Risks of Conflict: Population and Resource Pressures

The Mediterranean has been called many things in its long history: from a cradle of civilization to a cauldron of cultures, the soft underbelly of Europe, and most recently a sink of human-made pollution. In a way its future can be held to encapsulate the prospects for human society as a whole. In this preface I want to pull some of the issues together, and suggest a perspective in which these prospects can be seen and judged. I can think of few greater challenges than the risks of conflict arising from human population increase and pressure on the natural resources on which we all depend.