The Scramble for the Poles: The Geopolitics of the Arctic and Antarctic

by Klaus Dodds, Mark Nuttall

In August 2007 a Russian flag was planted under the North Pole during a scientific expedition triggering speculation about a new scramble for resources beneath the thawing ice.

But is there really a global grab for Polar territory and resources? Or are these activities vastly exaggerated? In this rich and wide-ranging book, Klaus Dodds and Mark Nuttall look behind the headlines and hyperbole to reveal a complex picture of the so-called scramble for the poles. Whilst anxieties over the potential for conflict and the destruction of what is often perceived as the world's last wildernesses have come to dominate Polar debates and are, to some extent, justified, their study also highlights longer historical and geographical patterns and processes of human activity in these remote territories. Over the past century, Polar landscapes have been probed, drilled, fished, tested on and dug up, as their indigenous populations have struggled to protect their rights and interests.

No longer remote places, or themselves 'poles apart' from one another, the contemporary geopolitics of the Polar regions has lessons for us all as we confront a warming world where access to resources is a concern for states, big and small.

232 pages, Paperback

First published November 9, 2015

About the author

Klaus Dodds is Professor of Geopolitics at Royal Holloway, University of London. He was educated at Wellington College and the University of Bristol where he completed degrees in geography and political science. After taking up a position at the University of Edinburgh, he was appointed to a lectureship at Royal Holloway in 1994.

In 2005 Klaus Doods was awarded the annual Philip Leverhulme Prize by the Leverhulme Trust for "an outstanding contribution to political geography and ‘critical geopolitics'"

Reviews

[Punky Brewster]

Never fear. They didn't forget to leave out feminist studies and gender theory