The origins of the Syrian conflict : climate change and human security

Does climate change cause conflict? Did it cause the Syrian uprising? Some policymakers and academics have made this claim, but is it true? This study presents a new conceptual framework to evaluate this claim. Contributing to scholarship in the fields of critical security, environmental security, human security, and Arab politics, Marwa Daoudy prioritizes non-Western and marginalized perspectives to make sense of Syria's place in this international debate. Designing an innovative multidisciplinary framework and applying it to the Syrian case, Daoudy uses extensive field research and her own personal background as a Syrian scholar to present primary interviews with Syrian government officials and citizens, as well as the research of domestic Syrian experts, to provide a unique insight into Syria's environmental, economic and social vulnerabilities leading up to the 2011 uprising. "This book puts forward a new framework for evaluating the climate-conflict hypothesis that examines the interactions between environmental, economic, and sociopolitical factors at the roots of the Syrian uprising (2011). The Human-Environmental-Climate Security (HECS) framework adopts a critical environmental security perspective to avoid deterministic thinking and recognize local agency by people and governments. Applying the HECS framework to the Syrian case, the author traces the history of climate, water, and food (in)security in Syria in the context of Ba'athist and liberal policies. Ultimately, the book concludes that while climate change might have contributed to the severity of a drought in the mid- to late 2000s, it was ultimately the Syrian government's poor policy decisions that created a nexus of vulnerability in rural agricultural communities"-- Provided by publisher "This book puts forward a new framework for evaluating the climate-conflict hypothesis that examines the interactions between environmental, economic, and sociopolitical factors at the roots of the Syrian uprising (2011). The Human-Environmental-Climate Security (HECS) framework adopts a critical environmental security perspective to avoid deterministic thinking and recognize local agency by people and governments. Applying the HECS framework to the Syrian case, the author traces the history of climate, water, and food (in)security in Syria in the context of Ba'athist and liberal policies. Ultimately, the book concludes that while climate change might have contributed to the severity of a drought in the mid- to late 2000s, it was ultimately the Syrian government's poor policy decisions that created a nexus of vulnerability in rural agricultural communities"-- Résumé de l'éditeur Contents Figures Tables Acknowledgements and Preface Part I. The Context: History, Geography, Security 1. Climate Change and the Syrian Revolution 2. The Many Faces of Environmental Security 3. When Geography Rules History Part II. Human–Environmental–Climate Security (HECS) 4. Rules of Ideology and Policy From Ba’athism to the Liberal Age 5. Vulnerability and Resilience: Human–Environmental–Climate Security 6. A (Hi)story of Vulnerability, Resistance, and Resilience References Index Policymakers, academics and the media have claimed that climate change causes conflicts. This study presents an innovative framework to evaluate this theory, asking whether climate change caused the conflict in Syria. Its argument and findings are essential for practitioners and scholars of climate change, security, and Middle Eastern politics