IASC Social and Human Sciences Working Group Report:

Priorities and Activities in 2015

Andrey N. PetrovSven D. Haakanson

Scientific Foci

Natural resource[s] / use / exploitation and development: past, present, future

The Arctic in a global context

Human health and well-being

Cross-cutting

Perceptions and representations of arctic science

Social & Human Sciences Working Group

Arctic residents and change: dynamics of mitigation and sustainability

Perceptions and representations of the Arctic

Security, governance and law

Collaborative community research on climate change

Human health, wellbeing and ecosystem change

Competing forms of resource use in a changing environment

People and coastal processes

Histories and methodologies of arctic sciences and arts

Steering Group

Chair: Gail Fondahl Vice-Chair: Hiroki TakakuraVice-Chair: Peter Sköld Past Chair: Peter Schweitzer

2015 SHWG Meeting

• Scientific Foci (revised in Toyama, 2015)

• Arctic residents and change: … sustainability• Perceptions, representations and histories of the

Arctic• Securities, governance and law• Natural resource[s] / use / exploitation and

development: past, present, future• Human health and well-being

SHWG 2015 Activities- Understanding Sustainability in the Arctic: A Transdisciplinary Workshop

(Charleston, South Carolina, USA, February 2015)• All priority topics (especially, Arctic residents and change +• Natural resource use)

- Special session/workshop on circumpolar health data (Oulu, June 2015)• Human health and well-being

- Special sessions on “Resources, Quality of Life and Sustainable Development in the Arctic” at the International Geographic Union Regional Conference (Moscow, August 2015) Natural resource use

- ICARP III activities

Understanding Sustainability in the Arctic: A Transdisciplinary Workshop

Charleston, SC, USA 6-11 Feb 2015

• Organizers: IASC SHWG, IASSA and Arctic-FROST research coordination network

• Participants: 8 researchers (including 2 early career): Shauna BurnSilver (US), Terry Chapin (USA), Gail Fondahl (CA), Annika Nilsson (SE), Andrey Petrov (US), Kathrin Kiel (GE), Rudy Riedlsperger (CA), Peter Schweitzer (AT)

• Goal: develop ICARP III White Paper on Arctic Sustsainability Research (Agenda 2025)

• Approach: writing-intensive workshop preliminary draft review of the first draft (input from other scholars) ICARP III presentation, feedback completion and publication of the WP

• The White Paper: • elaborates on the current state of knowledge about

sustainability and sustainable development in the Arctic; • identifies related knowledge gaps and needs for the next

decade; • includes a historical overview of the concepts of

sustainability in global and Arctic contexts; • provides a progress report on research related to Arctic

sustainability;• develops recommendations regarding key priorities for

Arctic sustainability research for the next decade.

Understanding Sustainability in the Arctic: A Transdisciplinary Workshop

Charleston, SC, USA 6-11 Feb 2015

IGU Arctic Sustainability Sessions

Special sessions on “Resources, Quality of Life and Sustainable Development in the Arctic” at the International Geographic Union Regional Conference (Moscow, August 2015)

Collaboration between IASC, IASSA, Arctic-FROST and IGU Cold Regions Environments Commission

Presenters from Russia, USA, and Australia

Included early career and Indigenous authors

Arctic Human Development Reportand Arctic Social Indicators II

• AHDR II DESCRIPTION• The goals of Arctic Human Development Report II are to provide an update to the first AHDR (2004) with a new assessment of the state of Arctic

human development, to highlight major trends and changes over the past decade, and to identify policy relevant conclusions and key gaps in knowledge. Producing AHDR-II 10 years after the first AHDR makes possible comparisons and contrasts across a decade of persistent and rapid change in the North. The report addresses critical issues and emerging challenges in Arctic living conditions, quality of life in the North, global change impacts and adaptation, and Indigenous livelihoods. It contributes to our understanding of the interplay and consequences of physical and social change processes affecting Arctic residents, at both the regional and global scales. It emphasizes that the Arctic is not a homogenous region. Impacts of globalization and environmental change differ within and between regions, between Indigenous and non-Indigenous northerners, between genders and along other axes.

• ASI II DESCRIPTION• Arctic Social Indicators II (ASI-II) is a follow-up activity to ASI-I (2010) and the first Arctic Human Development Report (AHDR, 2004). The objective of ASI

(2010) was to develop a small set of Arctic-specific social indicators that as a collective would help facilitate the tracking and monitoring of human development trends in the Arctic. Indicators were developed for six domains considered to be key aspects of human development by residents in the Arctic: Cultural Wellbeing; Contact with Nature, Fate Control, as well as Health and Population; Material Wellbeing, and Education. ASI-II presents regional case studies to examine the strength of the indicators developed in ASI-I, using Sakha Republic (Yakutia), the West-Nordic Region; Northwest Territories; Inuit Regions of Alaska; and the Inuit World (with the Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic (SLiCA) used to augment ASI in the last case). Based on these cases, the report identifies data challenges and draws conclusions about the ability of ASI to track changes in human development, and to serve as the basis for formulating policy relevant conclusions. We argue that the long-term monitoring of human development in the Arctic would be greatly facilitated by the regular and frequent collection and reporting of relevant data, including those required for the proposed small set of ASI indicators.

