodate multi-nodal authority across state, corporate and indigenous actors.

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Geopolitics of the Arctic Region publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in geopolitics of the arctic region across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Securitisation: Framing an issue as an existential security threat that justifies extraordinary political measures.

Desecuritisation: The process of moving issues out of the security domain back into routine political debate.

Re-securitisation: A renewed emphasis on security after a period of desecuritisation.

Arctic Council: An intergovernmental forum of Arctic states and indigenous organisations for promoting cooperation, coordination and interaction.

United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS): A comprehensive treaty defining maritime zones, rights and jurisdictional boundaries.

Anticipatory state identity: A construct by which a state projects and materialises its future strategic self through policy narratives and practices.

Multi-nodal heterarchy: A governance model in which authority is distributed among multiple interdependent actors without a strict hierarchy.

References

1. The art of Inuit administration: Post-war Canada, cultural diplomacy and northern administration. Polar Record (2024).
2. Anticipatory state identity: Understanding the Finnish state's approach to the Arctic. Area (2022).