Beginning July 2007, Ecowar was a Blogspot journal with hundreds of notes on links between conflicts of all sorts and the natural resources we all ultimately depend upon. December 2011, Ecowar became a book with a website. Since then, neither the Blogspot nor the book website has been regularly updated. A couple of the few times I wrote a new post, I even wrote in Danish.
Welcome to Ecowar II. Here, I have imported (most) old posts from both sites and will continue the project with some regularity and always in English.
When I began blogging, mentioning the connection between natural resources and conflict was taboo. It would risk labeling you as a Communist. But the time I published the book, it was becoming normal. I even heard it on the news. Things have not progressed along an unbroken extrapolation of that trend since then. In stead, we have seen a resurgence of mad conspiracy theories, fake news and callous points of view on global issues.
Compared to earlier work, I have realized that although land, water, oil and similar natural resources are still at the roots of any geopolitical disposition, data is perhaps the most interesting resource right now. For this reason I have decided to widen the scope a bit by trying to look out for international conflict over or with data as well. An experimental addition will be stock and market observations. Also, while I plan regular, short updates that will mainly summarize and link to essential stories, my work will meet higher journalistic standards than they did in 2007 – but the same ecpicurean scientific standards, of course.
I hope you will follow me along by regularly visiting this site, subscribing in RSS (it’s wonderful), via the Twitter account or email alerts.
Best regards,
Benno Hansen