HUMAN MOBILITY AND CLIMATE CHANGE: A REFLECTION ON THE URGENCY OF A CONVERGENCE OF THOUGHT AND JUSTICE
The link between migration and environmental factors is never separated from other aspects such as poverty, denied rights and conflicts. The nexus between the environment and forced movements remains an issue that needs close attention and meticulous monitoring. Indeed, the complex nature of migration does not always allow the extent of environmental displacement to be quantified, especially in cross-border situations.
The World Bank predicts that by 2050 more than 85 million people will be forced to flee in the context of natural disasters and climate change in sub-Saharan Africa, 40 million in South Asia, 17 million in Latin America. A global movement that demands a caring solidarity response.
We are going through a perfect storm: beyond the greenhouse effect and desertification, protracted conflicts in Africa, the Middle East, etc., remain unresolved in general oblivion, exacerbating inequalities and driving more and more people to flee. According to UNHCR’s Global Trend report in 2024 the number of people forced to flee due to conflicts is 120 million, of which more than 50% are women and girls. The number has doubled in the last 10 years. Truly the big lie of war never ceases to fascinate humanity.
Climate-related mobility is a socio-political and humanitarian issue, and should trigger a reflection on balance, a value we rarely worry about. One thing is certain: imbalance generates instability and conflict. The stakes are high: ethical reflection on care, the essence of which is to take life and the environment, the OIKOS we inhabit, to heart, must shake us up. Yet, politics struggles to take care as a deep part of its planning. Everything is reduced to market and power interests.
Climate chaos erodes ecosystem services, affecting people’s daily lives within their own countries, particularly in the tropical or arid belt. Fragile regions like the Sahel and the Horn of Africa, the Lake Chad basin, already ravaged by wars and terrorism. It is from this marginal perspective of disregarded rights that I reflect. Global warming, combined with environmental degradation, generates the escalation of conflicts that are already struggling to find their way to peace. Before reaching the level of severity that forces people to flee across borders, internal exoduses are generated, often from rural to urban areas. I have personally observed this phenomenon in Niger, Kenya, Afghanistan and Somalia. But the same casuistry is observed in Latin America and China.
The term ‘climate refugee’ is often used in the media. However, it is an expression that can be confusing, since it has no basis in international law. A ‘refugee’ is defined as anyone who has crossed international borders and cannot return to his or her country of origin ‘owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion’ (1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees). In certain contexts, the definition is extended to anyone fleeing ‘events that seriously undermine public order’ (1969 OAU Convention; 1984 Cartagena Declaration). There may therefore be situations in which recognition of refugee status under the 1951 Convention applies, for example when drought-related famines are linked to situations marked by armed conflict and violence – an area known as ‘nexus dynamics’.
The UN refugee agency, UNHCR, refers to the ‘climate refugee’ as a person ‘forced to flee in the context of natural disasters and climate change’. In 2019, the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty, Philip Alston, spoke of ‘climate apartheid’ to refer to the burden of inequality that climate change brings. Almost 75 per cent of the costs of global warming will be paid by poor countries, despite the fact that half of their population only generated 10 per cent of global CO2 emissions.
Protecting the climate necessarily becomes an action of care and social justice, because a failed harvest or a dying forest is not only an economic challenge, but a loss of human rights, a risk to the social cohesion of many rural communities and, in the long run, of us all.
We really should be the change we want to see, by taking responsibility for human activities and industrialized countries and investing fearlessly in the long term to build resilience and hope. The path to a binding international climate treaty that can avert the effects of global warming is still long and challenging. There is an urgent need to build a global democracy based on the principles of justice and sustainability. As the environmental activist Vandana Shiva reminds us, the fight for climate justice and the fight for social justice are two declinations of the same battle.
Article by Alessandra Morelli, migration expert and Delegate for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
The article is produced for Cinema e Ambiente Avezzano and financed by the film production company The Factory.