Abstract
The debate over 'environmental refugees' is prominent in the literature on environmental change and human migration. Protagonists in the debate are 'maximilists' and 'minimalists' depending on their support for the concept. This article argues for the use of 'proponents' and 'critics' of the term. A nuanced critique of the 'proponent account' is offered, showing how the 'environmental refugee' is a particular representation of the relationship between environmental change and migration. There are conceptual problems in 'proponent' models, regarding both migration and development. These pertain to a sedentary bias and a reliance on pushpull, neo-classical models of both migration and the migrant. Some accounts are ahistorical and apolitical. The article advocates a research agenda that focuses on the interactions between environmental and nonenvironmental factors in mobility decisions, and that is historically relevant and contextually specific.Keywords: environment, migration, environmental refugee, discourse, representation
Highlights
If we are to understand the polarization of the literature on 'environmental refugees', we require a similar understanding of the changing politics of migration and asylum, during the latter half of the 20th century
In showing how debate in the literature on environmental refugees has been poorly characterized in terms of causation, when really it was about representation, it should not be understood that this article is suggesting that the 'proponent position' is not without conceptual problems of its own
What conclusions can we draw from the literature on environmental refugees and the critique of the 'proponent' position?
Summary
Writings on the relationship between environmental change and human migration often use, as their starting point, reference to the literature on 'environmental refugees' (Suhrke 1994; Castles 2002; Goffman 2006; McNamara 2007; Perch-Nielsen et al 2008; Laczko 2009; Morrissey 2009; Gill 2010; Panda 2010; Bohra-Mishra and Massey 2011; Gemmene 2011). 'maximilist' accounts are effective because, by drawing on the paradoxical notion of the refugee, they can generate allegiances across the political spectrum, uniting groups that are usually at odds, on issues pertaining to immigration and the environment Given this neo-Malthusian conceptualization, it should come as no surprise that were the seminal articles on the topic written by environmentalists, but that such writings occurred during high points of support for environmentalism. Jacobson's piece (1988), which warned of the potential for climate change to drive future human migrations, was published in the same year as the IPCC was established, and Myers and Kent (1995) was commissioned by the Climate Institute (a Washington-based NGO) with the expressed intention of raising the profile of climate change issues (McNamara and Gibson 2009) It appears that the notion of an environmental refugee has been deployed as a means to garner support for environmental protection for some time. One might well ask "What's wrong with trying to protect the environment?" To answer this question, I turn to a brief exploration of the changing political context around issues of asylum and migration, in which the portrayal of asylum seekers and migrants as problems has been an issue of long-standing concern
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