Solidarity Versus Security: Exploring Perspectives on Climate Induced Migration in UN and EU Policy

Abstract

Migration has accelerated at the nexus of global warming and geopolitical unrest in vulnerable regions, challenging the resilience of societies. Forced displacements in the world have increased significantly in the recent decade, and an estimated 22.5 million people have left their homes due to climate change since 2008. Most of this migration has remained internal and regional, but who will move, where and in what numbers in future is still debated. How the relationship between climate change and migration is viewed and described by influential policy making bodies has consequences for what kind of actions that are proposed to deal with the phenomenon and thereby also for the lives of those who are most affected by the negative effects of climate change globally. Is migration considered a problem or a solution, and for whom? Focusing on years during which forced displacement increased significantly, we explore perspectives on climate induced migration in UN and EU official policy documents. The results show that both actors consider climate change as potentially leading to increased cross-border migration. UN perspectives tend to be human security-oriented while the EU perspectives tend to focus on state security. Response measures tend to focus on support to climate adaptation.

Who is the climate‐induced trapped figure?

“…However, the binary representations of order–disorder, where the trapped figure is framed as a challenge and as a human security threat, indicate that the figure feeds into another kind of fear. The securitisation that surrounds the trapped narrative, and other characters born out of the climate change discourse (i.e., the climate refugee and migrant), turns their representation into dangerous and hazardous entities (Brzoska & Fröhlich, 2016; Butros et al, 2021; Hartmann, 2014; Selby et al, 2017; Warner & Boas, 2019). In the case of a moving population, it represents an uncontrollable tide, flood, or wave of Others.…”

“…However, another important consideration sits in the background of this assessment. About a decade into the 2000s, just as the concept of “trapped populations” entered the lexicon of environmental migration, planned relocation would also become a prominent terminology among the international climate policy discourse group (Butros et al, 2021; Eckersley, 2015; McAdam, 2014; UNFCCC, 2010; Warner, 2012). It may be tempting to suggest that the discourse of planned relocation was a “natural” reaction to the attention now being paid to the trapped figure.…”

Governing People on the Move in a Warming World: Framing Climate Change Migration and the Unfccc Task Force on Displacement

“…Yet, only a few studies have considered how different framings might shape global governance (see e.g. Butros et al 2021;Nash 2019).…”

“…This article's contribution is twofold. First, we depart from existing research that has documented the processes leading to the adoption of formal decisions on the relationship between climate change and human mobility (Warner, 2012(Warner, , 2018Hall, 2015;Goodwin-Gill and McAdam 2017;Serdeczny, 2017;Lyster and Burkett 2018;Kälin 2018;Nash 2019;Atapattu, 2020) by shifting focus on to the institution-building and policy development phase of global governance (see Butros et al 2021 for another example). Second, empiricallythrough analysis of the development of the TFDwe identify how different framings of the governance theme help to outline the contours of this new institution of global governance.…”

Environmental Migration: German Experience of Regulation

“…Часто используются институциональный и организационный подходы к вопросу регулирования экологической миграции, например, в работе сотрудника Потсдамского научно-исследовательского института изучения климатических изменений Юлии Блохер, которая анализирует политику ЕС в этом отношении с точки зрения внутриорганизационной структуры (Blocher, 2015). Сотрудники Линчёпингского университета Дениз Бутрос, Вероника Броденберг, Анна Кайзер исследуют перспективы экологической миграции в ООН и ЕС через изучение официальных документов (Butros et al, 2021). Более концептуальными вопросами занимается Лидия Аяме Хираиде из Лондонского университета Голдсмит, которая рассматривает климатических беженцев с фокусом на ЕС (Hiraide, 2022).…”