While international relations has increasingly begun to recognize the political salience of Indigenous peoples, the related field of security studies has not significantly incorporated Indigenous peoples either theoretically or empirically. This article helps to address this gap by comparing two Arctic Indigenous peoples – Inuit in Canada and Sámi in Norway – as ‘securitizing actors’ within their respective states. It examines how organizations representing Inuit and Sámi each articulate the meaning of security in the circumpolar Arctic region. It finds that Inuit representatives have framed environmental and social challenges as security issues, identifying a conception of Arctic security that emphasizes environmental protection, preservation of cultural identity, and maintenance of Indigenous political autonomy. While there are some similarities between the two, Sámi generally do not employ securitizing language to discuss environmental and social issues, rarely characterizing them as existential issues threatening their survival or wellbeing.

Drawing on securitization theory, this article proposes three factors to explain why Inuit have sought to construct serious challenges in the Arctic as security issues while Sámi have not: ecological differences between the Canadian and Norwegian Arctic regions, and resulting differences in experience of environmental change; the relative degree of social inclusion of Inuit and Sámi within their non-Indigenous majority societies; and geography, particularly the proximity of Norway to Russia, which results in a more robust conception of national security that restricts space for alternative, non-state security discourses. This article thus links recent developments in security studies and international relations with key trends in Indigenous politics, environmental change, and the geopolitics of the Arctic region.