Environmental Security  Schools of Thought

During the course of this research project, the literature review found that Dr. Simon Dalby (2002b) suggests that environmental security concept has evolved in four “stages” that include:

1. “broader understanding of security,”
   
2. linkage exploration “between environment and insecurity,”
   
3. “empirical verification or refutation” of identified linkages, and 
4. “synthesis and reconceptualization” (96). 
   

As the debate over environmental security has matured, it has now benefited from several years of focused research.  As a result, fears of direct “large-scale [nation-state] warfare over renewable resources” have mostly receded (Dalby 2002b: 95).  As this concept has developed into its third and fourth stages, Dalby (2002b) identified and summarized the six main “schools” of environmental security thought, which have been summarized in the table below (96). 

Resource:
Dalby, Simon.  2002b.  Security and Ecology in the Age of Globalization.  ECSP Report, Issue 8, Summer 2002.  95-108.  Environmental Change and Security Program (ECSP), Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.  See http://www.wilsoncenter.org/topics/pubs/Report_8_Dalby.pdf