Syria and Climate Change – Framing the Relationship

There is also a potential role of climate change as well. Climate change has often been posited in media and analytical reports as an exacerbating force, an additional stressor and occasionally a root cause. Syria recently suffered flooding and snowfall that worsened the situation of hundreds of thousands of refugees, a five-year drought that helped to unravel its agricultural sector, and also shares traits of climate vulnerability with its fellow Arab Spring nations.

Assessing the potential role of climate change in the Syrian complex emergency can be challenging.

 

Yet viewing the conflict as a “mosaic” of geopolitical, economic and climate connections can be a valuable way to approach potential links. A mosaic approach shows the potential fallacies of viewing climate change in individual “tiles” – such as seemingly extreme individual hydro-meteorological events with strong humanitarian impacts. By backing out and transcending and including the complex emergency in the broadest possible picture, the true context of climate change and the Syrian complex emergency yields important conclusions.

 

 

Looking at individual tiles in the mosaic and connecting them to climate change, such as seemingly extreme individual events, may be tempting but can be fraught with problems. Take for, example, this year’s early January snowstorm, which brought torrential rains, flooding and up to a foot of snow to parts of Jordan, Lebanon and the West Bank. The storm brought especially trying conditions to hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees. Indeed, the World Meteorological Organization even referenced the event in the context of 2013 already being “a big year in terms of weather calamity,” with the implication that climate change generally increases the frequency of extreme and unpleasant events.

 

One could take it a step further. At the time of the storm, the Arctic Oscillation (AO) – a climate regime that can spill frigid air into Eurasia and North America when negative – was heading into modestly negative territory,  and new studies are  beginning to surface suggesting a link between sea ice loss and these negative episodes. In other words, loss of sea ice could potentially produce negative AO events that can exacerbate or even cause some humanitarian emergencies.  A freak Mid-East snowstorm that worsened the situation for hundreds of thousands of displaced could potentially be a poster child of a phenomenon that ultimately links sea ice loss to dire humanitarian situations.

 

However, making this leap based on one just one extreme event can problematic. According to AccuWeather.com meteorologist Jim Andrews, “the winter, on average, has not been unusually cold or even stormy in the region. Indeed, taking December through February as being the winter, it has actually been a little ‘warmer’ than usual.” The storm, which did have temporary paralyzing effects in the high altitudes of the region, was “significant, if not memorable,” according to Andrews. “Such a thing does happen in the region periodically, though certainly not on a yearly basis.” 

 

Andrews astutely points key factor in why the event was so significant – “rainfall (and snowmelt) was heavy enough to cause widespread runoff and ponding – a serious negative factor for people already exposed to the elements in a temporary ‘tent city.’” Indeed, the vulnerability of the displaced themselves could be viewed as the driving factor that made this one meteorological event a particularly dangerous humanitarian situation. 

 

 

While looking at an isolated, seemingly extreme hydro-meteorological event can be problematic, looking at the societal ramifications of a long-term scenario that may have produced conditions of social unrest is more compelling.

 

In an article published by Francesco Femia and Caitlin Werrell for the Center of Climate and Security last year, Femia and Werrell probe the potential connections between a massive drought suffered by Syria between 2006 and 2011, and subsequent social instability caused by the depopulation of the rural countryside.  Their analysis suggests that the drought was one of the most severe crop failures in the history of the Fertile Crescent itself. The drought, they suggest, was a combination of the impact of climate change in the region, coupled with failed agricultural policies of the al-Assad regime – ultimately resulting in massive crop failures and the migration of hundreds of thousands of people to tenuous urban environments.  “Disaffected rural communities” played a significant political role in the post Arab Spring Syrian opposition, their analysis suggests.

 

On one hand, the five year drought certainly survived both El Niño and La Niña episodes, and Femia and Werrell reference a NOAA study indicating that the Mediterranean is suffering droughts with increasing frequency.  The authors also acknowledge the significance of human-caused agricultural mismanagement, such as growing water-intensive and drought-vulnerable crops like cotton and wheat. An analysis by the New York Times affirms that the crop failure was indeed “as much a matter of human mismanagement “ as the drought.

 

All told, from a geopolitical perspective, the drought and subsequent depopulation of the countryside was likely a factor in the complex societal and political tapestry that unraveled in Syria. Affirms Bruce Riedel, the director of the Intelligence Project for the Brookings Institute, “I do think there is a case for overpopulation and climate change helping to spark the Arab Spring … the drought in Syria probably increased the frustrations of the Syrian people.”

 

 

To truly frame the complex humanitarian emergency in Syria and the ongoing influence of climate change, the entire mosaic must transcend and include the conflict itself. In this case, expanding the mosaic to include the entire Arab Spring political movement, the global economy and food system, overpopulation, water scarcity and climate change creates a picture that helps to put Syria and other Middle Eastern nations into context.

 

During a recent event hosted by the Brookings Institute to discuss the “Black Swans” the Obama Administration may face in its second term, (i.e., unpredictable, unlikely “wild cards” that could have major consequences), Riedell responded to an inquiry about the potential connections between the Arab Spring and climate change: “Sana’a [Yemen] will be the first capital in the world which runs out of water. People have been talking about overpopulation in Cairo since the 1950s. At a certain point it actually begins to matter. Pakistan [suffered] the worst floods in its history at a time when it is also running out of potable water. These climate changes will have a big impact on these Middle Eastern and South Asian societies which have always been at the edge of being able to function – it’s going to be even harder now.” 

 

In a newly-released report titled The Arab Spring and Climate Change, the Center for Climate and Security, Stimson Center and Center for American Progress further explore this broader concept in a series of essays. The role of climate change is referred to a “stressor” or “threat multiplier” tied into a set of complex, interrelated factors.

 

In the report, Troy Sternberg of Oxford University connects the regional Arab Spring movement to the massive droughts in China and Russia that spiked global wheat prices and dramatically multiplied the stressors felt by heavy wheat importing Middle Eastern nations such as Egypt.

 

Analysis by the Institute for Strategic Studies also references local and global food price fluctuations, and concludes that “Global warming may not have caused the Arab Spring, but it may have made it come earlier.”

 

And, as part of that assessment, Femia and Werrell review climate change within the context Syria’s iteration of the Arab Spring and conclude, “If the international community and future policymakers in Syria are to address and resolve the drivers of unrest in the country, they will have to better explore and address these changes.”

 

 

In conclusion, viewing the entire mosaic of the Syria complex emergency is extremely important. In its entirety, mosaic shows a picture of a complex, post-Arab Spring landscape of geopolitics, social upheaval, and political change. In that landscape, there are severe rain and snow events that have exacerbated the situation of the displaced, a massive drought that helped to catalyze rural migration and social instability, and a broader panorama of Middle Eastern and Southeast Asian nations coping with uprisings linked to global food prices, as well as long-term concerns about sustainability, overpopulation and available water. Not every tile in the mosaic is causally correlated to climate change, but the entire picture points to increasing vulnerability.

 

 

 

Viewing the Syrian complex emergency as a mosaic helps to put aspects of climate change's potential influence into contect. [Image: UNHCR]

---

 

Mehmet Burk is the senior writer at Melting Glacier Analytics’ Relief Analysis Wire website.  Sincere thanks to AccuWeather, the Brookings Institute, and the Center for Climate and Security for their support for this article.