Paper details

Paper authors	Ilan Kelman
In panel on	Climate Change and Humanitarianism
Paper presenter(s) will be presenting	In-Person / Online

Abstract

Low-lying island communities are often stated as being amongst the most vulnerable places to forced migration linked to climate change which will lead to major humanitarian concerns as the islands disappear and make the islanders become "climate refugees". These discussions make numerous unsupported assumptions and are not always placed within deeper and wider understandings of migration and non-migration. Instead, uncritical notions are frequently repeated of drowning or vanishing islands leading to forced migration and humanitarian crises, despite subtleties, nuances, provisos, and complexities from legal, social, and physical sciences which pervade choices and lack of choices for islander migration and non-migration. The key for analysing climate change, migration, island communities, and humanitarian contexts is about permitting islander control in the form of resources and choices for decision-making. This approach contrasts with assumptions of climate change being an inevitable and sole forcer of population movements. Without denying the major migration-related challenges which climate change could bring to many island communities, more grounded and interdisciplinary discussions are needed.

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