"Should I stay or should I go now? Conflicting discourses on climate change and human mobility in international climate politics" (Prof. Dr. Angela Oels)

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Climate-related (im)mobility has gained prominence in international climate negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). We ask: How is climate (im)mobility problematized at the last three UN climate conferences COP 27 to 29 (2022-2024) and which forms of governance are enabled? Our theoretical approach is a Foucauldian governmentality analysis. Covering the period up until 2013, we have identified three modes of governing the nexus of climate change and (forced) (im)mobility: migrants as security threats, vulnerable populations in need of protection and adaptive agents in quest of resilience. This paper analyses the competing discourses from 2022 to 2024, highlighting changes over time and the related climate (im)mobility governance. We analyse a sample of key UNFCCC documents, including advocacy documents by relevant actors e.g. International Organisation on Migration (IOM), UN High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR) and the Platform on Disaster Displacement (PDD) intended to influence the negotiation texts.

Moreover, we undertook participant observation and carried out qualitative interviews at the UNFCCC COPs from 2022 to 2024 Our preliminary findings show that there are some continuities and some changes in the discursive landscape. First, the securitizing discourse that frames migrants as a threat to national security has lost importance inside UNFCCC, but continues to persists outside the UNFCCC. Another continuity is the “normalisation” of climate-induced migration and planned relocation as adaptation strategies. The inclusion of migration and planned relocation in national adaptation strategies has been celebrated at COP30 in Belem. The discourse on legal protection has gone rather silent. Instead, there are two new discourses: The establishment of the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD) has reframed the issue of forced (im)mobility as one of loss and damage (L&D). While a right to compensation has been denied to all L&D issues, recent climate litigation cases are trying to change that. Moreover, island states have been advocating for a “right to stay” and adequate financial support for adaptation measures since the very beginning of UNFCCC, rejecting mobility altogether. This discourse has gained visibility within UNFCCC over the last years. We conclude that there is less emphasis on legal protection of displaced persons and more on the right to stay than in earlier decades. The presented research findings are based on joint research undertaken by Alina Kaltenberg, Sarah Haider-Nash and Angela Oels.

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Location: WZU, Room 101 (Building U), Universit?tsstr. 1a (innocube), 86159 Augsburg

Time: 12:00 – 13:00

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