THE RISKS OF CLIMATE CHANGE INDUCED INTER-STATE CONFLICT OVER

THE RISKS OF CLIMATE CHANGE INDUCED INTER-STATE CONFLICT OVER

Abstract:

Climate change has been recognized as one of the most important global challenges of the 21st Century in several ways: climate change poses threats to the availability of environmental resources like cropland and water which sustain the livelihoods of billions of people across the world. According to the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, West Africa is one of the regions that are highly susceptible to the impacts of adverse climate change (translated as big increases in the intensity and frequency of extreme events like droughts and floods). This is in addition to the recognition by the UN that water will become the critical resource of the twenty-first century due to growing demands in many regions in the world. Given the presence of nearly all the conditions that engender transboundary water conflicts in West Africa, there is therefore the risk of climate change induced disputes arising from competitions to have greater access to/and control of the water resources of the Niger River Basin between the riparian states. Our work attempts to assess and analyse these risks. The theoretical arguments of the two main research perspectives on water and international conflicts (i.e. the Realist/water war/neo-Malthusian perspective and the Liberal Institutionalist/ Water Cooperation/Cornucopian perspective) are both persuasive and also suffer from some important shortcomings. Consequently, in order to eliminate these limitations and to have a comprehensive assessment of the risks of climate change induced inter-riparian conflicts over the Niger River basin, the environmental conflict model as represented by Nils P. Gleditsch was adopted and modified Both primary and secondary sources of data were used and the interpretation of the data was done qualitatively. In conclusion, the study has highlighted the significance of the climate change factor as an important threat to the livelihoods of millions of people in the Niger basin area and consequently a threat to the stability of the West African sub-region. The findings reveal that the climate change factor has generated anxiety and consequently triggered competition to secure greater access to/and control of water resources between the riparian states of the Niger River basin. Secondly, the treaty rules that govern the behavior of the riparian states of the Niger River basin (as currently constituted) are not comprehensive and therefore cannot prevent the onset of disputes if the current trends of global warming, climate change and the decline in water availability continued in the basin.

THE RISKS OF CLIMATE CHANGE INDUCED INTER-STATE CONFLICT OVER

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