"Iceland is not an Arctic coastal state"

"Iceland is not an Arctic coastal state." No, I didn't say that, the Arctic Five did. Who are they? Well, if you haven't happened to have been following the details of climate change diplomacy in the Nordic countries in the last few years, you've missed this mighty fact. The Arctic Five is a group of five states who have decided that their coastlines form the shores of the Arctic Ocean, to the exclusion of Iceland. Have a look at a map of the whole Arctic, a circumpolar map. You can agree that Canada, Denmark/Greenland, Norway, Russia and the United States/Alaska all have edges that bound the Arctic Ocean. For some reason, they don't want Iceland to be part of their club. Although the current highest-level body in the far north, the Arctic Council, includes the Arctic Five, as well as Finland, Iceland, Sweden, the Indigenous Peoples and a number of Observers, the five coastal states have made a point of meeting amongst themselves, but excluding Iceland. That Iceland is not an Arctic coastal state isn't just something that bothers me, it also bothers the Icelanders. Can you imagine why? Important declarations on Arctic matters, involving climate change, the limits of the continental shelves, freedom of the seas, and so on, are being made in the name of the Arctic Five, without the involvement of the other Arctic parties.

A recently-published article by Klaus Dodds and Valur Ingimundarson, entitled, "Territorial nationalism and Arctic geopolitics: Iceland as an Arctic coastal state,"* explores Iceland's position on this contentious issue in a fascinating and penetrating way, if you want to read more. Although the article does a great job in explaining Iceland's arguments for being considered an Arctic coastal state, I can't find where it explains why the Five have acted so arbitrarily, except to postulate that they are acting from spontaneous hegemonic urges. Let me know if you know more about this!

*The article can be found at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/2154896X.2012.679557

A map from the public domain:



The map is accessed from:
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/image/IBCAO_betamap.jpg
where it can be seen even more clearly.