People just have this image that it's empty and vulnerable, and it's up to us to protect it - when in fact there are people up there, and they have been protecting it, and they do have jurisdiction to protect it.

Heather Exner-Pirot examines the mounting threats facing local and indigenous people of the Arctic, from climate change affecting communities without the resources or infrastructure to adapt, to the arbitrary global politics of NGOs and environment activists that rob local citizens of their autonomy and political power, and explains why the real solution to global warming involves Southerners curtailing their consumption and transforming their energy policies.

Heather wrote the chapter Whose Arctic Is it? in the Worldwatch Institute's report State of the World 2015: Confronting Hidden Threats to Sustainability.

Guest

Heather Exner-Pirot

@ExnerPirot

Heather Exner-Pirot is Strategist for Outreach and Indigenous Engagement at the University of Saskatchewan College of Nursing and a managing editor of The Arctic Yearbook.

Whose Arctic are you saving? Local autonomy and global activism.

Heather Exner-Pirot

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