Climate Change as a Security Threat: Comparing U.S, Chinese, and Russian Strategic Doctrines

Abstract

As an environmental phenomenon, climate change has been appreciated over the years as a complex security problem. Although the world awareness is consistent on its destabilizing nature, the national reactions vary radically. This paper fills the gap in the literature with respect to how the three key powers, the United States, China and Russia conceptualize and implement climate change within the confines of their national security paradigm. The research questions include (1) the comparison of the consideration of climate change as a security issue in the U.S., Chinese, or Russian strategic doctrines, (2) the quantification of the relative importance of the implementation of the strategic doctrines, and (3) the measurement of influence of geopolitical interest in the strategic doctrines and policy priorities. This study will analyze official defense and strategic documents (2000-2025) through a mixed-methods introduction to the research based on the statistical content analysis. Quantitative coding scheme determines what terms of climate-related security are most frequent and most situation specific, whereas statistical data analysis (chi-square tests, correlation analysis) will determine the differences across the three states. Additional presentation of qualitative content also gives contextual richness to the differences in ideology and policy. Early evidence indicates that there is statistically significant divergence in U.S. doctrine believing climate change to be a non-traditional security challenge which needs to be cooperatively addressed at the multilateral level; China places climate change within the frameworks of environmental governance and domestic stability; Russia is less emphatic, and in many instances, climate-related problems are relegated to energy and resource security discourses. The statistical results indicate there is a high correlation (r = 0.72, p less than 0.05), between climate risk perceived and the policy innovation indices. It is concluded in this study that climate change acts as a reflection and also as a driver of changing national security priorities. Through quantitative comparison of the doctrinal strategies, it indicates the geopolitical, and ideological imbalances that act as climatic-security governance.