Security Perspectives in the Arctic Region: From Competition to Cooperation or Confrontation?

In the last decade, following the climate and environmental changes, the geopolitical and strategic importance of the Arctic Region has grown substantially. Global warming has rendered it more and more accessible from the economic, energetic, commercial and even touristic point of view, but on the other hand, this fact also represents a concern for some global, regional or state actors. Warming in the region has created a new space, important from the point of view natural resources, but a non-governed space, which a series of governments are willing to attribute to themselves. The situation tends to complicate because of territorial disputes, the activity and military presence in the Arctic region have grown, generating a more and more complex competition and rivalry, however this state does not necessarily suggest an imminent conflict. On the other hand, at present, the region does not have a security architecture generating a cooperation dynamics. The paper proposes a synthetic analysis and a prognosis on the possibilities of confrontation in the region, based on geopolitical, economic, military and non-military interests of the actors in the Arctic space in global context, using elements of PMESII matrix.