In the autumn of 2019 I was engaged in an exercise to reveal a number of strategic concerns faced by the defence community by the middle of this century. Two of the concerns thrown up by this piece of research were the consequences of disruptive climate change - particularly with regards to the thawing of the Polar Ice Cap - and the strategic consequences of a loosening of the cohesion of the institutional framework of the international order. It struck me at the time that this would have the makings of an interesting matrix game.
A good starting point in game design is to consider the critical uncertainties that the game is to examine. One axis stood out as a possibility - institutional fragmentation -vs- institutional cohesion. In terms of the matrix game, we took this to signify the degree of effectiveness of the Arctic Council. A cohesive institutional framework would imply an enhanced Arctic Council, whereas a fragmented framework would imply a diminished Arctic Council, when compared to today.
We took the view that the extent to which the thawing of the Polar Ice Cap could be disruptive was dependent upon how the various actors viewed the unfrozen Arctic Ocean. At present, the Arctic Ocean is treated as of it is more of a global commons, to be enjoyed and shared by all. This is largely due to the remoteness of the region and high cost of commercially exploiting it. As the ocean thaws, increasing it's accessibility and reducing the costs of operating in it, there is an incentive for some actors to adopt a policy of territoriality within the Arctic, effectively enclosing the commons. We took that as our second axis.
We felt that six actors to the game ought to give us some interesting results. In terms of general stance, we felt that the two main Arctic nations - Canada and Russia - would take a higher degree of territoriality, with Canada preferring the multilateral framework of the Arctic Council and Russia seeking a degree of institutional fragmentation. As opposites, we felt that the minor Arctic actors - the US and Europe in the form of the European Commission - would seek to retain the Arctic as a global commons, with the US comfortable with a diminished role of the Arctic Council but with the European Commission seeking to enhance it's role. We took China and Japan as the main shipping beneficiaries of an unfrozen Arctic Ocean. We had both of these nations as veering towards enclosure and as veering towards a reduced scope for the Arctic Council.
This gave us the main framework outline for the game. We next had to identify the starting point for the game in 2020 - we had previously settled on a framework of six turns of five year each - and to write a general briefing for all players and specific briefings for each individual player. However, that is a story best left for another time.
Stephen Aguilar-Millan
© The European Futures Observatory 2020
No comments:
Post a Comment