When you turn up the heat and conflict rises, what about interdisciplinary research on the relationship between climate change and recruitment?

The growing impacts of climate change have created a global humanitarian crisis. Growing populations, unstable political structures and competition for scarce resources are creating unprecedented levels of insecurity. Terrorist groups exploit these complexities, using the environment as a weapon of war, exploiting the stress and dissatisfaction caused by climate change to increase support, aid recruitment, and incite violence.

The potential impact of human-induced climate change on left-wing terrorist groups is often overlooked in contemporary analyses. The research presented in this article therefore takes an interdisciplinary approach, combining terrorism studies with disaster management, to examine a specific type of security crisis that exists in this overlapping relationship between climate change and left-wing conflict. This article examines in detail examples of terrorist groups and activities in three regions: the Revolutionary Armed Forces in Colombia, the Shining Path in Peru, and the Naxalites in India. The article reveals the complex issues behind climate disasters, focusing on the impact of hazards such as deforestation, rising sea levels, extreme weather, retreating glaciers, drought, famine, water shortages and migration on left-wing terrorist recruitment and activity.

Climate change is one of the biggest and most urgent threats to our current way of life. Globally, its impacts are becoming more severe, unpredictable and frequent. Over the past two decades, the rise of terrorist groups has become increasingly linked to climate change, posing new challenges to national, regional and international security, as the complex risks posed by global warming facilitate non-state militancy The emergence and development of organizations. Conceptualized by Schwartz as "environmental terrorism," climate conflicts occur when resources are used as both targets and weapons in armed conflict. This leads to a cycle of unstable conditions that exacerbates the potential impacts of climate change, which in turn promotes further instability. Even in the absence of a direct link between climate change and terrorism, broader challenges such as poverty, inequality, marginalization and weak governments provide fertile ground for non-state armed groups to develop and challenge state authority. soil.

Climate models show that the impacts of anthropogenic (human-driven) climate change are expected to become more frequent and severe, with global meteorological trends reaching unprecedented extremes. Hurricanes and storm systems are breaking records for their intensity and number, causing unprecedented damage to island communities. Likewise, record-breaking earthquakes, seismic disasters and volcanic eruptions have shocked people around the world. Long-term hazards such as drought and famine continue to affect communities and those forced to live in higher-risk areas due to social and environmental factors such as poverty and war. Opportunities for these organizations to exploit uncertainty remain prevalent and must be addressed to avoid future humanitarian situations.

Numerical models of the atmosphere and biosphere show that deforestation and land-use changes are causing significant increases in surface temperatures and causing potentially devastating disruptions to rainfall patterns. Climate warming is also fueling the retreat of glaciers around the world, with field, satellite and meteorological records confirming that 9% of the ice in the Himalayas disappeared between 1970 and 2000. Alarmingly, a combination of climate models, water budgets and socioeconomic data shows that most of the world’s population is already experiencing water scarcity. Often overlooked in contemporary analyzes of anthropogenic climate change, and in the broader terrorism literature, are the potential security risks posed by left-wing terrorist groups.

Assessment of these organizations remains important because the destruction and/or exploitation of certain aspects of the natural world, coupled with complex climate, political and social issues, will lead to more Larger and more lasting turmoil. To do this, we urgently need to understand how terrorist groups exploit and benefit from these situations. This article therefore attempts to further analyze and assess the emerging types of humanitarian crises that exist due to the interaction between climate change and left-wing conflicts.

This article therefore considers how grievances exacerbated by climate change can act as a “pull factor” for left-wing terrorist groups, aiding recruitment. To better understand the links between climate change and left-wing terrorism, this article takes an interdisciplinary approach that combines terrorism studies with disaster management to examine the rise of Marxist-Leninist organizations using the natural world to increase support and recruitment. We have selected case studies of terrorist groups and activities in three regions: Colombia’s Revolutionary Armed Forces, Peru’s Shining Path, and India’s Naxalites to demonstrate how each group gained traction through environmentally destructive means.

These studies reveal complex issues related to climate hazards, with particular emphasis on the impact of deforestation, sea level rise, extreme weather, glacier retreat, drought, famine and water scarcity on human settlements, economic activity and Impact on community morale. Each case study ties together the political, social and environmental factors surrounding the rise of terrorist groups, particularly their relationship to climate change. We hope that through interdisciplinary analysis we can better identify and understand how left-wing terrorist groups operate in a world experiencing climate change.

However, once the FARC withdrew after the 2016 peace deal, new armed rebel groups began engaging in illegal logging, clearing more than a hundred hectares of forest every week, leaving these previously relatively untouched areas areas are being rapidly deforested and significantly exacerbating climate change in the region.

In addition, rebel groups began unregulated gold mining operations, further destroying the forest and poisoning the surrounding soil and water with mercury. As a result, the land cannot sustain agricultural production and the water is undrinkable, forcing communities to move from the area, further exacerbating socioeconomic stress. Somewhat paradoxically, the more stable socio-political conditions brought about by peace expose the environment to greater risks.

The product of a comprehensive understanding of the relationship between climate and conflict: such efforts are essential if we are to understand the causes and consequences of future environmental acts of left-wing terrorism and to successfully try to mitigate and prevent them .