Environment-influenced Human Mobility in Latin America: Narratives of the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM

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Environment-influenced Human Mobility in Latin America

Narratives of the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM

Alistair Keepe – 11033746

Msc Thesis in International Development Studies

Graduate School of Social Sciences

Universiteit van Amsterdam

Supervisor: Dr. Fabio de Castro

Second reader: Dr. Dennis Arnold

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Acknowledgements

First, I would like to thank Dr. Fabio de Castro for his knowledgeable guidance during this project. His substantive knowledge on the Latin American context and his vast academic experience helped me to successfully complete this thesis. This thesis has mostly been written in a period which greatly influenced the world as we know it. The covid-19 pandemic drastically altered my academic path and, as undoubtably many fellow students also experienced, coloured this research. Instead of performing in-the-field research as is customary in the International Development Studies programme, due to travel restrictions Fabio and I had to swiftly come up with a new research design. I thank him for his flexibility and his patience with me during this process.

Secondly, I would like to thank my interviewees who both agreed to an online interview, regardless of the hectic and unpredictable period at hand. Their insights provided me with intellectual guidance and greatly helped me to focus my research.

Thirdly, a special thanks to Eva van der Sleen who was my study advisor during the master’s programme. She made sure to regularly check on me and my progress and to assist me wherever she could.

Last but not least, I would like to thank my parents. They have always lovingly supported me throughout my studies at the University of Amsterdam and in life.

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Abstract

Environmental changes have always been a reason for people to move but due to the effects of climate change, it is becoming an increasingly dominant driver in human mobility patterns around the world. Erratic rain patterns, sea level rise and melting glaciers are amongst the environmental challenges that people are facing today. However, adequate policy measures to effectively address this category of human mobility have remained highly contested. Human mobility is a multi-faceted denominator which consists out of three different concepts: displacement, migration and planned relocation. This thesis investigates how narratives built by the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM to address environment-influenced human mobility resonate in policy making in Latin America. This thesis analyses the discourses of the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM to describe the issue of environmental-influenced human mobility in the last ten years through a framing analysis. From a critical realist perspective, discourse can influence how people perceive their social reality. In particular, frames have the power to select and emphasize aspects of perceived social reality in communication processes which legitimizes (policy) action. The UNEP, UNHCR and IOM frame the issue of environment-influenced human mobility within an adaptation or a protection narrative; they move away from the traditional security narrative. Both narratives are used to highlight particular characteristics of human mobility to legitimize their recommendations for policy action. This research has shown that this predominately relates to the amount of agency that is attributed to people on the move. Actionable policy measures on environment-influenced human mobility, however, have only recently started to materialize in Latin America. In the creation of government policies, significant attention should be paid towards efforts to determine whether people voluntarily migrate, are forcefully displaced or are in need of planned relocation measures.

Key words: environment-influenced human mobility, UNEP, UNHCR, IOM, discourse, framing, critical realism, migration, displacement, planned relocation, adaptation, protection, human mobility policy.

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Table of Figures

Figure 1: Human Mobility. Source: The Advisory Group on Climate Change and Human

Mobility (2014: 3). ... 11

Figure 2: The concept ‘environment-influenced human mobility’. Source: own material and design. Portrayed vertically for page fitting. ... 24

Figure 3: El Corredor Seco Centroamericano [The Central American Dry Corridor] (in Purple). Source: FAO (2016). Translations: Oceáno Pacífico [Pacific Ocean]; Mar Caribe [Caribbean Sea]. ... 59

List of Tables

Table 1: Overview of the three UNSDG-agencies. ... 34

Table 3: Security narrative ... 52

Table 4: Adaptation narrative ... 56

Table 5: Protection narrative ... 64

Table 6: Three different narratives on EIHM in Latin America. Source: Oakes et al. 2019, adjusted by author for use. ... 75

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List of Abbreviations

CCEMA Climate Change, Migration and Environment Alliance

CILLS Permanent Interstate Commission for Drought Control in the Sahel COP Conference of Parties

EIHM Environment-influence human mobility

ENCC Estrategia Nacional de Cambio Climático Honduras GIZ Deustche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit GRGC Regional Network for Risk Management in Central America IASC Inter-Agency Standing Committee

ICCCAD International Centre for Climate Change and Development IDB Inter-American Development Bank

IDMC Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre

IFAD International Fund for Agricultural Development IOM Organisation for Migration

IPCC International Panel on Climate Change

MECC Migration, Environment and Climate Change Division OCHA Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs OHCHR Office of the United Nations High Commissioner SDG Sustainable Development Goal

UN United Nations

UN DESA United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs UNDRR United Nations Disasters Risk Reduction

UNEP United Nations Environment Programme

UNFCCC United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change UNHCR United Nations Refugee Agency

UNICEF United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund UNSDG United Nations Sustainable Development Group

UNU United Nations University WBG World Bank Group

WFP World Food Programme

WIM Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage associated with Climate Change Impacts

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1. Introduction

1.1. Research background and the environmental change-human mobility

nexus

‘Early in 2019, a year before the world shut its borders completely, Jorge A. knew he had to get out of Guatemala. The land was turning against him. For five years, it almost never rained. Then it did rain, and Jorge rushed his last seeds into the ground. The corn sprouted

into healthy green stalks, and there was hope — until, without warning, the river flooded. Jorge waded chest-deep into his fields searching in vain for cobs he could still eat. Soon he

made a last desperate bet, signing away the tin-roof hut where he lived with his wife and three children against a $1,500 advance in okra seed. But after the flood, the rain stopped again, and everything died. Jorge knew then that if he didn’t get out of Guatemala, his family

might die, too.’ (Lustgarten 2020).

Stories of human mobility in the context of environmental change have merited an increasing amount of social and academic attention since the mid-1990s (Thornton et al. 2018: 240). In the last ten years, this issue has also entered international and domestic public policy spaces (idem: 241). The United Nations have engaged this subject in various international agreements, including: the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, where a group of experts presented the latest data on human mobility in the event ‘Human Mobility and the Paris Agreement: What’s Next?’, the inter-governmental Platform on Disasters Displacement’s Agenda for the Protection of Cross-Border Displaced Persons in the Context of Disasters and Climate Change and the United Nations Disaster Risk Reduction’s (UNDRR) Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.

