o 80 o 70 o 60 ARCTIC SOCIAL INDICATORS ARCTIC SOCIAL INDICATORS A FOLLOW-UP TO THE AHDR o 80 o 70 o 60 Arctic Social Indicators - a follow-up to the Arctic Human Development Report TemaNord 2010:519 © Nordic Council of Ministers, Copenhagen 2010 ISBN 978-92-893-2007-8 Print: Scanprint as, Århus Cover: Joan Nymand Larsen and Jón Haukur Ingimundarson, Stefansson Arctic Institute, Akureyri, Iceland Layout: Guðjón Heimir Sigurðsson, Ásprent, Akureyri Photos: Front-cover: Many people gain extra income from tourism in Eastern Greenland. Two dog sledges on the way back to the village Kulusuk after they have been driving tourists around at the end of the season in late May. Photo: Johanna Roto Back-cover, upper: Town of Akureyri, Northern Iceland. Photo: Joan Nymand Larsen Back-cover, middle: Sahtugotšine Dene drummers at Deline, NT, Canada June 2007. Photo: Stephanie Irlbacher Fox Back-cover, lower: Ice-floe jumping: A challenging sport among adolescents when the ice is breaking up in spring. Tasiilaq, East Greenland, 1893 inhabitants (2009). Photo: Rasmus Ole Rasmussen Photos are used with permission Copies: 500 Printed on environmentally friendly paper This publication can be ordered on www.norden.org/order. Other Nordic publications are available at www.norden.org/publications Printed in Denmark Editors: Joan Nymand Larsen, Peter Schweitzer, and Gail Fondahl ASI secretariat: Stefansson Arctic Institute, Akureyri, Iceland: www.svs.is Nordic Council of Ministers Nordic Council Ved Stranden 18 Ved Stranden 18 DK-1061 Copenhagen K DK-1061 Copenhagen K Phone (+45) 3396 0200 Phone (+45) 3396 0400 Fax (+45) 3396 0202 Fax (+45) 3311 1870 www.norden.org Nordic co-operation Nordic cooperation is one of the world’s most extensive forms of regional collaboration, involving Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and three autonomous areas: the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Åland. Nordic cooperation has firm traditions in politics, the economy, and culture. It plays an important role in European and international collaboration, and aims at creating a strong Nordic community in a strong Europe. Nordic cooperation seeks to safeguard Nordic and regional interests and principles in the global community. Common Nordic values help the region solidify its position as one of the world’s most innovative and competitive. Preface 5 The Arctic Social Indicators report is published by © Nordic Council of Ministers, Copenhagen 2010 Project Leaders Joan Nymand Larsen Peter Schweitzer Editorial Team Joan Nymand Larsen Peter Schweitzer Gail Fondahl Project Manager Joan Nymand Larsen Executive Committee Joan Nymand Larsen Peter Schweitzer Gail Fondahl Rune Sverre Fjellheim Acknowledgements Lead authors, contributing experts, and ASI working group participants (in alphabetical order): Andrey Petrov Hugh Beach Lee Huskey Rune Sverre Fjellheim Anna Sirina Igor Krupnik Leslie King Solveig Glomsrød Birger Poppel Jack Kruse Magne Ove Varsi Stephanie Irlbacher Fox Bruce Forbes Jan Henry Keskitalo Matthew Berman Susan Crate Carl Christian Olsen (Puju) Jens Dahl Níels Einarsson Tatiana Vlassova Ellen Inga Turi Joan Nymand Larsen Oran Young Torunn Pettersen Gail Fondahl Jón Haukur Ingimundarson Peter Bjerregaard Vladimir Bocharnikov Gorm Winther Kathleen Graves Peter Schweitzer Yvon Csonka Gunhild Hoogensen Lawrence D. Kaplan Rasmus Ole Rasmusssen Gunn-Britt Retter Lawrence Hamilton Raymond Barnhardt Arctic Maps Winfried Dallmann (AHDR map) Rasmus Ole Rasmussen and José Sterling (Nordregio maps) Local - and Student Assistants Søren Bitsch Brynjar Helgi Ásgeirsson Olga Sif Guðmundsdóttir Sigrid Rasmussen Nikolaj Nordby Thøgersen Note Taker Marg Kruse Editorial Services Ruth Wilson, West Coast Editorial Associates, B.C. Thank you to all the invaluable feedback from anonymous peer reviewers, including review comments received on ASI findings at numerous international conferences, workshops, and seminars. 6 Arctic Social Indicators The Sustainable Development Working Group of the Arctic Council: Indigenous peoples’organizations, permanent participants, international organizations Aleut International Association (AIA) Arctic Athabaskan Council (AAC) Gwich’in Council International (GCI) Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC) Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North (RAIPON) Saami Council Canada Denmark/Greenland/Faroe Islands Finland Iceland Norway Sweden Russian Federation United States of America International Arctic Science Committee (IASC) International Arctic Social Sciences Association (IASSA) Indigenous People’s Secretariat (IPS) International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) University of the Arctic Special thanks are due to Bernard Funston, executive secretary of the SDWG secretariat and to the Norwegian Chairmanship