LAUSR

ABSTRACT This paper explores the developments that led to the creation of the Arctic Economic Council (AEC) by the Arctic Council, and its relationship to the larger structures of global investment as represented by the World Economic Forum’s Arctic Investment. It argues that the prioritization of environment, and the construction of a regional “map” based primarily upon environmental cooperation positions development as a lower order problem for regional actors to resolve and leads to a particular positioning of economic activities and networks at the regional scale. What this means for the scale of regional cooperation, especially in light of larger Arctic investment initiatives such as the World Economic Forum’s Arctic Investment Protocol (AIP), will be considered.