Another influential framework regarding human mobility is the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, in which the United Nations have pledged to ‘cooperate internationally to ensure safe, orderly and regular migration involving full respect for human rights and the humane treatment of migrants regardless of migration status, of refugees and of displaced persons (United Nations 2015: 29). In target 10.7 of the Agenda’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), they operationalized this pledge through indicator 10.7.2: number of countries with migration policies that facilitate orderly safe, regular and responsible migration and mobility

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of people.1_{There are three United Nations Sustainable Development Group (UNSDG)} agencies involved in SDG target 10.7, while spending specific attention on the environmental change-human mobility nexus in Latin America: the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and the International Organisation for Migration (IOM).2_{The UNSDG is a high-level forum for joint policy formation and} decision-making. It guides the United Nations development system to supporting the successful implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.3

Academics, policymakers and politicians have attempted to identify and characterize the people that move in the face of environmental changes, or are unable to move: who are they, why do they move (or not) and what are the consequences of their movement (Thornton et al. 2018: 240)? These questions and a plethora of definitions to describe human movement present implications for the management and governance of human mobility in the context of environmental change and has emerged as a significant concern in policy development (idem: 241). As long as it is unclear who the people that are moving are, or what motivates them, this thesis will use the concept environment-influenced human mobility. I introduce this concept as a neutral ‘umbrella’ concept, which incorporates all aspects of human mobility, unless explicitly clarified. This is dealt with further in section 1.3. ‘academic relevance’.

Latin America is a region vulnerable to many types of environmental change which can influence human mobility. Amongst them are: erratic rain patterns resulting in floods and drought, sea level rise, tropical cyclones and melting glaciers (Kaenzig and Piguet 2014: 155). However, relatively few empirical studies on human mobility related to environmental change have been conducted here (idem: 169). This research will contribute to the body of knowledge on human mobility in the face of environmental change by researching this issue in the Latin American context. It will do so by following a ‘less-travelled (research) path’ (Thornton et al. 2018: 240), which is focused not on the relationship of environmental change and human mobility itself, but on those who take an interest in addressing a multitude of issues associated with human mobility. In particular, this research will analyse how the UNEP, UNHCR and the IOM address this issue. In the context of the UNSDG-framework and EIHM, the main research question is: how do the narratives addressing the environmental change and human mobility 1_{https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/metadata/files/Metadata-10-07-02.pdf}

2_{See chapter three}

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nexus built by UNSDG-agencies resonate in policy making in Latin America? Sub questions of this research are: which narratives do the UNSDG-agencies use to describe the issue? How do the narratives that they use influence policy action recommendations? How does this compare to Latin American government policies?

1.2. Societal relevance: why study human mobility in Latin America?

Human mobility is an engrained phenomenon in historical and contemporary Latin America. The steady flow of migrants heading for the United States, the massive amounts of people fleeing Venezuela or the many internally displaced people due to Colombia’s civil and political unrest have been discussed substantially around the world. There are many reasons for people to move: political turmoil, economic crises or social injustice, to name a few. Currently, slow- and fast-onset environmental changes are increasingly being related to human mobility (Jayawardhan 2017; Nishimura 2015). There is widespread agreement that climate change will lead to an increase in frequency and severity of these environmental changes (Weerasinghe 2014: 11). However, little progress has been made on understanding how the environment influences human mobility and who it will affect the most (Nishimura 2015; Bettini and Andersson 2014). Although several international frameworks have started to address this issue, there is a societal need for new analytical frameworks, more empirical research and innovative governance designs (Bettini and Andersson 2014: 161). Human mobility in relation to environmental changes is predicted by many to become more pressing as climate change continues, but if concerted and targeted action is taken it does not have to become a crisis (Rigaud et al 2018: 181).

1.3. Academic relevance: the concept of environment-influenced human

mobility

In the last decade, academics have increasingly turned to the role of a changing environment in the context of the process of human mobility. A significant amount of academics have endeavoured to quantify human mobility and have questioned how many people will have to leave their homes in the future due to the effects of climate change (Kelman 2019; Rigaud et al. 2018). This question has proved challenging to answer due to the multicausal relationship between environmental change and human mobility; it is difficult to attribute human mobility

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directly to environmental changes (Kelman 2019: 131). Although the nature of this relationship is highly contested, there is a consensus on its multicausal nature (Kelman 2019; Foresight 2011). Attributing the environment to human mobility in a particular context is one challenge, another is attributing a particular type of movement to environmental change. This concerns the question if people move voluntarily or are forced to. Does the amount of agency that people have, influence if we choose to talk about migration, displacement or planned relocation (Ransan-Cooper et al. 2015: 106)?

In order to respect the multicausal context in which the environment influences human mobility, as well as refraining from selecting a particular terminology to describe human mobility which would steer our perception of the amount of agency that people have in the process, this thesis introduces the concept of environment-influenced human mobility (hereafter: EIHM). This concept is visualized in Figure 2 in theoretical framework. Environment-influenced entails that the environment affects human mobility, while leaving room for the intersection of other variables. What is meant by the environment and what constitutes slow- and fast-onset environmental changes is dealt with in the theoretical framework. The term human mobility is used to describe three different types of human movement: migration, displacement and planned relocation.

Figure 1: Human Mobility. Source: The Advisory Group on Climate Change and Human Mobility (2014: 3).

This thesis argues that how the UNSDG-agencies describe the issue of EIHM and which narratives they use, can influence our interpretation of the concept. In the theoretical

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framework, it will introduce three narratives which are used by academics, governments and policymakers to describe human mobility. By researching how these narratives materialize in the discourses of the UNEP, UNHCR and the IOM, this thesis aims to contribute to our understanding of which public narratives on EIHM currently exist and what perspectives on human mobility they entail. In addition, this research is conducted in the geographical region of Latin America since research on EIHM in this region is relatively scarce compared to other areas in the world such as the Horn of Africa, South Asia and the Pacific (Kaenzig and Piguet 2014: 16)

Finally, the base of this research is set in a Foucauldian perspective since this research assumes that the discourse used by the UNSDG-agencies has the power to influence Latin American government policy due to their agenda-setting capabilities. From a Foucauldian perspective, discourse is a way of organising knowledge that constructs social and global relations through the collective understanding of a particular issue (Adams 2017). Discourse is conceptualized by Robert Doherty as ‘a body of ideas, concepts and beliefs that have become established as knowledge, or as an accepted way of looking at the world.’ (Doherty 2007: 194). In addition, discourse can have political intentions and legitimize particular rules and categories which define the criteria for statements to be perceived as reality (ibid.). It has the power of exclusion, where concepts outside of a discourse are not included into collective understanding. The power of discourse, in particular framing, and agenda-setting is further dealt with in the theoretical framework.

