Even while being hammered by rapid climate change, the Arctic has long managed to keep its balance.  “For decades the Arctic was a rare, low-tension region where international cooperation prevailed,” Canada’s Governor General, Mary Simon, said at the Arctic Frontiers conference held at the start of February in Tromsø, Norway. This “Arctic exceptionalism,” as it came to be known, manifested in cooperation over resources and borders, and in smaller ways too. In the Norwegian town of Kirkenes, for