Arctic-FROST ActivitiesArctic-FROST Annual Meeting and Early Career Scholars

WorkshopSt. Petersburg, August 15-17

ReSDA/Arctic-FROST Community WorkshopKuujjuaq, QC, October 2015

PGSG-AAG/Arctic-FROST Sessions at AAG

MeetingChicago, IL April 2015

Newly Approved SHWG Activities

• Gender Asymmetry in Northern Communities: Building a Research Network for the Nordic Countries, Baltics and Russia (NOR-GA) (Workshops and seminars 2015/2016)

• A European Arctic Policy: The Role of EU Non-Arctic Member States (Congress in early 2016)

• Tenth Siberian Studies Conference, “Passion for Life: Emotions and • Feelings in the North and Siberia” (Workshop in St. Petersburg, October • 2015, and edited volume)• Adaptation Options in the Barents Region -Synthesis and Feedback • Workshop (Bodo, Norway, Fall 2015)• Infrastructure in the Arctic as a Social and Ecological Challenge (Workshop,

Vienna, Fall 2015)• Two Workshops on “Building Arctic Resilience” (Reykjavik and Los Angeles,

October 2015 – February 2016)

Circumpolar Arctic Coastal Communities Observatory Network

caccon.org

CACCON LEAD MEMBERS: Donald Forbes, Helene Amundsen, David Atkinson, Trevor Bell,

Nicole Couture, Shari Gearheard, Gleb Kraev, Elizabeth Marino, Joan Nymand Larsen,

Paul Overduin, Andrey Petrov, Peter Pulsifer, Rasmus Ole Rasmussen, Rudy Riedlsperger,

Peter Schweitzer, Tom Sheldon, Tatiana Vlasova

Andrey N. Petrov (USA)PI, NSF RCN Arctic-FROST & Arctic-COAST

U.S. Representative, IASC Social and Human Sciences WGCouncilor, International Arctic Social Sciences Association

Chair, Polar Geography SG, Association of American Geographers

GOALS•A pan-Arctic network of community-engaged, multi-faceted and integrative coastal observatories and local and regional knowledge hubs

•Co-designed and co-produced knowledge in the hands of decision-makers is the key to successful adaptation and resilient communities

•Build capacity through sharing experience between stakeholder peers across the circumpolar world to identify information needs and transformational insights

Circumpolar Arctic Coastal CommunitiesObservatory Network (CACCON)

Lead: IASC Network Arctic Coastal Dynamics (ACD); Partners: All IASC WGs, Land-Ocean Interactions in the Coastal Zone (LOICZ), International Arctic Social Sciences Association (IASSA)

CACCON agenda

• Integrative analyses of sustainability challenges in Arctic coastal communities – situational & sustainability indicators

• Solutions-oriented research for actionable, proactive, adaptation policies in Arctic coastal communities

• Sharing insights among existing community-based research and resilience programs – CBM workshop (winter 2016)

• Responding to community-based agendas and building resilience by growing local and regional knowledge co-production and dissemination capacity – thematic pilot focused on landfast ice

• Arctic Regional Engagement Network of Future Earth Coasts

CACCON Seed Network

1. Lorino*2. Shishmaref*3. Inuvialuit Settlement

Region#4. Clyde River*5. Nunatsiavut*,6. Unjárga/Nesseby*7. Murmansk#8. Kujalleq*9. Arviat*

*Active CACCON engagement

# possible future partners

Arctic Engagement Network

• CACCON hubs (knowledge centres)• Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada• Nordic Centre for Spatial Development (NordRegio), Sweden• Exchange for Local Observations and Knowledge in the Arctic

(ELOKA)• Future Earth Coasts• Other community-based observation networks (CBONs)• Arctic-COAST

caccon.org

RoadmapStep 1: Initiating workshop – April 14-16, 2014

Follow-Up Workshop, December 10, 2014Step 2: Create Circumarctic Indicators• Indicators: ASI indicators• Devise Biophysical indicatorsStep 3: Community engagementRegional pilots (indigenous, non-indigenous, hazards)• Shishmaref, Alaska, USA• Nunatsiavut, Canada• Lorino, Chukotka, Russia• Clyde River, Canada • Kujalleq, Greenland• Nesseby, NorwayStep 4: Sustainable networks• Knowledge hubsStep 5: Dissemination and outreach

2015 accomplishments

• Identified case studies and team members• www.caccon.org • Strong presence in Toyama (ASSW 2015)• Canadian funding: establish hubs in northern Canada

(ArcticNet) “Knowledge co-production for sustainability in Canadian Arctic Coastal Communities”

• US funding: RCN Arctic-COAST: community of scholars and stakeholders to improve understanding of coastal social-ecological systems particularly in northern Eurasia

• Session at ArcticNet meeting (December)