1.4. Structure of the thesis

This thesis is structured as follows. First, the theoretical framework is presented. The theoretical framework will include a chronological examination of the development of academic and social understanding on the issue of human mobility related to environmental change. Also, framing theory, the power of discourse and agenda-setting will be addressed. Subsequently, the three main narratives that are used to discuss EIHM are introduced: the security narrative, the adaptation narrative and the protection narrative. Secondly, a methodological justification for this research is provided. This chapter will also provide an in-depth overview of the involvement of the UNSDG-agencies regarding target 10.7 of the SDGs and their role in EIHM. The thesis then moves on to provide an empirical context of environmental issues and human mobility issues in Latin America in the fourth chapter. In this

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chapter, environmental change and human mobility is discussed separately to illustrate the context in which they intersect as the concept of EIHM. Chapter five discusses the results of the framing analysis of the documents published by the UNEP, UNHCR and the IOM. A framing analysis was conducted on these documents to identify which narratives the UNSDG-agencies use, why they use them, and which concepts are linked to these narratives. Chapter five concludes by arguing that the perspective from which the issue of EIHM is approached, can empirically influence how the concept is perceived and which policy measures are deemed adequate. Finally, the conclusions are presented as well as suggestions for further research.

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2. Theoretical Framework

This chapter presents a theoretical framework by first providing a chronological overview of several influential reports and publications in the field of EIHM. This helps to illustrate how the concept has evolved over time in academic and political arenas. Second, framing theory is discussed. Framing theory conveys one important theoretical base for this thesis: discourse is a way of organizing knowledge and structuring social relations (Adams 2017). Finally, this chapter presents three dominant narratives that are used to describe human mobility in the context of environmental change: the security narrative, the adaptation narrative and the protection narrative.

2.1. Evolution of the perceptions on the environmental change-human

mobility nexus

‘Energy has been invested in defining and characterizing [people moving in the context of environmental changes] to identify, locate and categorize this diverse social group, thereby

enabling “solutions” to the “problem”’ (Ransan-Cooper et al. 2015: 106).

This section deals with the way that scholars and policymakers have discussed EIHM for over thirty years. The issues of identifying and categorizing people affected by environmental change and determining the nature of the relationship between environmental change and human mobility are still widely contested today.

2.1.1. The Emergence

A UNEP researcher, named Essam El-Hinnawi, first attempted to provide a generic definition of environmental refugees in 1985: ‘people who have been forced to leave their traditional habitat, temporarily or permanently, because of a marked environmental disruption (…) that jeopardized their existence and/or seriously affected the quality of their life.’ (Bates 2002; El-Hinnawi 1985). This influential definition determined how these people were perceived by social scientists and other actors involved in this issue in the following years (Bates 2002: 466). However, it was also subject to widespread critique due to the broad nature of this generic definition, without any criteria to distinguish environmental refugees from other types of migrants (ibid.).

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It was after the report titled Our biological heritage under siege in November 1989 by Mostafa Tolba, who was the executive director of the UNEP, that many scientists and advocacy group started producing research and literature on this new category of human mobility (idem: 465). In the report, he stated that ‘as many as 50 million people could become environmental refugees due to climate change’ if we did not support sustainable development and lowered our greenhouse gas emissions (Bates 2002; Tolba 1989). He argued that especially people living near coastlines in low-lying developing countries would be affected by rising sea levels due to increasing global temperatures. He specifically names Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia and the Maldives as countries where the expectation is that many people will have to relocate due to rising water levels.

During the 1990s, Norman Myers was one of the most prolific writers on the topic of environmental refugees (Bates 2002: 465). He argued that environmental refugees would become one of the largest groups of involuntary migrants (Bates 2002; Myers 1995). In the publication Environmental Exodus, he stated that in 1995, there were at least 25 million environmental refugees. This compared to 22 million refugees of the ‘traditional kind’ – in other words, refugees that are included under the statues of the UNHCR 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol. In this Convention and its Protocol, refugees are characterized as people who have ‘a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion’ and thus does not include people fleeing environmental hazards (UNHCR 1951: 6). Myers stated that if global warming did not stop, by 2010 we could have reached 50 million environmental refugees – eventually growing to 200 million worldwide (Myers 1995: 1). In addition, he predicted that water shortages, deforestation, desertification and an increase in extreme weather events would lead to the sharp increase in environmental refugees over the years (idem: 3). 25 years later, Hein de Haas, a leading expert in the field of development and human migration, critiqued Myers by stating that ‘Myers drew a direct, but simplistic, link between environmental change and large-scale migration’ (de Haas 2020). As further discussed later, the relationship between environmental changes and human mobility, such as large-scale migration patterns, is relatively complex due to the influence of political, economic, social and demographic variables. Nevertheless, in 1998, the UNHCR attempted to create a framework to address environmental displacement in ‘The Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement (Jayawardhan 2017;

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UNHCR 1998). These principles contained a broad definition of internally displaced persons ‘which includes those fleeing man-made or natural disasters.’ (ibid.) Due to this broad definition however, it proved difficult to enforce accountability from states to adhere to these principles (Jayawardhan 2017: 110).

In conclusion, during this period, academics first started discussing the relationship between environmental change and human mobility. The concept of ‘climate’ or ‘environmental’ refugee emerged and was widely adopted by social and academic actors who engaged in the exploration of this issue. The concept was relatively young and contestation concerning the terminology was limited. Research mostly focused on the characterization of natural events that could influence human mobility, instead of debating the classification of ‘refugee’ (Myers 1995: 37). The first linkages between climate change, environmental degradation and human migration were being made in a relatively simplistic way – not taking other variables into account which could influence their relationship (Bates 2002: 466). Drawing such a direct and causal link removed the political dimension of this social issue since environmental and climatic changes are portrayed as something beyond the control of governments (de Haas 2020). Therefore, the subject at first had a comparatively a-political nature – this would change later.

