Conference “Resources, Environment and Infrastructures between Russia and the Asia-Pacific: Cooperation and Conflicts (18th – 21st cent.)”
On 21-22 February 2019 the cooperative research project “Russia’s North Pacific” held a conference under the title “Resources Environment and Infrastructures between Russia and the Asia-Pacific: Cooperation and Conflicts (18th – 21st cent.)”, which was hosted and co-organized by the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies (HUFS) in Seoul. Joonseo Song (HUFS), Benjamin Beuerle and Sandra Dahlke (German Historical Institute Moscow) as well as Andreas Renner (LMU Munich) formed part of the organizational team.
Ever since Russians established their first settlements in the North Pacific area, their relations and interactions with representatives of other neighbouring countries have been shaped by their trade with as well as their competition for various resources. As has always been the case in human history, resources and a shared environment has served both as a bridge-builder and as bones of contention.
This international and interdisciplinary conference explored historical and contemporary developments of cooperation, trade with and conflict over various resources between Russian actors in the Far East and their counterparts from neighbouring countries in the Asia-Pacific. In particular, the conference paid attention to conflictual and cooperative moments and developments in the realms of
- natural resources
- fossil and renewable energies
- civil and military infrastructures and the respective concepts of order and space
- transportation systems for people, energy and (other) commodities
- environmental knowledge and protection
- industrial facilities and products as well as
- human resources
The conference brought together an interdisciplinary field of scholars from research institutions in South Korea, Russia, China, Japan, the United States, Israel, France and Germany.
Based on results of the conference, a second volume in the new “Russia and the Asia-Pacific” book series (Heidelberg University Publishing) is currently in preparation.
You can find the conference programme here (pdf).