Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 02/2010

Coping with Global Change

Anja H. Ebnöther, Ernst M. Felberbauer

November 2009

Austrian National Defence Academy

Abstract

At the beginning of the 21st century, the international security agenda is witnessing profound change. We are confronted with a shifting face of violence. We are no longer – or at least no longer primarily – confronted with traditional threats, such as violence between states or coalitions of states. Today, most conflicts are of a non-traditional nature – from intrastate conflict to terrorism. This trend will continue. In an increasingly globalised world, highly dynamic and fluid security challenges emerge that are the product of interlinked, but diverse, causes. Global warming will further encourage migration from the most hard pressed regions in the South towards the North and towards the sprawling urban centres in the South. Growing demographic imbalances will contribute to that trend. Raw material scarcities – from oil to food and water, soon also arable land – are likely to become more acute and may lead to open conflict, respectively to a new form of proxy wars. Urban violence is on the rise.