| Summary: | Antarctica—the huge southern continent surrounded by isolating and defining polar oceans—is highly complex in terms of human politics and governance. Antarctica is extreme, and provides no kind of living for humans without technology; fuel is needed even to produce drinking water. Throughout history, there has been a range of attitudes towards this remote part of the globe. These attitudes span from Captain James Cook's proclamation that nobody would want to explore any further than he had, (and that if they did, they would find nothing of use), to current perceptions of potential economic return—and thus decades Of disagreement about what should be done With it, by whom, and how. Since Cook, exploration of the continent has advanced little by little, with sightings and first landings throughout the nineteenth century, and then with initial expeditions and overwinterings at the turn of the twentieth century. Many of these expeditions became the basis for national claims of sovereignty. At the start of the twenty-first century, many different nations are involved with governing and regulating human use of Antarctica. Many more again hold the perception that they fhould be involved, and these are mostly motivated not by intrinsic interest in the continent, but by a fear of losing out on potential future developments. In all cases, it seems that national Interests are paramount, and tempered only recently with a growing understanding of the scale of human influence on global biological and geochemical cycles and thus an appreciation of what remains unaltered. National interests are expressed in terms of opportunities for national economic gain. But whilst our economic activity was historically developed as a mechanism for the freeing up of human creativity, time and exploration, it has now become a driving force and often an end in itself— subordinate to no other values. Profit and commercialisation are recognised as being forces that may institute undesired change; those who control resources and means of ...
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