Antarctica

CONTINENT
TABLE OF CONTENTS
WRITTEN BY:
Arthur B. Ford
LAST UPDATED:
9-14-2015
IGY and the Antarctic Treaty
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The importance of coordinating polar science efforts was recognized in

1879 by the International Polar Commission meeting in Hamburg, Ger.,
and thus the 11 participating nations organized the First International
Polar Year of 1882–83. Most work was planned for the better-known
Arctic, and, of the four geomagnetic and meteorologic stations scheduled
for Antarctic regions, only the German station on South Georgia
materialized. The decision was made at that time to organize similar
programs every 50 years. In 1932–33 theSecond International Polar Year
took place, with 34 nations participating, but no expeditions were
mounted to Antarctica.

The development of IGY

The idea for more frequent programs was born in 1950, when it was
proposed that scientists take advantage of increasing technological
developments, interest in polar regions, and, not the least, the maximum
sunspot activity expected in 1957–58. (The earlier, second polar year was
a year of sunspot minimum.) The idea quickly germinated and grew: a
formalized version was adopted by the International Council of Scientific
Unions (ICSU), and in 1952 ICSU appointed a committee that was to
become known as the Comité Spécial de l’Année Géophysique
Internationale (CSAGI) to coordinate IGY planning. Plans widened to
include the scientific study of the whole Earth, and eventually 67 nations
showed interest in joining. Plans were laid for simultaneous observations,
at all angles, of the Sun, weather, the aurora, the magnetic field, the
ionosphere, and cosmic rays. Whereas in the first polar year observations
were confined to ground level and in the second to about 33,000 feet by
balloon, during IGY satellites were to be launched by the United States
and the Soviet Union for exploration of space. Several international data
centres were established to collect all observations and make them freely
available for analysis to scientists of any nation.
SIMILAR TOPICS
 Europe
 Africa
 North America
 Asia
 South America

Two programs, outer space and Antarctica, were especially emphasized

at an ICSU committee meeting in Rome in 1954. Antarctica was
emphasized because very few geophysical studies had yet been made on
the continent, because the south geomagnetic pole focuses auroral and
cosmic-ray activity in the Southern Hemisphere, and because on the eve
of IGY almost half the continent had not yet even been seen by humans.
The First Antarctic Conference was held in Paris in July 1955 to
coordinate plans for expeditions, the advance parties of which were soon
to set sail for the continent. Early tensions, due in part to overlapping
political claims on the continent, were relaxed by the conference
president’s statement that overall aims were to be entirely scientific. Plans
were laid for extensive explorations: 12 nations were to establish more
than 50 overwintering stations on the continent and subantarctic islands;
the first regular aircraft flights to the continent were to be inaugurated (by
the United States); massive tractor traverses were to be run in order to
establish inland stations in West Antarctica (Byrd Station for the United
States), at the south geomagnetic pole (Vostok Station for the Soviet
Union), and the pole of relative inaccessibility (also for the Soviet Union);
and an airlift by giant cargo aircraft was to be established in order to set
up a station at the South Pole itself (Amundsen–Scott Station for the
United States). Several major scientific programs were scheduled for
Antarctica, dealing with the aurora and airglow, cosmic rays,
geomagnetism,glaciology, gravity measurement,
ionospheric physics, meteorology,oceanography, and
seismology. Biology and geology were not primary studies of IGY.
 Coastal bases were established in the summer of 1955–56 and inland
stations the next summer for the official opening of IGY on July 1, 1957.
For 18 months, until the end of IGY on Dec. 31, 1958, a frenzy of activity
not only in Antarctica but all over the world and in space resulted in a
multitude of discoveries that revolutionized concepts of the Earth and its
oceans, landmasses, glaciers, atmosphere, and gravitational and
geomagnetic fields. Perhaps the greatest contribution was the political
moratorium by the governments and the cooperative interchange
between scientists of participating nations.

