This paper is concerned with the question of trying to further the understanding of how different types of shocks and stresses caused by climate change influence different types of migration. The relationship between climate change and migration is currently a topic of great interest as the ongoing “environmental refugee” debate demonstrates. Proponents of the concept of “environmental refugees” argue that climate change will increase the severity and the frequency of extreme weather events, which will in turn cause the displacement of the majority of the population of affected areas. As a consequence, hundreds of millions of “environmental refugees” from vulnerable regions all over the world are expected to seek refuge in wealthier countries.
This approach is potentially misleading for a number of reasons. First, the consequences of changes in climate patterns are diverse, ranging from slow-onset phenomena such as rising sea levels and melting glaciers, to increased extreme events that occur suddenly, and at variable intervals such as tropical cyclones and floods. It is likely that these heterogeneous manifestations of climate change will affect people’s livelihoods in different ways. Second, people might make use of a variety of different coping strategies in response to these different shocks and stresses. It is not clear whether and under what conditions migration is one of them. Third, migration decisions are complex with respect to destination, length of stay, and the profile of migrants. In addition, migration itself is a multi-causal phenomenon, making it difficult to isolate climate change related factors from other factors that cause people to move.
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