One of the quieter consequences of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine was a joint decision by Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and the United States (the Arctic 7) to pause the activities of the Arctic Council, which includes Russia. Almost immediately, some experts worried that this move would backfire on the Arctic 7 and make for a more disorderly Arctic. A recent article in the Financial Times is just the latest example to perpetuate fundamental myths about Arctic economic and social governance.
In the Financial Times, former Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto warned that “an Arctic with no rules” was in the offing with the Arctic Council in limbo. But the council itself doesn’t create, or enforce, the rules of the north. The council is just a forum, and the vast majority of Arctic governance—economic, social, and climate—has always happened beyond its doors. International and national law are the real powers in the Arctic, and the only threat to them comes from Russian impunity.
The Arctic Council, established in 1996, is an intergovernmental forum composed of the eight Arctic states, a half-dozen Indigenous communities as permanent participants, and an assortment of observer states and organizations. The council is chaired by the Arctic states on a rotating basis, with biennial summits between foreign ministers capping one chair’s agenda and handing the reins to the next chair. The vast bulk of the council’s work is producing environmental, social, and development assessments (military security is off limits) through ad hoc projects and seven working and expert groups. Decisions require unanimity. Projects are funded and recommendations implemented by members, not the council.
International law underpins regional governance. The Arctic is ringed by land with clear owners—no land dispute remains in the Arctic. Beyond the Arctic’s shores, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) sets rules on resource entitlements in the oceans. The Arctic states all generally respect UNCLOS both in the Arctic and globally, and its universal rules clearly delineate where Arctic states have exclusive resource rights to oil, minerals, and fish, and where the high seas begin.
Exclusive economic zone (which stretch up to 200 nautical miles from shore) boundaries are all but settled, and competing Russian, Canadian, and Danish claims to more rights to seabed resources are proceeding in full accordance with international law. All that will be left for the global commons are the fish of the central Arctic Ocean—and even they are off the menu until 2037 thanks to a temporary international fishing moratorium.
Beyond these universal legal structures, Arctic-specific measures—such as a treaty divvying up search-and-rescue responsibilities (negotiated via the Arctic Council) or the International Maritime Organization’s Polar Code setting standards for ships operating in Arctic waters—also remain in place. The United States (and China, among others) have long-standing disagreements with Russia and Canada over navigational rights in the Northeast and Northwest Passages, but these are fundamentally universal issues about the sanctity of navigational freedom.
National law, whether on economic development, environmental protection, or Indigenous rights, provides the matter of governance within the framework of national sovereignty and exclusive rights. Take investment, for instance, which all Arctic states recognize as a key need for creating sustainable economies that respond to growing demand for Arctic resources. At the Center for Naval Analyses, we recently demonstrated how Canada, Norway, Russia, and the United States all use their own foreign direct investment screening laws to scrutinize and block investments from China at odds with national security.
This is just one example of how, even at its height, the Arctic Council was no European Union; states remained fully in control of what happened in their own Arctic lands and waters. For that exact reason, the Arctic Council was never going to prevent Russia from bringing on board new actors like BRICS states and investors to replace fleeing Western firms.
Haavisto also worries that the Arctic will be left without a “common goal for climate change.” Here he is half right. The Arctic Council plays a significant role facilitating scientific cooperation, and losing access to Russian data is a major blow to understanding how the climate crisis is unfolding in the Arctic. But already before the freeze, Russia did not participate in almost two-thirds of all Arctic Council projects, as the A7 demonstrated when they restarted these projects in mid-2022. Everything from environmental monitoring to economic development could work without Russia. The Arctic 7 has shown that they can continue most of the Arctic Council’s technical work without Russia. For missing climate data, the Arctic 7 governments should explore options for facilitating scientist-to-scientist contacts until Moscow ends its war.
Arctic hands might lament the death of Arctic exceptionalism, but suspending participation in a Russia-chaired Arctic Council was a justified response to Russia’s invasion. The Arctic could not remain an exception to a rightful Western repudiation of cooperation with Russia as Russia ripped through the principles underpinning the council and the international law providing the foundation for peace in the Arctic.
Norway took the chair of the Arctic Council in May and announced its ambition to reanimate the body in some form. To the extent the Arctic 7 can freeze Russia out of the Arctic Council while still starting or renewing projects among themselves under the Arctic Council banner, they should do so. But the Arctic 7 should remember that the Arctic Council’s coma or death does not invite disorder. That would only come from a return to business as usual and Russia getting away with trying to redraw settled boundaries with force. Properly understanding the stakes and the council’s scope puts its importance in context—the Arctic 7 should not rush to revive the full Arctic Council while Russia continues its war in Ukraine.