Climate Change and Migration

The topic of climate change and migration attracts a strong following from the media and produces an increase in academic literature and reports from international governmental institutions and NGOs. It poses questions that point to the core of social and environmental developments of the 21st century, such as environmental and climate justice as well as North–South relations. This article examines the main features of the debate and presents a genealogy of the discussion on climate change and migration since the 1980s. It presents an analysis of different framings and lines of argument, such as the securitization of climate change and connections to development studies and adaptation research. This article also presents methodological and conceptual questions, such as how to conceive interactions between migration and climate change. As legal aspects have played a crucial role since the beginning of the debate, different legal strands are considered here, including soft law and policy-oriented approaches. These approaches relate to questions of voluntary or forced migration and safeguarding the rights of environmental migrants. This article introduces theoretical concepts that are prompted by analyzing climate change as an " imaginative resource " and by questioning power relations related to climate-change discourses, politics, and practices. This article recommends a re-politicization of the debate, questions the often victimizing, passive picture of the " drowning " climate-change migrant, and criticizes alarmist voices that can trigger perceived security interests of countries of the Global North. Decolonizing and critical perspectives analyze facets of the debate that have racist, depoliticizing, or naturalizing tendencies or exoticize the " other. "

North Carolina Journal of International Law, 2019

discussing how climate change has a varied impact on migration and spans a broad array of migration choices).

GroJIL, 2019

This article analyses the impacts of climate change which are no longer only within the scientific realm. This analysis reveals the effects of climate change and the challenges that it poses to the current refugee definition and the existing regime of refugee protection in international law. An all-inclusive refugee definition under international law, to include climate change as a Convention ground for people to seek refugee status is argued for herein. Judicial expansion of the definition and the development of soft law principles to cater for climate migrants is also discussed. Nevertheless, it is also noted that there exist numerous challenges in the re-imagination of the concept of forced migration in the face of climate change. Political considerations as well as a lack of State will and consensus on the existence of climate migrants have been the most visible challenges yet.

International Journal of Refugee Law

Despite the reality of climate change, no international agreement or protection framework exists to plan for or address the expected dramatic increase in migration. Current international refugee, environmental, and human rights law does not account for climate change-induced displacement and migration, creating legal gaps in protection. This article explores why these gaps persist and seeks to understand the barriers to a protection framework for climate change migrants. If improved protection is to be achieved, then a typology and assessment of the obstacles such an effort faces is a necessary first step. Accordingly, the analytical focus of this article is on the impediments to protection, including whether and how to define a category of ‘climate change migrants’, a lack of political will to create new protection obligations or expand existing legal regimes, and the national security focus that dominates current climate change and migration discourse. Institutional capacity issues, difficulty linking climate change directly to migration, the causal complexity of climate change, and the limitations of civil society in its climate change advocacy further hinder protection efforts. To advance protection for those displaced or induced to migrate by the effects of climate change, however, the emphasis cannot remain exclusively on obstacles. Climate change presents an opportunity for local decision makers and the international community to plan for impacts, fulfill human rights obligations, and take action on behalf of those who are and will continue to be harmed by climate change. This article concludes by proposing a shift in primary focus from the national security of developed countries to the particular needs of migrant populations, which allows migration to be included in climate change adaptation strategies.

