Climate change and migration: Beyond the myths

Myth-busting was in focus in a recent DIIS seminar which explored how and to what extent climate change leads to migration. For several years now, media reports and policy documents have warned that climate change may lead to transnational, national and regional mass-migration and associated social and political disruption. However, a closer look at the issue reveals a rather different picture.

At the seminar, key speaker Professor Richard Black from the School of Oriental and African Studies at University of London presented four main conclusions from research on the relationship between climate change and migration;

• It is a myth that climate change is a singular, direct cause of mass migration. There is no actual empirical evidence for this, and the numbers sometimes quoted in the media and reports have no factual basis.
• Most people are not moving away from climate change risk – they are moving towards it. For example, the global trend towards urbanization means that more and more people settle in large cities that are typically located by the sea, and therefore at risk of flooding.
• Even if people would like to move away from climate change, they often can’t. To migrate requires resources, and poor people in marginal regions of developing countries are therefore often trapped in areas susceptible to climate risks such as drought and floods.
• Sometimes, climate change may indirectly contribute to individual people’s decision to migrate, as one among many other causes. But when people do migrate, it does not necessarily constitute an economic or social problem – on the contrary, the positive effects of remittances can be substantial.

You can download Professor Richard Black’s presentation here.

The event converged two current DIIS seminar series, namely the “Migration Seminars” and the “New Perspectives on Climate Change” series. For more information, please contact Ninna Nyberg Sørensenand Ian Christoplosrespectively.