2.1.2. The Problematization

In the early 2000s, academics started to problematize the concept ‘environmental refugee’. One of the main arguments was that the concept of environmental refugee is too broad: such a large amount of people could now be classified as an environmental refugee that critics started to question the usefulness of the concept. In addition, researchers and academics started to resist the term refugee since environmental stressors are not included within the 1951 United Nations Convention on Refugees and its 1967 amendment Protocol, as described in the previous section. Another point of criticism was that research had a strong regional bias towards Africa and Asia - neglecting other parts of the world (Bates 2002: 466).

In 2002, Diane Bates argued the need for a clearer conceptualization of environmental refugees. A conceptual distinction between voluntary migrants and refugees needed to be made (Bates 2002: 467). If an individual or household actively chooses or decides to relocate, this implies that they have done so relatively voluntarily. Categorizing people who migrate due to

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environmental stressors as ‘refugees’ implies that people are being forced to relocate, thus not enjoying any type of agency. Narrowing down the concept provides increased theoretical power by making a distinction between forced and voluntary environmental migration (ibid.). However, the distinction between voluntary and forced movement is somewhat arbitrary and has been described more accurately as a spectrum between completely voluntary and completely forced (Oakes et al. 2019: 286). Often, the motivation for people to become mobile is very complicated and is formed within local political, social, economic, demographic and environmental contexts. In addition, people can feel forced to migrate because they expect incoming environmental hazards and feel that they are forced to leave before a disaster occurs. This process is different compared to when people leave after the disaster has occurred. Nonetheless, both decisions can be seen as involuntary migration because in both situations, they did not have a realistic choice; at some point, they would have had to leave. Therefore, it is difficult to classify the types of (in)voluntary migration; environmental changes and resulting migration are interwoven with the underlying context of a country or region. This makes it difficult to prove causality and pinpoint the exact drivers behind migration (Bates 2002: 475). Although academics started to question the ‘environmental refugee’ terminology, in 2005, the UNEP together with the United Nations University (UNU) issued a warning which stated that by 2010, there would be 50 million environmental refugees worldwide. In this warning, their predictions were the same as Myers’ in 1995 – despite academic debate regarding the predictions and conceptual accuracy of the report. The media widely picked up on this forecast. Years later however, when the predictions failed to materialize, the UNEP distanced itself from this warning (Bojanowski 2011; de Haas 2020). Since the numbers overlap, it is likely that Norman Myers’ publication was at the foundation of the claim of the UNEP, even though these predictions were seen as controversial in the academic community. Early predictions simply looked at the number of people that lived in areas potentially affected by climate change and assumed that they would have to flee regardless of their ability to cope with, and adapt to, environmental changes. In reality, this has proven to not be that simple (Bojanowski 2011). After a report in 2007 by Sir Nicholas Stern, who is a British economist, the amount of attention towards environmentally motivated mass migration surged (Piguet 2013: 153). In this influential report titled The Economics of Climate Change, Stern stated that ‘Greater resource scarcity, desertification, risks of droughts and floods, and rising sea levels could drive many millions of people to migrate’ (Piguet 2013; Stern 2007). Many non-governmental

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organizations brought out alarming reports hereafter. One example is a report by Christian Aid in 2007, titled Human Tide: The Real Migration Crisis. In this report, the writers predict that if current trends continue, one billion people would be forced to leave their homes due to the effects of climate change. They argued that forced migration would be the biggest challenge for poor people in developing countries. In this report, an alarmist discourse is used; huge numbers are attributed to the environmental change and human mobility nexus (Piguet 2013: 154).

In the same year as the report by Nicholas Stern and the Christian Aid publication, the IOM developed a working definition of the concept ‘environmental migrant’: ‘Environmental migrants are persons or groups of persons who, for compelling reasons of sudden or progressive change in the environment that adversely affects their lives or living conditions, are obliged to leave their habitual homes, or choose to do so, either temporarily or permanently, and who move either within their country or abroad.’ (IOM 2007). With this definition, they aimed to describe environmental migrants as people who move either temporary or permanent, internal or cross-border, voluntary or forced, or due to sudden or gradual environmental change. The IOM developed this definition because they wanted to offer an alternative to the regularly adopted term ‘environmental refugee’. Another reason for this new definition is that most environmental migration tends to be internally instead of between countries (Laczko and Aghazarm 2009: 18); a refugee is someone who crosses borders.

While the issue of defining people who move in the context of environmental change was widely debated in this period, the first attempts were also being made at establishing the nature of the complex relationship between environmental change and human mobility. Some scholars assumed that the environment is a primary factor for migration. As described earlier, those scholars often used the concept ‘environmental refugee’ (Piguet 2008: 376). The usage of this concept suggests that people migrate when the environmental conditions force them to. However, Etienne Piguet found that many other considerations influence the decision to migrate due to environmental stressors by conducting a research which looked into mediating variables in the relationship between climate change and migration. Such considerations include relative wealth, age and employment status. In addition, people can either choose to migrate permanently or temporary. This also depends on the reason behind displacement; if it is due to fast-onset disaster displacement, people are more likely to return to their homes than

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if migration is a result of slow-onset changes in the environment. In that case, people might be forced away permanently or until conditions improve (idem: 390).

2.1.3. Consolidation

From 2010, the number of national and international organizations and policymakers which engaged the subject of EIHM increased. In this period, research and literature on EIHM expanded rapidly. Also, in the policy context, the amount of attention towards the issue surged (Thornton et al. 2018: 240).

The Cancun Adaptation Framework was founded in 2010 and is the first text on migration, displacement and planned relocation within the UNFCCC climate negotiations in its sixteenth Conference Of Parties (COP) (Warner 2012: 1061). Each year since 1995, the UNFCCC hosts a COP in which all Party States convene to discuss the specifics of the Convention on Climate Change which entered into force on 21 March 1994 and included the ratification of 194 countries. The original mission of the Convention is to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations and limit humans’ effect on climate change. The detrimental effects of climate change on humans are also examined during the COPs (UNFCCC 2021). In the Cancun Adaptation Framework, human migration, displacement and planned relocation were framed within a wider adaptation framework concerning the consequences of climate change (Warner 2012: 1061). In the Framework, state parties argued that climate change adaptation must be given the same priority as mitigation and that international cooperation was needed to do so (McAdam 2014: 13). The Cancun Adaptation Framework became a predecessor for other frameworks in the following years (ibid.).

