Is it all going south? Four future scenarios for Antarctica

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TitleIs it all going south? Four future scenarios for AntarcticaAbstractThe future is uncertain for Antarctica, with many possibilities-some more plausible, others more preferable. Indeed, the region and its governance regime may be reaching (or may have reached) a crossroads moment as a result of a series of challenges, including the changing Antarctic climate and environment, increasing human activity, shifting values among Antarctic states and a low-cost, somewhat benign governance regime (the Antarctic Treaty System). Within this context there are a number of interdependent drivers that are likely to influence Antarctica's future over, say, 25 years: global environmental and socio-economic developments; Antarctic governance; Antarctic research, including national Antarctic programme operations; and Antarctic tourism. The research presented here involved a thorough examination of Antarctic literature on current Antarctic developments and challenges, and an assessment of global trends. Scenarios were developed through a facilitated workshop process. From these, four future scenarios were developed based on interactions between these drivers. The resulting scenarios provide a dynamic, evolving possibility space to be explored as a means of understanding where Antarctic issues might evolve, depending on the growth or diminishing importance of drivers. In turn these suggest that more structured polar futures are needed based on formal quantitative and qualitative data. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017‚ This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (.Funding DetailsC09X1413, MBIE, Ministry for Business Innovation and Employment

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1st AuthorLiggett, D. AuthorLiggett, D.Frame, B.Gilbert, N.Morgan, F.Year2017JournalPolar RecordVolume53Number5Pages459-478DOI10.1017/S0032247417000390URLhttps://www.scopus.com/inward/recor.....ac6bfef406245b1efee232763PublisherCambridge University PressKeywordsclimate changeenvironmental changefuture prospectgovernance approachhuman activitytourism, Antarctica, rank5

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CitationLiggett, D., Frame, B., Gilbert, N. and Morgan, F. (2017). Is it all going south? Four future scenarios for Antarctica. Polar Record, 53(5): 459-478