CLIMATE CHANGE AND DISPLACED PEOPLE
It is widely recognised that the effects of climate change will force people to flee their homes on an unprecedented scale. While exact estimates are contested, the UNHCR predicts that in the coming decades, climate change will become the biggest driver of population displacement worldwide. Many of these people will be internally displaced in their home countries, yet some will cross international borders and may need international protection.
This explainer sets out the impact of climate change on forced displacement and the legal protection challenges for those displaced by climate change events.
The impact of climate change on forced displacement
The most recent report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) makes it clear that, on current trajectories, rising sea levels will make many small island states uninhabitable. Droughts and water scarcity will ruin crop productivity in traditionally fertile regions. An increase in floods and the intensity of storms will destroy essential public infrastructure. Australia’s neighbours, the low-lying Pacific atolls of Kiribati and the Marshall Islands, are already suffering the consequences of climate change. However, no legal framework has been developed to deal with this expected mass movement of people.
“Climate refugees” and international law
People displaced by the impacts of climate change do not fall under the narrow definition of ‘refugee’ in the 1951 Refugee Convention. At the time the Convention was adopted, its authors could not have envisioned the impacts of climate change. However, it is now recognised that individuals displaced by climate change may have relevant protection claims under the Refugee Convention. The UNHCR has recognised that the impacts of climate change adversely affect an individual’s enjoyment of human rights and safety, which may lead to a successful claim for refugee protection. For example, an individual in a marginalised group may be discriminated against in the provision of aid after a natural disaster. In reality, the application of the refugee definition and subsequent protection remains narrow and underused.
In 2016, the UN Human Rights Committee (HRC) considered a complaint by Ioane Teitiota, a Kiribati national. Mr Teitiota and his family fled Kiribati due to the effects of climate change and sea level rise which was resulting in land disputes and a housing crisis. The New Zealand government rejected Mr Teitiota’s claim for asylum, so he brought a complaint to the HRC. Mr Teitiota alleged that by removing him to Kiribati, New Zealand would violate his right to life under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), invoking a claim under complementary protection.
Mr Teitiota’s claim was unsuccessful because the HRC determined that the threat to his life was not sufficiently imminent as to trigger New Zealand’s obligations. However, the Committee highlighted that an individual seeking protection from the effects of climate change may trigger non-refoulement obligations where their right to life is imminently threatened. The decision provides precedent for future claims if the individual is able to demonstrate a sufficiently imminent threat to their life because of climate change.
The Refugee Convention and the ICCPR are unlikely to provide adequate legal protection for the increasing numbers of people displaced by climate change. International environmental law, including the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the subsequent Paris Agreement, also fail to adequately address human mobility in the context of climate change.
Steps towards effective action
In 2011, the Nansen Principles were established ‘to guide responses to some of the urgent and complex challenges raised by displacement in the context of climate change and other environmental hazards’. This evolved into the Nansen Initiative in 2012, led by Norway and Switzerland, with a three-year mandate.
The culmination of the Nansen Initiative in 2015 was the Agenda for the Protection of Cross-Border Displaced Persons in the Context of Disasters and Climate Change (‘Protection Agenda’), a non-binding instrument endorsed by 109 states. The Protection Agenda sets out a comprehensive approach to disaster displacement, particularly across international borders, and effective responses for states and other actors to employ.
In May 2016, a successor to the Nansen Initiative was launched – the Platform on Disaster Displacement. This Platform does not seek to establish new international norms, but to support states to implement existing frameworks that are relevant for disaster displaced persons, address protection gaps, and strengthen evidence on the impacts of displacement.
International law is gradually developing to address the protection needs of specific individuals who are displaced by climate change. For now, State-led initiatives, like the Platform on Disaster Displacement, may offer more promising avenues to confront wide-scale displacement and the subsequent protection needs.
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Last updated 2 July 2023