A common Arctic or contested spaces? Focus on European Arctic
Rovaniemi Arctic Spirit is Finland’s main regular international Arctic conference, organized biannually since 2013. The event is being planned as a hybrid-event, with both on-site and virtual attendees and speakers.
A special feature of this year’s event is that the public launch of the Finnish chairmanship of the Euro-Arctic Council (BEAC) will take place at our event. As we aim to be a dedicated event on Arctic issues we are delighted to host the festivities. In collaboration with the Finnish ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland, Rovaniemi Arctic Spirit aims to offer this year’s participants an opportunity to learn more about the work done by BEAC and discuss the perspectives of Arctic regional, people-to people level co-operation. We hope to welcome representatives from all regions active in the Barents Regional Council (BRC) to this year’s event.
Under the theme “A common Arctic or contested spaces? Focus on European Arctic” this year’s conference will explore subjects such as regional co-operation, Arctic security, European Union in the Arctic and land use from several perspectives.
The discussions on Arctic security will be hosted by our collaborator FIIA, and the Arctic Society of Finland will host a session on EU Arctic policies and Finland’s new Arctic strategy. The University of the Arctic (UArctic) will also be collaborating with us on bringing in speakers on Arctic issues.
This year’s event will have a significant input from the Horizon2020-funded research projects ArcticHubs, CHARTER and JustNorth. These collaborators will facilitate discussion on contested spaces in the North, as we will be exploring land use from the perspectives of just transition and climate change. The session includes presentations from both researchers and stakeholders.