The Antarctic Treaty

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With the ending of IGY the threat arose that the moratorium too would
end, letting the carefully worked out Antarctic structure collapse into its
pre-IGY chaos. In the fall of 1957 the U.S. Department of State reviewed
its Antarctic policy and sounded out agreements with the 11 other
governments with Antarctic interests. On May 2, 1958, President Dwight
D. Eisenhower issued identical notes to these governments proposing
that a treaty be concluded to ensure a lasting free and peaceful status for
the continent. Preparatory talks by the 12 governments were held in
Washington, D.C., beginning in June 1958 and continuing for more than a
year. A final conference on Antarctica convened in Washington on Oct.
15, 1959. Agreement on the final draft was reached within six weeks of
negotiations, and the Antarctic Treaty was signed on Dec. 1, 1959. With
final ratification by each of the 12 governments
(Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Chile, France, Japan, New
Zealand, Norway, South Africa, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom,
and the United States), the treaty was enacted on June 23, 1961.

T YOUR KNOWLEDGE
rything Earth

The achievement of the Antarctic Treaty was an unprecedented landmark

in political diplomacy: an entire continent was reserved for free and
nonpolitical scientific investigation. Article I of the treaty provides for the
peaceful use of Antarctica; Article II for international cooperation and
freedom of scientific investigation; Article III for free exchange of plans,
scientific results, and personnel; Article IV for the nonrenunciation of prior
claim rights and for the prohibition of new claims and the citation of any
activities during the treaty term as a basis for past or future claims; Article
V for prohibition of nuclear explosions or waste disposal; Article VI for
application of the treaty to all areas south of latitude 60° S, excluding the
high seas, which come under international law; Article VII for open
inspection of any nation’s Antarctic operations by any other nation; Article
XI for reference of disputes to the International Court of Justice if they
cannot be settled by peaceful negotiation or arbitration by involved
parties; and Article XII for a review of the treaty after it has been in force
for 30 years, if such a review is requested by any contracting party.
CONNECT WITH BRITANNICA

As stated in Article IV, the many territorial claims that existed before the
signing of the treaty were not abrogated by signatory nations. Multiple
claims in some regions have never been resolved by international courts,
and a number of countries, including the United States, recognize the
validity of no claims in the absence of permanent habitation and
settlements on the continent. An important provision of the treaty requires
periodic meetings of representatives of signatory nations to take up
occasional problems. Such meetings have agreed upon important
measures for conservation of Antarctic flora and fauna and for the
preservation of historic sites. The granting of consultative status within the
 Antarctic Treaty, permitting full participation in its operation with that of
the original 12 contracting states, began in 1977 with the addition of
Poland, followed by West Germany (1981), and Brazil and India (1983).
Several other nations have also acceded to the treaty and have been
granted partial status.

Post-IGY research

In order to continue and coordinate the international Antarctic scientific

effort in the post-IGY period, ICSU in September 1957 organized
the Special Committee on Antarctic Research, or SCAR. (In 1961 the
word Scientific was substituted for Special.) The foundations for the
committee were laid at its first meeting in The Hague in 1958. SCAR, a
nonpolitical body, coordinates not only research activities in Antarctica
itself but also, through ICSU, those Antarctic programs that relate to
worldwide projects, such as the International Years of the Quiet Sun, the
World Magnetic Survey, the Upper Mantle Project, the International
Biological Program, and the International Hydrological Decade. Member
nations send representatives to periodic meetings of “working groups” for
the various scientific disciplines. International scientific symposia are
organized by SCAR for exchange of latest research results, on a
timetable depending upon progress in the discipline. The great success of
the political venture of the Antarctic Treaty depends in no small way on
the achievements of SCAR and of the scientific and support teams in the
field and laboratory.
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Scientific knowledge of Antarctica has increased steadily. Many important

