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Falling Through the Gaps: Why climate migrants are not recognised as refugees

Eleanor Meehan

Eleanor Meehan explores why climate migrants are at extreme risk from global warming and why they are falling through the gaps of international asylum law.


According to forecasts from the international think tank Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), up to 1.2 billion people could be displaced globally by 2050, due to the effects of climate change. Still, the term ‘climate refugee’ itself has no legal standing internationally. Why this strange discrepancy exists between the displacement of vulnerable people, and the response of organisations such as the United Nations refugee agency or the International Organisation on Migration, is more complex than first assumed.


The term ‘climate refugee’ has been in use since 1985, when the UN Environment Programme expert Essam El-Hinnawi defined it as people who have been forced to leave their traditional habitat due to sizable environmental disruption or conflict attributed to resource scarcity. Examples fitting this definition in the modern day are unfortunately very easy to come by. From those in Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, travelling across the border into Mexico after devastating hurricanes, to deadly floods in Libya and Pakistan, this form of displacement is most certainly on the rise.


A refugee camp in Syria is ravaged by severe flooding. Image Credit: Salah Darwish via Unsplash


The scale of the issue is beyond anything we have experienced so far. Hundreds of millions of people will be affected, and billions, if not trillions, more in dollars are at risk. As both climate and refugee activists argue, it is imperative that the law be proactive on this issue. To highlight the urgency of protecting displaced peoples, the European Parliament outlined in a 2023 report that “the growing impact of climate change is making certain areas increasingly uninhabitable, making it difficult to return”.


For many, the cause has never been so clear, thanks to the connections between environmental degradation, climate change, and the influx of migrants and refugees, which are so prevalent in the current mainstream narrative. Why is it then that so-called ‘climate refugees’ are still falling through the gaps of international asylum law?


Climate migrant or climate refugee?


As so often is the case in today’s emerging issues, language, and the power it holds, is particularly relevant. In short, labels serve to standardise policy, and so become a political tool. As with many issues surrounding the movement of people, the terminology is an ever-increasingly important, yet blurred, phenomenon which applies significantly when terminology can dictate who deserves protection and who does not.


Isolating environmental or climate-related explanations for mobility is particularly difficult, especially in comparison to humanitarian, political, social, and economic explanations. No clear definition of ‘climate refugee’ exists and this term is not included in the 1951 Refugee Convention. The definition of ‘refugee’ only extends to those who have a justified fear of persecution due to their race, religion, nationality, or membership of a particular social or political group, and who are unable or unwilling to seek protection from their home nations.


Climate refugees are the common outlier here because the climate crisis cannot be identified as a reason for seeking asylum and refugee status. Due to this, the international response to the threat of climate change is too often inadequate, raising the question of whether discriminatory persecution should be used internationally to determine who gains refugee status.


On the other hand, the  International Organisation for Migration argues that “establishing a climate refugee status can lead to a narrow and biased debate and would provide only partial solutions to address the complexity of human mobility and climate change.” The term ‘refugee’, especially in mainstream media and political discourse, has taken on a dichotomy, where it is increasingly being used to describe people as either vulnerable victims with little to no agency or as ‘illegal’ immigrants.


The Mixed Migration Centre has rejected calls for definitions altogether, stating that “the impacts of climate change do not result in new or distinct ‘climate migrants’ or ‘climate refugees’.” This is because all migration is complex and climatic factors are not necessarily the most prominent motivation for those moving within environmental contexts. Instead, the MMC asserts that a more holistic approach be adopted.


What has also become a real sticking point in legislation is that most migration linked with environmental and climate-related factors occurs internally. Therefore, most ‘migrants’ do not cross borders and are not seeking protection from other nations, highlighting perhaps why international protection is not afforded to them.


However, climate refugee advocates have responded that by only recognising the term ‘climate migrant’, we ignore those that would otherwise be recognised under the term ‘refugee’. Although it is true that these two terms are different and should not be conflated, we must be able to do this whilst acknowledging that the effects of the climate crisis on displaced people extend much further than the current definition of ‘migrant’.


It risks forgetting an, albeit small but no less valid, percentage of those who do not fit into this narrow definition of refugee, and who are only going to increase in number. This is not simply an issue that should be measured by immediate harm caused to people and habitats in certain areas of the world but needs to be understood as a crisis with implications for global migration flows.


Rejecting the term 'climate refugee’ because of its definition, or the risk of potentially generalising their experiences, does little to protect those most in need of real policy in action. And this starts with affording them international protection.


What can be done? What should be done?


Legally defining ‘climate refugees’ has been a topic strongly debated on a global scale. What is clear is that the current legal definitions of refugees do not equate to global discussion on climate migration and displacement. For many organisations, activists, and members of the public, the protection of climate refugees, requires a legal definition. Although current policies and legal frameworks go some way to address migration needs arising from environmental factors, professor in Liberal Studies, Cristina-Ioana Dragomir remarks that “the urgency to address climate-induced humanitarian crises shouldn’t be paralysed by the complexities of diplomacy or the fear of potential aftershocks.”


Does the solution lie in reviewing current legal frameworks and working on new international agreements? Said international agreements are known to be routinely reviewed, and so should they also be considering the climate crisis? Dragomir, although accepting that this change will not occur overnight, has championed a multi-layered approach, which she claims will enable long-term and proactive change towards the protection of people most vulnerable to the consequences of climate change. She has further highlighted collective action; championing human rights, and confronting the ongoing and historical actions of those nations which have contributed to both climate and migrant crisis.


In 2023, UN climate expert Ian Fry declared that everyone affected by displacement should have the right to international protection, regardless of the cause, while safeguarding the status of existing refugees. The main aim has always been and should continue to be, preventing the involuntary displacement of people from their homes and countries. We now have the opportunity to, as Dragomir comments, “develop a spectrum of strategies, intertwining migration management, refugee protection, and environmental solutions for those who stay and/or return”.



About The Author: Eleanor Meehan is a master's student studying International Journalism at the University of Stirling, Scotland.

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