In 2012, the Nansen Initiative on Disasters-Induced Cross-border Displacement was launched by the Swiss and Norwegian governments (idem: 18). The Initiative was created to develop a guide intended to aid in the discussion of cross-border displacement in the context of the effects of climate change and disasters (McAdam 2016: 1518). The Initiative attempted to develop an internationally respected guide in which a consensus on the key principles and elements regarding the protection of cross-border displaced persons in the context of natural disasters was build (McAdam 2014: 18). Its aim was to achieve international cooperation and operational responses to the issue of cross-border displacement through an agenda for future domestic, regional and international action (ibid.). In 2015, the Nansen Initiative was replaced

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by the Platform on Disaster Displacement, which is a follow-up project still operating today. Just like the Initiative, the Platform aims to create better protection policies for people displaced across borders in the context of disasters and climate change (McAdam 2016: 1520).

During the nineteenth COP in Warsaw in 2013, the UNFCCC established the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage associated with Climate Change Impacts (WIM). The WIM addresses economic and non-economic losses and damages resulting from the effects of slow-onset environmental changes and extreme (fast-onset) environmental events. In the WIM framework, slow-onset environmental changes include rising temperatures, desertification, salinization, sea level rise, loss of biodiversity, land and forest degradation, ocean acidification and glacial retreat. Fast-onset extreme environmental events include drought, heatwaves, floods, storm surges and tropical cyclones (UNFCCC 2020). For the remainder of this thesis, these indicators for environmental change will be used to discuss slow- and fast-onset environmental changes. These indicators have been selected because this research focuses on three UNSDG-agencies which operate within the UNFCCC framework and the Sustainable Development Goals – further explained in the next paragraphs.

The WIM promotes knowledge and understanding of risk management approaches to address the effects of climate change such as extreme events and slow-onset impacts. Also, it aims to strengthen dialogue and coordination amongst relevant stakeholders. In 2014, it initially developed a two-year working plan with nine Action Areas. In Action Area 6, explicit attention was awarded to ‘migration, displacement and human mobility’. Eventually, this workplan converted to a Five Year Rolling Workplan at the 22nd_{COP (ibid.). But, before moving on to} this COP in 2016, the 21st_{COP in Paris needs addressing, along with two other influential new} frameworks raised in 2015.

The 21st_{COP, held in December 2015, led to the adoption of the Paris Agreement on climate} change. This is the first binding and universal agreement with the goal to keep global average temperature rise below 2 degrees centigrade above pre-industrial levels. The Paris Agreement specifically referred to human mobility and the need for respecting and promoting the rights of migrants. The Agreement also included a mandate to establish the Task Force on Displacement. This task force was evoked under the auspices of the WIM and is responsible for the development of recommendations for integrated approaches to avert, minimize and address

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displacement related to the impacts of climate change (McAdam 2016; UNFCCC 2015). The Task Force was established in order to ‘transform the information-oriented agenda of Cancun into an action-oriented agenda’ (McAdam 2016: 1529) by creating an opportunity to feed migration issues into national plans (McAdam 2016; Kälin and Clements 2015).

Other important international frameworks that were constructed in 2015 regarding the issue of EIHM are the Sendai Framework on Disaster Risk Reduction and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development with its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. The 2030 Agenda is a plan of action to stimulate global endeavours to improve the lives of the people on this planet and the health of the planet itself.4_{The Agenda was introduced in the introduction in order to} justify the relationship between the three UNSDG-agencies and the issue of EIHM.The Sendai Framework on Disaster Risk Reduction was adopted in March 2015 as a result of the concerted efforts of several Nansen Initiative Steering Group member states (McAdam 2016: 1528). It discusses human mobility in the context of disasters and is a fifteen-year, non-binding- agreement (ibid.). This framework argued that displacement is one of the most pressing issues resulting from disasters (General Assembly 2015). Although it was an authoritative agreement in the United Nations framework, it did lack legal power due to its non-binding nature. Furthermore, the 22nd_{COP was co-organized by the IOM and included several facets of climate} change related human mobility. Countries approved a five-year workplan under the WIM, which is meant to address topics such as slow-onset impacts of climate change and migration. Moving forward to the most recent and 25th_{COP in Madrid, the IOM stated that in the last} decade, issues of human mobility and migration have increasingly been considered in the annual COP meetings and the UNFCCC framework in general. Migration is now an institutionalized item on the agenda.

This institutionalization of human mobility in relation to environmental changes was further consolidated in the international arena by the release of an influential report by the World Bank Group (WBG). In 2018, the WBG released the Groundswell: Preparing for Internal Climate Migration report, which has been quoted widely by media. This report attempts to map out how many people will be pushed to migrate internally by 2050. It focuses on three regions: Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Latin America. It projects that without appropriate climate

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and development action and policies, around 143 million people could become internally displaced, of which 17 million in Latin America (Rigaud et al. 2018: xix).The report projects that there will be several ‘out-migration’ hotspots. These hotspots are places which are compromised the most by climate change impacts and thus will be abandoned by people that rely on these areas for their livelihoods. On the other hand, there will also be climate ‘in-migration’ hotspots. The Groundswell report names the central plateaus surrounding Mexico City and Guatemala City as examples (idem: xxii). Regarding urban hotspots like these, they predict that urban and peri-urban areas will need to prepare for a heavy influx of people in the near future. The report states that if policymakers are able to manage this influx, ‘in-migration’ could create positive economic momentum (ibid.). In this sense, migration is framed by the report as an opportunity. Furthermore, the writers argue that migration could be a sensible climate change adaptation strategy if supported by good development policies and investments (idem: xxiv). Skill training programs, job creation programs and policies to safeguard people on the move are examples of possible positive policies. The report concludes with a positive note. If we are able to anticipate climate-induced migration and act accordingly, an increase in climate-induced migration does not have to become a crisis. To do so successfully, more research into this area is needed in the future.

