Climate Change, Migration, and Civil Strife
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CLIMATE CHANGE AND HEALTH (C GOLDEN, SECTION EDITOR)
Climate Change, Migration, and Civil Strife Satchit Balsari 1,2
&
Caleb Dresser 1,3 & Jennifer Leaning 2,4
# The Author(s) 2020
Abstract 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 businessas-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 surface mainly in the Sahara. Summary We find that the post–World War II regime designed to receive European migrants has failed to address population movement in the latter half of the twentieth century fueled by economic want, globalization, opening (and then closing) borders, civil strife, and war. Key stakeholders are in favor of using existing instruments to support a series of local, regional, and international arrangements to protect environmental migrants, most of whom will not cross international borders. The proposal for a dedicated UN agency and a new Convention has largely come from academia and NGOs. Migration is now recognized not only as a consequence of instability but as an adaptation strategy to the changing climate. Migration must be anticipated as a certainty, and thereby planned for and supported. Keywords Climate change . Migration . Climate refugees . Adaptation . Civil strife
Introduction Trends in human migration
This article is part of the Topical Collection on Climate Change and Health * Satchit Balsari [email protected] 1
Department of Emergency Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA 02215, USA
2
FXB Center for Health and Human Rights, Harvard University, Boston, MA 02215, USA
3
Climate and Human Health Fellowship, Emergency Department, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA 02215, USA
4
Department of Emergency Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA 02215, USA
People have always been on the move in search of a better life and often simply for survival. Population movements, both voluntary and involuntary, have been of interest to those in power and especially so in the last 400 years, coinciding with the period of great explorations, wars of extensive scale, accelerated population growth, and increased control
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