Since its inception in 2014, we have produced three GlobalArctic edited books, as well as a freely available Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on Coursera. In doing so we have established a comprehensive and resolutely trans-disciplinary approach and framework of the Arctic in global ecological, cultural, economic, geopolitical, and societal contexts.

When we started, a significant part of our effort was to convince researchers, journalists, managers, and policymakers that the Arctic was indeed Global and that Global Change is indeed profoundly transforming the Arctic in all the above dimensions. These times have now passed, and we are proud to have contributed, albeit modestly, to that change in perception. We are indeed pleased that our approach and conceptualization is now taken up by many of the Arctic stakeholders, and beyond, and especially by young researchers. Since, the rapidly changing geopolitical environment since the Ukraine war has led to securitization of more or less everything pertaining to the Arctic, notably energy and minerals, but also transport, data, and indigenous peoples.

Still, we think that this securitization and ensuing militarization of the Arctic has to be resisted. Our mission is to continue to remind everyone that the increasingly vulnerable Arctic plays a crucial role in the Earth’s dynamics, that it is a particularly illustrative laboratory of the dead-end into which run-away military-industrial development is heading, that it constitutes a warning for humankind and the planet, and that it therefore has to be governed accordingly.