problems relating to knowledge of the entire Earth are best resolved in
the polar region, such as studying the stratosphere’s apparently
endangeredozone layer. About half the topics of modern polar research
could not even have been guessed at in the early 20th century. At that
time no one could have foreseen the advent of jet aircraft, turbine-
powered helicopters, ski-planes, data-recording machines powered by
radioactive isotopes, and polar-orbiting satellites that automatically collect
meteorologic and upper atmosphere data across the continent and
transmit it to a base collection station. The polar knowledge gained in the
decades during and after IGY have far outweighed that learned in the
preceding millennia. The incredible advances in modern Antarctic science
have only been possible by adapting to polar operation the great
technological advances in aircraft, oceanographic technique, and remote
data acquisition and telemetry systems (unmanned weather stations,
satellite surveillance, and the like). For example, advances in airborne
radio-echo sounding methods now allow routine mapping of Antarctica’s
ice-covered bedrock surface by aircraft, a task that previously required
laborious seismic surveys from tracked vehicles across the ice sheets.

During the period of the Antarctic Treaty there has been a steady growth
in the number and nature of cooperative international scientific projects
(the International Antarctic Glaciological Project, Dry Valley Drilling
Project, Biomass [Biological Investigations of Antarctic Systems and
Stocks], International Weddell Sea Oceanographic Expedition); of the
various SCAR working groups; and, notably, of projects at the interface
of astronomy and atmospheric physics (the International Magnetospheric
Study, Antarctic and Southern Hemisphere Aeronomy Year).

In addition to these internationally supported programs, there have been

major increases in individual national programs, mostly among those
countries with territorial interests in the continent but also among
countries that had not for decades (or never) supported programs there.
This latter group includes Italy, which mounted its first expedition during
1975–76; Uruguay, which made its first land expedition in 1975; Poland,
which established marine and land programs during 1976–77; West
Germany, which first undertook large-scale operations in 1980–81; India,
which began work in the early 1980s; and China, which established its
first station in 1984.

Virtually all the physical sciences are represented in the studies carried
out under these programs, often having direct impact on such disparate
fields as meteoritics and planetary geology, continental drift, geophysics,
astrophysics, meteorology and climate history, or biology and population
studies. The biological programs reflect both the inherent interest of the
Antarctic subjects themselves and the interest elsewhere in the world in
ecology and conservation. The history of Antarctic whaling had made
apparent to scientists the necessity of conserving biological populations,
and the area below 60° S had long contained nature reserves of greater
or lesser extent, but the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic
Marine Living Resources (1982) gave special impetus to the principle.

As noted above, geologic and geophysical studies led to an expectation

that Antarctica probably has a mineral and petroleum potential similar to
that of other continents, though nothing of possible economic interest has
ever been found. Environmental and political concerns over the
commercial exploration and eventual development of such resources if
found led, after six years of arduous negotiations, to the June 1988
signing in New Zealand of a new Convention on the Regulation of
Antarctic Mineral Resource Activities (CRAMRA), also known as the
Wellington Convention, by the representatives of 33 nations. CRAMRA
was designed to manage the exploitation and development of Antarctica’s
nonrenewable resources, a subject not covered under the original 1959
Antarctic Treaty. Several nations soon raised strong objections, and the
convention was short-lived. Ensuing consultative party meetings on the
Antarctic Treaty in Paris (1989) and Chile (1990) overturned the
CRAMRA agreements and called for a complete and permanent ban on
all mineral-resource activities in Antarctica. An October 1991 meeting in
Madrid finalized CRAMRA’s defeat. Article VII of a new Protocol on
Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty states simply, “Any
activity relating to mineral resources, other than scientific research, shall
be prohibited.” The protocol has been accepted by Treaty member
nations. Treaty nations now plan for the protection of Antarctica under
some regime such as a world park. In the United States, for example, the
U.S. Congress proposed the Antarctica World Park and Protection Act of
1990. With the elimination of the threat of mineral resource exploitation,
the regime of an Antarctica World Park seems assured, though many
political hurdles remain for its establishment.