The politics of non-renewable resource development in Greenland, North Norway and Svalbard

Abstract

Only recently has the importance of politics in northern resource development been apparent. Governments, resource companies, and the public thought that lack of technology would be the major obstacle in the way of exploiting non-renewable resources in northern areas. The political difficulties encountered by British Petroleum and its Alaska North Slope partners, when trying to obtain government approval for the trans-Alaska (Alyeska) oil pipeline in the late 1960s, were the first clear sign that there exist widely varying political attitudes towards non-renewable resource development in northern lands (Arnold and others, 1976). Native groups in Canada's Northwest Territories were later successfully to argue their case against a Mackenzie valley gas pipeline before the public and a special inquiry (Morton, 1978). The attitude of the Canadian public towards the native position was sympathetic and open to compromise. Recent political emphasis in northern North America has been on the impact of non-renewable resource development upon native peoples and the environment. This has been true of Greenland but less so of North Norway (Nord Norge). Political attitudes over Svalbard have focused almost exclusively upon the international implications of non-renewable resource development (Sollie and others, 1974).