Social Science Research Network, 2020

Introduction Much has been said about the link between climate change and migration. 1 While the exact numbers are disputed, 2 there seems to be a wide consensus that climate change is affecting the process of human mobility, whether as a major 'push-factor' or as a significant contributing element. 3 It is also clear that the scale of this phenomenon will be significantmillions will be relocated, in one way or another. 4 International law will have to provide answers to this emerging phenomenon. To date, the relevant international regulatory framework is patchy and certain gaps seem to exist. 5 Notable gaps include issues such as statehood and finance. 6 It is also not clear who is responsible for the damage caused to climate refugees (the issue of causality still acts as a significant barrier), and affected communities do not have the right to seek refuge in a different country, nor are they allowed to stay there legally, at least not on the basis simply that the effects of climate change have forced them from their homes. 7 This short contribution will open with an evaluation of the development of the international law of climate-induced migration. It will explain that despite notable efforts, a regulatory gap still exists. It will then examine a new strategy, one that in recent years has been employed by communities and civil society organisations wishing to force progress in the fight against climate changethe use of litigation. It seems that at least some of this recent wave of litigation is relevant also in the more specific case of climate-induced migration. 1 See inter alia Jane McAdam (ed.) Climate change and displacement: Multidisciplinary perspectives (OUP 2010), Simon Behrman and Avidan Kent (eds) Climate Refugees: Beyond the legal impasse? (Routledge 2018). 2 See more about the difficulty in estimating the numbers in the context of climate-induced migration in Alex Randall, 'Climate refugees: how many are there? How many will there be?' < http://climatemigration.org.uk/climate-refugees-howmany/>. 3 See inter alia Dina Ionesco et al. The Atlas of Environmental Migration (Routledge 2017). 4 According to a World Bank report, by 2050 the number of climate-induced internally displaced persons alone, in only three regions (Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Latin America) will reach 143 million. Kumari Rigaud et al. Groundswell: Preparing for Internal Climate Migration (The World Bank 2018). See other estimates in Dina Ionesco et al (n 3) 16-17. 5 Avidan Kent and Simon Behrman, Facilitating the resettlement and rights of climate refugees (Routledge 2018). 6 See more in Kent & Behrman (n 5) Chapter 1. 7 Ibid. We will evaluate this new phenomenon and ask whether the use of litigation could be the solution to the longstanding stalemate, and whether some answers will, at last, be provided to the plight of climate refugees. 8 The development of international law in the context of climate-induced migration? The international regulation of climate-induced migration is a relatively new development. Until 2010, the international community was by and large silent on this matter. While climate change was very much at the heart of public debate, the fact that it could lead to mass migration was left untouchedan elephant in the room, whose social and economic implications were almost too big to fathom. In that year, the member states of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) admitted, for the first time, that a problem exists. In the, now iconic, Paragraph 14(f) of COP Decision 1/CP.16, the international community was called on 'to enhance action on adaptation […] by undertaking, inter alia[…] [m]easures to enhance understanding, coordination and cooperation with regard to climate change induced displacement, migration and planned relocation, where appropriate, at the national, regional and international levels'. This unassumingly vague paragraph ignited a process that, 10 years later, has not yet matured into a concrete change in the regulatory framework. Nonetheless there have been important stepping-stones including non-binding declarations such as the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants (2016) and the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration (2018). These are important: they kept the plight of climate refugees at the heart of the political debate, and inspired further action by states and regional frameworks. 9 At the same time, it is important to recognise these declarations for what they are-mere political statements that mostly reconfirmed what many have regarded as obvious: climate change is affecting human mobility, and those displaced by climate-related events will require protection. In normative terms, they simply do not add much to the debate. Other important developments from the previous decade include the adoption of the Nansen Protection Agenda (2015) and the establishment of a UNFCCC-led Taskforce on Displacement (2015). These two steps may provide real utility in the future: the Nansen Protection Agenda 8 The reader should be aware that our use of the term 'climate refugee' is controversial. We explain it at great length in Kent & Behrman (n 5), chapter 2. 9 See for example Beatriz Felipe Perez, 'Climate migration and its inclusion in Mexican legal and political frameworks' in Simon Behrman and Avidan Kent (eds) Climate refugees: global, local and critical approaches (CUP forthcoming).

2021

Climate change and migration are significantly affecting the geopolitics of the 21st century, and although they are still dealt with by common policies as distinct phenomena, they are indeed strongly interrelated and the nature of this relationship is the subject increasing attention both in the academic environment and in international political fora. In fact, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), for example, - which took place in Glasgow, Scotland, on the occasion of COP26 - has established a specific Task Force on Displacement and Mobility driven by the environmental effects of climate change. Given our globalised world, both phenomena require a response at national and international levels, involving state sovereignty, social justice and Human Rights. The aim of this paper, from a climate justice perspective, is to contribute towards the debate on the impact of climate change on migration and on the latter’s possible contribution to adaptation processes in response to the negative effects of the current climate crisis

2017

Climate-induced migrations. Different forms of climate migrations. Climate change and displacement: a brief history. Three scenarios of glimate-induced migrations. Legal aspects of climate-induced migrations. Restraints in setting a framework.

SI Social Sciences, 2020

This special issue explores underrepresented aspects of the political dimensions of global warming. It includes post-and decolonial perspectives on climate-related migration and conflict, intersectional approaches, and climate change politics as a new tool of governance. Its aim is to shed light on the social phenomena associated with anthropogenic climate change. The different contributions aim to uncover its multidimensional and far-reaching political effects, including climate-induced migration movements and climate-related conflicts in different parts of the world. In doing so, the authors critically engage with securitising discourses and resulting anti-migration arguments and policies in the Global North. In this way, they identify and give a voice to alternative and hitherto underrepresented research and policy perspectives. Overall, the special issue aims to contribute to a critical and holistic approach to human mobility and conflict in the context of political and environmental crisis.