Global Classroom: ICE Case Study Assignments

Ice Assignment #4: Environment Impacts

How does the environment play a role in the conflict? Is it a direct impact such as a resource of great need such as oil or an indirect result of more general issues (such as land disputes). Take some tyime to lay out the linkages to the environment and how this translates into a national security interest. Is it a problem of scarcity or surplus? Think of the differing ways to categorize and consider the case.

Here are the ICE coding categories for this cluster of indicators.

II. Environment Aspects

6. Type of Environmental Problem

This field would divide the cases into six categories that may not be mutually exclusive. The first three groups belong to a subset of resource concentration problems, the second to a subset called resource depletion problems. The types of problems are divided into three categories: source, sink, and global problems. Choose the most important, but alos discuss other impacts.

Environmental Problem Type:_________________________

Types of Source and Sink Problems

SOURCE PROBLEMS:
Habitat Loss [HABIT]
Deforestation [DEFOR]
Coral Loss [CORAL]
Bio-diversity Loss [BIODIV]
Species Loss Land [SPLL]
Species Loss Air [SPLA]
Species Loss Air [SPLS]

SINK PROBLEMS
Pollution Air [POLA]
Pollution Land [POLL]
Pollution Sea [POLS]
Waste [WASTE]

GLOBAL PROBLEMS

Global Warming [GWARM]
Ozone Loss [OZONE]

These are general categories that allow for a comparison of which types of problems are occurring with the most frequency. One
could also chart how the importance of these types of problems has tracked over time.

You will find biological diveristy information in World Resources, World Resources Institute annual report on bi-diversity. (Tables in the back.) Match the species with the species shown for levels. User "Higer Plants" for habitat problems. For ocean cases, there is another table that shows levels of seas stocks by ocean area.

7. Type of Habitat

The types of habitat are based on simple climate and bio-geographic types. Discuss them.
a. Dry
b. Cool
c. Temperate
d. Tropical
e. Ocean
f. Space

8. Act and Harm Sites:

The answer in to Geographic Locations placed the conflict according to the site of the conflict, which sometimes coincides with where the environment is at issue. The site of the conflict and where it originates in environmental terms may be different and this category points out those instances (see Table below). Think about the combinations in your case.

Table: Combinations of Act and Harm Sites

Site of Act Site of Harm Example
(1) Nation A impact Nation A, Brazil deforests the Amazon
(2) Nation A impacts Nation B, Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine impacts Europe
(3) Nation A impacts Commons, Russian radioactive dumping in Arctic Sea
(4) Commons impacts, Commons Over-fishing of salmon by Japanese fishermen
(5) Commons impacts antion, Nation B Italian Waste Dumping in Lebanon
Source: Modified from Christopher Stone