Currently, social and academic debate on both methodological practices and theoretical definitions of climate-induced migration persists, also after this influential report (Kelman 2019: 1). Migration in relation to climate change remains a contested issue. Attributing climate change to human mobility is challenging due to the multicausal nature of the relationship (ibid.). But the question of attribution is developing:

‘See, in the past, until this year, one of the big issues discussing climate migrants, or climate-induced displacement, was attributing the migrant to climate change (…). In 2020, we are seeing attributable impacts of climate change. In fact right now, if you look at the wildfires in California and Oregon, 500.000 people have been displaced already. Many of them won’t be able to go back to their homes because their homes have burned. And those super wildfires

are attributable to human induced climate change because we have already increased the global atmospheric temperature by well over 1 degrees C, because of human emissions.’

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The effects of climate change are becoming increasingly clear. But still, various other factors potentially come into play in the relationship between climate-change-influenced environmental changes and human mobility. This is visualized in the figure below. In line with the quote above, I have also included forest fires as a fast-onset event. Moreover, the environmental change-human mobility nexus is a highly context-specific relationship – different for each region or area.

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Figure 2: The concept ‘environment-influenced human mobility’. Source: own material and design. Portrayed vertically for page fitting.

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To conclude this part of the theoretical framework, many aspects of the issue of EIHM have been – and still are – debated by academics and professionals. When the issue first emerged, the terminology of ‘environmental refugee’ was adopted and was relatively uncontested. Academics presumed that if climate change did not stop, the future would witness massive amounts of people fleeing their homes due to environmental changes. Later, approximately from the 2000s forward, academics started to problematize the concept of ‘environmental refugee’ because it did not hold any legal weight under the Refugee Convention, and it was a relatively uncomplicated concept for a highly complex issue. Also, academics questioned the relationship between environmental changes and human mobility. This developed further in the last decade and remains a contested issue today. Especially during this period, there has been an interplay between academic research and (mostly international) policy debates. As research on this topic intensified and the issue became more consolidated in the academic arena, so did a notion of relevance amongst policymakers grow. Regarding international policy, several international frameworks have been developed in order to address the issue of EIHM. However, these frameworks often lack the capability to legally enforce their principles upon local governments. Their potential lies within the possibility to create international narratives regarding EIHM which local governments may incorporate and use in their own policies (Gardner 1972: 238).

2.2. The importance of discourse in the environmental change-human

mobility nexus

This section will help to clarify the relation between discourse and framing, and policy making. A Foucauldian philosophical perspective, which forms the theoretical base of this research, helps to characterize this relationship. In addition, ‘policy making does not take place in a vacuum, where the government is in total control of its agenda’ (Hallsworth et al. 2011: 6). Therefore, the role of the UNSDG-agencies as agenda setters is also elaborated on.

2.2.1. Framing and policy making

As mentioned in the introduction, this research adopts a Foucauldian perspective on knowledge production. According to Foucault, our perception of ‘truth’ is dependent on the dominant discourse at a certain point in history (Jørgensen and Philips 2002: 13). Truth can therefore be

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fluid and relates to the context in which an issue such as EIHM is understood. Both academic and political knowledge are produced within a specific intellectual environment (Hallahan 1999: 219). Examples of such environments are organizational structures or academic schools of thought (Thoss 2016: 15). Depending on the environment, particular ideas, beliefs and responsibilities are highlighted and attributed to an issue (ibid.). These environments influence which aspects of a phenomenon are highlighted – thus steering our understanding of an issue. This type of reasoning is part of a ‘critical realism’ perspective (Bryman 2012; Fairclough 2005). Critical realism argues that the natural world exists independently of our knowledge (Fairclough 2005: 922). The social world, however, is socially constructed (ibid.). In this world, discourse (including frames) can influence how people perceive their reality (idem: 916). Frames have the power to highlight some forms of action as logical while others are portrayed as undesirable or impossible (Entman 1993: 52). Framing means selecting and emphasizing some aspects of perceived reality in communication processes (Hallahan 1999: 207). On the contrary, parts that are excluded from these communication processes are framed as irrelevant and therefore unlikely to be addressed (ibid.). Hence, frames organise central ideas of a complex issue, highlighting certain dimensions with greater apparent relevance than others (Ransan-Cooper et al. 2015; Nisbert 2010). A framing approach focuses on the process and context in which a particular issue is problematized and in turn is mobilized to become the basis for decision-making (Ransan-Cooper et al. 2015: 107).

According to Major, ‘framing plays a crucial role in how policymakers view issues by focusing on certain aspects of a social issue in public discourse’ (2018: 52). Hence, policymakers and the policies they create, are influenced by the intellectual environments in which they are positioned. Frames define problems, who is to blame, and identify possible solutions (ibid.). This research aims to understand under what conditions which aspects of EIHM are deemed most important in the framework of the UNSDG-agencies in the context of Latin America. Therefore, a framing analysis is a useful theoretical tool5_{to analyse the narratives that the} UNSDG-agencies use to discuss EIHM and how, in turn, knowledge is produced through these narratives.

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In public debates, framing can be used as a strategic instrument to create salience for certain issues (Meiläinen 2014: 34). Through framing, actors attempt to actively generate information and spark public interest for the subjects that they prioritize. The prioritization of subjects is related to the concept of agenda setting. Agenda setting concerns the process of raising issues into salience amongst particular actors (Livingston 1992: 313). Examples of actors who have the power to influence agenda setting are the media, the public and organizations (Meiläinen 2014: 33). Although all actors can exert power in different ways and through different channels, this thesis focuses on the UNSDG-agencies specifically since, as inter-governmental organizations, they have great power to act as ‘a catalyst for affirmative change’ (Meiläinen 2014; Crable and Vibert 1985).

The UNEP, the UNHCR and the IOM do not have mandates which enables them to directly intervene in countries through the implementation of policy measures (Coate and Puchala 1990: 127). Instead, their power comes from their ability to influence global agendas by formulating resolutions, plans of action, declarations, conventions and treaties (ibid.). The 2030 Agenda is a contemporary example. The aim of the 2030 Agenda is to provide a plan of action for ‘people, planet and prosperity’. The United Nations developed this agenda but is dependent on governments and organizations to implement it into their governance and organizational structures, respectively. The academic, the private, and the public sector all have a role to play in the achievement of these goals (Macht et al. 2020: 920). As seen in the introduction, target 10.7 of the Agenda concerns the implementation of sound migration policies in order to facilitate safe and orderly migration and mobility. Through their narratives and their agenda-setting capabilities, the UNSDG-agencies can influence how national governments and policymakers approach this target and what policy measures are deemed suitable.