of the Arctic Council. Special thanks are also due to the Icelandic representative on the SDWG, Mr. Ragnar Baldursson. Financial Support The project could not have been completed without the generous financial support received by: Nordic Council of Ministers’ Arctic Cooperation Programme Icelandic Ministry for the Environment/Stefansson Arctic Institute University of Alaska Foundation, USA Circumpolar Directorate of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada Canadian Embassy in Reykjavík, Iceland Department of Environmental, Social and Spatial Change (ENSPAC), University of Roskilde, Denmark Vancouver Island University, B.C., Canada The above list of contributors to the ASI is not comprehensive; it includes main contributors only. Thanks are also due to the numerous individuals who have been involved in this project but who are not mentioned by name. ARCTIC SOCIAL INDICATORS The Arctic Social Indicators report 7 A FOLLOW-UP TO THE AHDR o 80 o 70 o 60 Preface This report is a result of and follow-up to the Arctic Human Development Report (AHDR), which appeared in 2004 and had been conducted under the auspices of the Arctic Council’s Sustainable Development Working Group (SDWG). The AHDR marked processes of maturation within the Arctic Council and beyond. On the one hand, the AHDR represented the first social science-driven report prepared for the Arctic Council, indicating that various stakeholders, from politicians to Arctic residents, understood the importance of the “human dimension” for sustainable development in the Arctic. On the other hand, the processes leading to the AHDR marked new developments in the relationship between Arctic govern- ance and scholarship, including coordinated support for the report from the Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region (SCPAR). The AHDR was largely met with approval and enthusiasm, signaling that human development in the Arctic had become a matter of widespread concern and interest. In the years since, Arctic human development has become even more critical for stakeholders in the Arctic and beyond. One of the reasons is certainly the impact of global climate change on Arctic environments and communities (see, among many other reports, the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) of 2004). As the Arctic has become an “early warning” site for climate-induced changes to come (the figurative “canary in the coal mine” for much of the rest of the world), the effects of these changes on arctic residents have become a matter of general concern. Thus, tracking Arctic human development through a small set of indicators becomes a matter of significant practical and theoretical relevance in times of (climate) change. While the first thoughts regarding an Arctic Social Indicators (ASI) project reach back to the years 2004 and 2005, the majority of work for the initiative was produced during the years 2006-2009. Thus, the ASI activities largely coincided with the research initiatives of the International Polar Year (IPY) 2007-2008, which officially lasted from March 2007 to March 2009. Actually, ASI was recognized as an IPY activity by the International IPY programme office. Given that the IPY 2007- 2208 differed radically from its predecessors – by its inclusion of the social sciences and of arctic residents -, the co-occur- rence of IPY and ASI was more than pure coincidence. It was indicative of increased research activities in the Arctic (and Antarctic), as well as of increased input from Arctic residents who consider the study of human development as critical as the study of changing sea ice conditions. 8 Arctic Social Indicators Similar to the AHDR, ASI set itself the task of combining state-of-the-art arctic social science research with applied con- cerns of arctic countries and communities and of arctic indigenous peoples’ organizations, the so-called permanent partic- ipants of the Arctic Council. While the applicability (and usefulness) of Arctic research to northern communities is the ultimate test of research that considers itself appropriate within the context of the Arctic Council’s SDWG, this relevance cannot be achieved without the input from a broad spectrum of scholars and practitioners, representing the best in their fields. We hope that this report will nourish the growing recognition that the study and tracking of human development is necessary for understanding the Arctic, as well as necessary for increasing well-being in the circumpolar North. This first ASI report is, by design, focused on the development of a small set of social indicators in the Arctic and cannot provide the implementation of these indicators. Data challenges, as outlined in the final chapter of this report, need to be overcome in order to implement the set of social indicators proposed in this