Hot issues

This 59th annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission will be just another meeting in a long list of fruitless wrangling and trench fighting. The only thing of substance will be the five-year renewal of the aboriginal whaling quotas. The so-called whaling moratorium will be maintained, though in practice it expired many years ago, and certainly there will be no new sanctuaries established.

The anti-whaling nations have been busily recruiting new members – eager to restore order in the house after relinquishing their majority on one vote in the polarised organisation last year. They did not at all like the passing of the St. Kitts and Nevis Declaration stating that the whaling moratorium is no longer necessary.

With a simple majority once again firmly in place, expect hate resolutions strongly condemning whaling nations for actually engaging in whaling at all and demanding they stop immediately. Such resolutions have been adopted before but they are non-binding and only an expression of a certain point of view.

Japan’s plans to include humpback whales in their scientific whaling program will be highlighted. And since this is the first meeting after Iceland resumed ordinary commercial whale hunting, they may also be in for some attention, but Icelanders are Westerners so they may get away without any really harsh criticism.

Bargaining chip not wanted

What could have been a very hot issue this year is the renewal of the aboriginal whaling quotas, in particular the quota for the United States.

The IWC is a highly polarised, single-issue regime with only whaling on the agenda. Either you are against it or in favour of it. Unlike most other multilateral regimes, it is therefore hard to find something with which to negotiate, something to compromise on. Only a handful of countries have real interests at stake. Simply put, the ordinary horse trading that allows many other international instruments to operate is absent at the IWC.

However, there is one potential major exception. The US is an anti-whaling whaling nation – it hunts whales and is against whaling elsewhere. This is at the outset an irreconcilable and contradictive policy, and has made the US worthy of accusations of double standards and hypocrisy. But this position is perfectly logical and coherent if you look at the interests at stake. This contradiction will continue as long as these very interests are not challenged.

On one hand, the US must promote the whaling interests of Alaska, mainly through securing an aboriginal quota at the IWC. On the other hand the US must satisfy the anti-whaling sentiments of various American animal rights groups. This is done by opposing so-called commercial whaling. Except for the occasional accusation of double standards the US does not have to bear any political or economic costs due to this policy.

In 2002, the US tasted the flavour of their policy, and didn’t enjoy it. A sufficient number of IWC-countries blocked the US bowhead quota at the ordinary annual meeting, pointing out that some Japanese whaling communities were equally worthy of being allocated whaling quotas. The US delegation was told by its politicians to never ever return from any IWC-meeting without a quota to Alaska, no matter what it took. After much wrangling, the US secured the quota at a special meeting held later in the year.

Now it is time for the quota renewal. The US has done its homework. First of all it is hosting this year’s meeting, fully aware that a host’s priorities are rarely neglected. The US has made the pro-whaling nations accept the fallacy and buy into the American propaganda: innocent Alaskans should not be penalised for the behaviour of its own Government.

Those very same pro-whaling nations will, however, accept at the same time that their own innocent, local communities, whether it is Hafnafjordur, Reine or Taiji, should in fact be penalised by the US.

After all the IWC is a meeting of sovereign governments. These should be negotiations at governmental levels, where each and every government is responsible for the consequences of its behaviour, however bad.

What the consequences would be if aboriginal quota was used as a bargaining chip is not evident. Certainly it would rock the boat with strongly worded accusations flying across the tables. But it would also challenge the US power balance, the US whaling policy. The US could very well be forced to make a choice, to find out what should be their first priority:  securing their whaling quota or opposing whaling by other peoples. There is reason to believe that securing the whaling quota would win that competition.

If the US were to secure its quota, it would then have to convince other countries as well. More countries than the US would be needed to meet the requirements of those demanding something in return, e.g. a whaling quota also to them.

National interests take priority in international negotiations. It’s quid for pro, give and take. Either all legitimate quota requests are met or everyone goes home empty handed. When pro-whaling nations refuse to use the only bargaining chip available, it should be no surprise to anyone that the whaling conflict continues, that a solution is not found in the IWC.

However, it is worse. When the US gets what it wants, it shows no gratitude. On the contrary, the US then focuses on its second priority – making life hard for the whalers for the next four years, until it once again must behave a short time to secure the renewal of the whaling quota.

The problem is not the US. The problem is the pro-whaling nations refusing to promote and defend their own interests. After 25 years with putting forward good arguments and sound scientific evidence to no avail, it should be time for them to reconsider their strategy by asking themselves: Is there another way of doing things? Is there another way of promoting and defending our interests? The answers to both are yes.

Hate, not love

Very few people are aware that the US is steadily driving the first large whale to extinction –  the North Atlantic right whale. Only a few hundred of them remain. They are mainly killed by ship strikes and entanglements. Harpoons have not been pointed at them for centuries.

US policy is once more illuminating. It will take an effort to save the North Atlantic right whale, and it may very well be that it is too late. If we again look at the interests, it is understandable that the US government is not doing much. It may have severe economic consequences for cargo ships and thus also an economic cost for the average American.

What the US is doing is limited to taking photographs, register deaths and thinking about ways to do something without too much cost involved.

On the other hand, how can the save-the-whale campaign ignore the fate of the right whale? If avoiding extinction was the basis of this campaign, all and every resources should be spent on the right whale. But they are not. On the contrary, the right whale is left behind.

The likely reason is that it will cost money to save the right whale, a bill that must be paid by the average American. The save-the-whale campaign is fully aware that it is hard to do fundraising, next to impossible, when the only promise to the donors is that they must later also pay the costs for implementing a new policy saving the right whale.

Ignorance of the plight of the North Atlantic right whale demonstrates that all these save-the-whale groups are not guided by love to the whales, but hate for the whalers, Japanese whalers in particular. If they were guided by compassion and love, the future for the right whale would have been bright.

In line with this, the High North Alliance would have some sympathy with the argument that whalers should cease hunting super abundant whale stocks until the-not-having-been-hunted-for-centuries-species, the North Atlantic right whale, is saved, or the time it takes to declare it extinct, gone for ever. Only with this action by the whalers could necessary resources be allocated to the needed North Atlantic right whale?

Boomerang strategy

Not long ago, only about 20 countries cared to attend meetings of the IWC; now about 70 countries put IWC on top of their travel agenda.

The growth of the IWC may serve to revitalise this dead body. The whaling nations keep the IWC alive, but they are about to make the IWC relevant once more.

Without all the proposals submitted by the pro-whaling nations and their active participation in the meeting deliberations, the IWC would steadily slide into oblivion, a state of coma and irrelevancy. The IWC needs help to be buried, not to be resurrected from the living dead.

As a 75 % majority is required to change the IWC, it is relatively easy for the anti-whaling side to block any change, they only need 25 %. While the pro-whaling side has increased, it has only secured a simple majority a couple of times. In return the anti-whaling nations have recruited new members to their camp.

Several new “pro-whaling” countries are not very reliable; several of them have changed side, such as Panama and Belize. This year it is expected that Ortega’s Nicaragua, until now a staunch pro-whaling advocate, will change side, standing shoulder to shoulder with the US in the fight against whaling.

Something about the IWC always remains the same: The IWC is different.