In conclusion, the environmental change-human mobility nexus is a multi-faceted issue which is highly context specific and, as seen in figure 2, is subject to many intervening variables. As described above, framing can emphasize specific aspects of this issue, depending on the motivation of the ‘framer’ (i.e., actor). Although the UNSDG-agencies operate within the framework of the United Nations and the 2030 Agenda, they have different mandates. These mandates influence their priorities and presumably the way that they

approach the issue of EIHM. This is further dealt with in chapter three. Furthermore, this research analyses how the narratives built by the UNSDG-agencies resonate in Latin

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American countries’ government policies. The next section examines the different narratives that the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM use to frame the issue of EIHM.

2.3. Three narratives on EIHM

‘Numerous terms have been used to describe people who move as a result of environmental and climate change’ (Oakes et al. 2020: 284).

Three main narratives on human mobility in context of environmental changes have emerged in the academic arena, the media and policy circles: human mobility is either related to a potential threat to security, an opportunity to adapt and cope with environmental changes, or an issue that requires protection measures (Oakes et al. 2020; Nishimura 2015). This chapter will further explain what these narratives entail by first presenting the security framework, secondly the adaptation framework and third the protection framework. The analysis in chapter five will examine in what way the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM use these narratives to present their perspectives on EIHM in the context of Latin America.

2.3.1. Security threats

First, the security framework is discussed. Human mobility, either cross-border (i.e., international) or in-country (i.e., internal), is often portrayed as a potential security risk in debates on migration in general (Nishimura 2015: 120). According to Nishimura, placing (environmental) migration in a human security framework provides migrant-receiving states with an opportunity to justify national security responses (ibid.). Such responses are likely to lead to a militarization of the issue (ibid.).

This form of securitization regarding human mobility in the context of environmental changes can be seen on the global, regional, national and sub-national levels. People who move in relation to environmental changes are often characterized as potential threats to national security (Ransan-Cooper et al. 2015: 110). They are framed as ‘security threats’ since a possibility of violence and environmental conflict resulting from people moving in context of environmental changes is attributed to them (Nishimura 2015: 120). Linkages between environmental issues such a drought or land degradation and violent conflict are common within this narrative.

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An issue that arises from framing people within a security narrative, is that they are consequently portrayed as the ‘other’ (Burrows and Kinney 2016: 451). Conflict and violence in the form of discrimination and exclusion is encouraged through this depiction. Also considering socioeconomic tensions, the idea of ‘the other’ is potentially harmful (ibid.). Incoming migrants often compete with locals on the labour market. The notion that other, non-local, people present a threat to local job opportunities, amplifies the negative image of this group of people. Examples of such tensions are commonly found in areas with rural to urban migration patterns. Urban workers perceive peasants as threats when these peasants start to compete over jobs similar to those of urban workers on the labour market (ibid.).

The security framework, therefore, revolves around a negative image of EIHM (Nishimura 2015: 121). It is not to say that human mobility is the sole reason for conflict, but within this narrative it is viewed as a potential factor for social tensions. Although this framework has been incorporated widely in migration debates globally, for example by extremist right-wing politicians who oppose immigration in general, it is subject to heavy criticism from academics and practitioners in the field of migration (Burrows and Kinney 2016; Nishimura 2015). Framing EIHM as a security threat foremost, can lead to a hinder of protection efforts and naturalize the external political, economic, social, demographic and environmental factors that contribute to human mobility (idem: 121). Government policies that are developed from a security perspective will attempt to prevent migrants from entering the borders instead of accommodating a smooth transition for these people into the national labour force if, and more likely when, they do enter.

2.3.2. Adaptation opportunities

In contrary to the security perspective, the EIHM as adaptation opportunity narrative offers a more positive view on the environmental change-human mobility nexus (Oakes et al. 2019: 292). The security framework is popular in social and political discourse, and policymakers often view climate change adaptation measures as a way to limit high numbers of people on the move and reduce pressures resulting from this movement. However, there is a growing consensus amongst scholars that human mobility itself can be a positive adaptation measure in the context of environmental change (Gemenne and Blocher 2016: 2).

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The International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) defines adaptation as ‘in human systems, the process of adjustment to actual or expected climate and its effects, which seeks to moderate harm or exploit beneficial opportunities’ (IPCC 2014). In the adaptation narrative, human mobility is often understood as a risk-management strategy adopted by households (Gemenne and Blocher 2016: 2). In particular amongst rural households, who are highly dependent on natural resources for their survival, internal and international migration can serve as a diversification strategy and informal insurance (Gemenne and Blocher 2016: 5). For example, in the face of soil and land degradation, where it becomes more difficult to reap enough economic benefits from a part of land, a household that is dependent on this land can decide to use migration as an adaptation strategy. One member can move, either internally or cross-border, to a more suitable area for work and send back remittances – benefitting the entire household (idem: 7). So, even though people on the move due to environmental stressors might often be portrayed as victims, evidence has shown that mobility is a common household livelihood strategy to support basic needs (Gemenne and Blocher 2016; Piguet 2013).

However, this narrative has also been critiqued for ignoring political and economic realities which shape the possibilities for people to adapt (Oakes et al. 2019: 285). In addition, according to critics the adaptation narrative often portrays an overly positive picture of migrants’ realities. Moving might may reduce vulnerabilities in the short-term but could have detrimental effects in the long-term (ibid.). This is called maladaptation. Adaptation measures that are taken in order to escape one precarious situation, can lead to other vulnerable situations; for the migrant, the home community or the host community (Gemenne and Blocher 2016 II: 2). A security framework will likely emphasize these issues.

‘Adaptation for who’ is another critical note that has been placed by this narrative (de Haas 2020; Oakes et al. 2019; Burrows and Kinney 2016) In the face of environmental stress, voluntary mobility is often viewed as a ‘last-resort’ measure. However, in order to move, individuals need to have considerable resources at their disposal. Migration is a high risk and relatively financially expensive endeavour, thus not available to everybody in society. Often, the poorest, most vulnerable, people are the ones who stay behind in precarious situations and are those who are at the highest risk of extreme weather events such as droughts or flooding (Burrows and Kinney 2016; de Haas 2020). People who lack the resources to move and are trapped in high-risk situations are called trapped populations (Thornton et al. 2018: Foresight 2011).

