Study Team on Climate-Induced Migration (original) (raw)

Climate Change, Migration and Conflict: Receiving Communities under Pressure

… paper for the transatlantic study team on …, 2010

"Summary: This paper analyzes the likely intersections between climate change, migration and conflict. The paper identifies some of the most relevant factors that might turn environmentally induced migration into a source of conflict and hold major implications for receiving areas. Scientific literature is still inconclusive about the conflict potential of environmentally induced in-migration and the mechanisms potentially linking it to conflict onset. In general, such mechanisms tend to apply more often in cases of conflict induced as opposed to environmentally induced migration. In a possible chain of events leading from environmentally induced migration to conflict in a receiving area, a host of other factors comes into play, including the causes and type of migration and responses to and perceptions of migration. The impacts of current and future climate trends are likely to increase the pressures that trigger environmentally induced distress migration and migration as a means of adaptation to environmental change. At the same time, climatic and non-climatic factors further strain governance capacities and weaken the stability and the natural resource base of receiving communities, thus making it harder for them to respond to migration appropriately. Consequently, governments and donors need to invest in (a) extending the knowledge base, for instance by conducting long-term case studies, and (b) supporting mechanisms for receiving communities in devising migration governance strategies based on this knowledge."

Climate Change, Migration and Violent Conflict: Vulnerabilities, Pathways and Adaptation Strategies

Migration and Development, 2015

It has often been predicted that large numbers of people will be displaced by climate change and that this will lead to violent conflict. At the core of this prediction is a simple causal model which assumes that climate change will result in resource scarcities, which in turn will drive migration as well as violent conflict. Academic research into the links between climate change, migration and conflict has questioned such predictions; their theoretical foundation and empirical support are thin. This does not mean that climate change will be irrelevant for future patterns of migration, including migration that may be linked to violent conflict. However, it has become clear that the links between climate change, migration and conflict are complex and defy simple and sensationalist conclusions. After outlining the state of the art on climate migration and the environment–migration–conflict nexus, this article sketches the environmental, economic and sociopolitical consequences of climate change contributing to migration and the different functions of migration in this context, for instance as an adaptive strategy to environmental change. It then delineates the different theorized pathways from migration to conflict escalation, evaluates their analytical value and develops a more differentiated model of the assumed links between climate change, migration and conflict.

Climate Change, Migration, and Civil Strife

Current Environmental Health Reports, 2020

Purpose of Review In this article, we examine the intersection of human migration and climate change. Growing evidence that changing environmental and climate conditions are triggers for displacement, whether voluntary or forced, adds a powerful argument for profound anticipatory engagement. Recent Findings Climate change is expected to displace vast populations from rural to urban areas, and when life in the urban centers becomes untenable, many will continue their onward migration elsewhere (Wennersten and Robbins 2017; Rigaud et al. 2018). It is now accepted that the changing climate will be a threat multiplier, will exacerbate the need or decision to migrate, and will disproportionately affect large already vulnerable sections of humanity. Worst-case scenario models that assume business-as-usual approaches to climate change predict that nearly one-third of the global population will live in extremely hot (uninhabitable) climates, currently found in less than 1% of the earth’s su...

Navigating Complexity: Climate, Migration, and Conflict in a Changing World

Climate change is expected to contribute to the movement of people through a variety of means. There is also significant concern climate change may influence violent conflict. But our understanding of these dynamics is evolving quickly and sometimes producing surprising results. There are considerable misconceptions about why people move, how many move, and what effects they have. In a discussion paper for USAID’s Office of Conflict Management and Mitigation, the Environmental Change and Security Program presents a guide to this controversial and consequential nexus of global trends. Building off a workshop held at the Wilson Center last year, we provide a background scan of relevant literature and an in-depth analysis of the high-profile cases of Darfur and Syria to discern policy-relevant lessons from the latest research.

The Nexus of Climate Change and Migration

2019

International system has been facing a plethora of challenges since the beginning of the 21st century. Climate change and migration are among the crucial problems threatening the integrity of the system. Moreover, environmental and humanitarian crises have been triggered due to the global and transboundary effects of climate change and migration. This study argues that the nexus of climate change and migration is one great issue that requires the state to adopt a new governance approach to tackle with these problems. In this context, the study focuses on the different terms used in migration literature and the conceptualization of interrelation between migration and climate change with a descriptive method. The study aims to reveal vital problems by examining some hotspots where the migration flows happen as a result of climate change and its impacts. However, the study considers the potential positive effects of migration, as well. It is argued that for the state to respond to the ...

SLOW VIOLENCE OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND, ITS RELATION TO MIGRATION (ESPECIALLY CLIMATE MIGRANTS

The paper investigates the slow violence of climate change and this kind of violence whether affects the migration of the people and generates climate migrants or not. The paper focuses on two case study which is conducted in Kenya and, China and India to find this relationship. According to that, in both studies, these places have experienced slow violence of climate change due to reasons of desertification and water scarcity. The paper is given that these case studies found a correlation between migration and slow violence of climate change. The paper starts with giving some basic definitions such as refugee, asylum seekers, internally displaced persons, and climate migrant. Thereafter, the paper gives the general schema of slow violence to gain a perspective about it. Following, the paper focuses on the slow violence of climate change specifically rather than looking at other types of slow violence such as toxic drift, deforestation, etc. Lastly, the paper concludes that there is a correlation between slow violence and climate change-induced migration by giving two case studies. But, it does not assert that in such a short paper whether slow violence have generated climate migrants or not.

Migration and Conflict in a Global Warming Era: A Political Understanding of Climate Change

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.

Climate, conflict and forced migration

Global Environmental Change

Despite the lack of robust empirical evidence, a growing number of media reports attempt to link climate change to the ongoing violent conflicts in Syria and other parts of the world, as well as to the migration crisis in Europe. Exploiting bilateral data on asylum seeking applications for 157 countries over the period 2006-2015, we assess the determinants of refugee flows using a gravity model which accounts for endogenous selection in order to examine the causal link between climate, conflict and forced migration. Our results indicate that climatic conditions, by affecting drought severity and the likelihood of armed conflict, played a significant role as an explanatory factor for asylum seeking in the period 2011-2015. The effect of climate on conflict occurrence is particularly relevant for countries in Western Asia in the period 2010-2012 during when many countries were undergoing political transformation. This finding suggests that the impact of climate on conflict and asylum seeking flows is limited to specific time period and contexts.

Climate Migration: Adding Fuel to the Ethnocentric Fire

Terrorism and Political Violence, 2022

While conflict, crime, and terrorism are persistent geopolitical and human security threats, climate change can be a threat multiplier, affecting geopolitical stability on local, regional, and global scales. This paper provides a qualitative assessment of the literature and geopolitical trends related to climate change, migration, and ethnocentrism in order to evaluate the current situation and future potentials for climate-driven conflict, crime, terrorism, and ethnocentric extremism. The paper concludes that as climate change becomes a major driver of environmental degradation, natural disasters, mass migrations, and urbanization, this will escalate the impetus for violence against migrants, the exploitation of migrants, and anti-migrant politics. Potential implications in terms of terrorism and extremism are discussed.