Lawyers warn against using term ‘climate refugee’
With so much destruction from this season’s hurricanes in the Caribbean, there are going to be a lot of people on the move — looking to start their lives in new places. We’ve already seen mass movements of people from areas plagued by drought, floods or storms. Many casually refer to these people as “climate refugees.”
But the problem with the term climate refugee starts with the word “refugee.”
“The term refugee has some very serious legal consequences, and it’s a very rigid legal definition. It’s usually an individual determination based on a person’s fear of persecution,” explains Mara Kimmel, an immigration attorney in Anchorage, Alaska.
The legal definition of refugee goes back to the years following the Second World War when the United Na- tions defined a refugee as an individual outside of his or her own country, someone who can’t return because of a well-founded fear of persecution due to race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a social group.
“I don’t think that’s necessarily translatable to a situation where whole communities are being forced to flee and to relocate because of climate change,” says Kimmel.
“The whole idea of refugee is that you can’t rely on your national government to provide that protection,” says attorney Robin Bronen, the executive director of the Alaska Institute for Justice in Anchorage.
“And in the context of climate change, we should expect that our national governments are going to protect us.”
Many countries are already trying to do that, from Pacific island states to the Netherlands. They’re trying to keep people from having to relocate. But, an untold number of people are already on the move due to climate change.
The United Nations estimates that 21.5 million people have been displaced annually since 2008 due to “weather-related, sudden onset hazards,” and that there is “high agreement” among scientists that climate change, along with other drivers, is expected to increase those numbers.
So, if we shouldn’t call these displaced people climate refugees, what should we call them? How should we refer to the phenomenon of having to move because of climate change?
Kimmel says, “I think that the terminology that is increasingly gaining a foothold is ‘climigration.’ ”
Climate plus migration: climigration. It’s a new word for a new problem. Whatever term we end up using, it’s a conversation that needs to be had.