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The third perspective on EIHM is that human mobility needs to be seen as something for which protection measures are required or desirable. One important concept in the context of a protection narrative, is vulnerability (Jayawardhan 2017: 104). There are multiple ways to define vulnerability. This research uses the definition by the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDDR) because it follows a human-based definition which concerns the effects of environmental change on people. From a human-based point of view, vulnerability includes ‘the characteristics and circumstances of a community, system or asset that make it susceptible to the damaging effects of a hazard.’ (UNDDR 2009). However, as shown in figure 2, EIHM is not just an ecological problem. Instead, it is a multicausal complex issue where political, economic, social, demographic and environmental factors come together and negatively influence marginalized groups within society (Jayawardhan 2017: 104). Racial and class inequities for example can skew a group’s vulnerability to environmental changes (ibid.). According to this narrative, one of the greatest impediments for effective protection measures is a lack of legal protection (Jayawardhan 2017; Nishimura 2015). Current legal frameworks often do not adequately address human mobility in the context of environmental changes (Nishimura 2015: 114). The lack of adequate human rights laws increases the vulnerability of already relatively vulnerable and marginalized people and communities (Jayawardhan 2017: 115). This is partly due to the lack of clear categorizations regarding the different types of human mobility as discussed in the introduction. Another reason is the abovementioned complex causality regarding the relationship between environmental changes and human mobility. The lack of adequate legal frameworks and protection measures is what are called protection gaps (Jayawardhan 2017; Nishimura 2015; Zetter 2011). The fact that people on the move due to environmental changes are not protected under the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol is an example of such a protection gap. Those who cross borders but are not fleeing from persecution or conflict will not receive any protection under this agreement. Within this narrative, academics argue that we need to focus on the incorporation of EIHM into international and national legal frameworks. In order to do so effectively, more research is needed into the characteristics of those who need protection: who are they and what are their motivations to move (if able) (Thornton et al. 2018: 240)? Only if these aspects are understood, will it become possible to take effective protection measures in order to guarantee the safety and human rights of people on the move in the context of environmental changes.

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In order to conclude this chapter, the following is important to stress: although these narratives describe EIHM in different ways and argue for widely varying policy actions, they are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Due to the complexity of EIHM and depended on the context in which it occurs, narratives might complement each other. As Lauren Nishimura, a doctoral candidate at the University of Oxford, argues, ‘protection efforts should also acknowledge that the needs of climate change migrants will differ based on their adaptive capacity’ (2015: 125). Instead of existing alongside each other in orderly fashion, in reality these narratives are intertwined and interactive: ‘Frames are non-static and interactive, thereby altering the ways in which environmental migrants are understood or sought to be governed (Ransan-Cooper et al. 2015: 112). How this occurs in Latin America is dealt with in chapter five. The next chapter deals with the methodological justification of this thesis.

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3. Methodology

This chapter will elaborate on the methodology for the empirical research used in this thesis to answer to research questions. First, the research design will be discussed. This research compares three cases, namely UNEP, UNHCR and the IOM to investigate which narratives these UNSDG-agencies use to discuss the issue of EIHM in Latin America. Second, this section explains how the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM relate to each other within the UNSDG-framework and to the issue of EIHM in Latin America. Finally, I will discuss the data collection methods of this research: two semi-structured interviews and a framing analysis.

3.1. Comparative perspective

The research conducted for this thesis focused on the comparison of three organisations, making it a comparative research design (Bryman 2012: 72). Three UNSDG-organisations are analysed by exploring and analysing similarities and differences between them (concerning the narratives that they use) and attempting to understand why these exist (idem: 75). The UNEP, UNHCR and the IOM are compared since they all function within the UNSDG-framework. A comparative research design helps to improve theory building regarding the researched subject since ‘the researcher is in a better position to establish whether theory will or will not hold’ (ibid.). One of the reasons that theory building is improved is because ‘the key to the comparative design is its ability to allow the distinguishing characteristics of two or more cases to act as a springboard for theoretical reflections’ (ibid.). Critics of this design argue that in this research design, often not enough attention is given to the specific context in which the cases are positioned and more to the need to compare the cases. However, the aim of this research is to investigate how the UNSDG-agencies make sense of the Latin American context in relation to EIHM, instead of simply discovering differences or similarities between them. By incorporating three agencies that deal with this issue, but do so from different perspectives, into one research design, I aim to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of EIHM. Specifically, this is done by analysing three UNSDG-agencies which are engaged in this subject: the UNEP, UNHCR and the IOM. The three agencies are selected because they function within the UNSDG-framework on the topic of EIHM but do so with different

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mandates. In what way their mandates influence their perspective is one of the questions dealt with in this thesis. It is relevant to research how these organisations perceive EIHM in Latin America because they are powerful global agendasetting and researchfacilitating -organisations (Coate and Puchala 1990: 127). They have the power to influence national government policy and the resources to facilitate and finance research projects. Table 1 and the three sections discussing the organisations below, will clarify their historical and contemporary engagement in EIHM.

Table 1: Overview of the three UNSDG-agencies.

Organization Date Mandate EIHM SDG

UNEP 1971 Keep the global

environment under review6 Environmental perspective Expressed commitment to target 10.77 UNHCR 1950 Ensure that the

human rights of refugees are respected and protected8 Human rights approach and cooperation with other agencies and organisations Target 10.7 amongst core goals and targets for the UNHCR9 IOM 1951 (officially part of United Nations since 2016) Facilitate the humane and orderly management of international migration10 Research, policy and advocacy efforts and operational activities One of the custodians of target 10.7

6_{General Assembly 1972 A/RES/2997}_{https://undocs.org/en/A/RES/2997(XXVII)} 7_{UNEP 2017 UN/POP/MIG-15CM/2017/2}

https://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/migration/events/coordination/15/documents/papers/2_UN EP.pdf

8_{1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol}_{https://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10}

9_{UNHCR Engagement with the Sustainable Development Goals 2019} https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/5ef33d3f4.pdf

10_{IOM Council 2007 MC/INF/287}

https://governingbodies.iom.int/system/files/jahia/webdav/shared/shared/mainsite/about_iom/en/council/94/MC _INF_287.pdf

Environment-influenced Human Mobility in Latin America: Narratives of the UNEP, UNHCR and IOM