By Divya Goyal
Growing interest in recognizing and promoting migration as a form of climate adaptation risks exacerbating existing inequalities and generating new ones for disabled people.
Scholars, policymakers, and advocates in this field need to pay greater attention to the impact of climate-induced migration on disabled people, document the experiences of disabled people with climate-induced migration and displacement — with a particular focus on their vulnerabilities and capabilities — and deliberate on strategies to build the adaptive capacity and resilience of disabled people.
The impact of climate change on human mobility and displacement is complex and multifaceted, with the debate oscillating between forced migration as one of the most devastating impacts of climate change on one hand, and emphasis on migration as a proactive adaptation strategy on the other. In reality, it is difficult to assign a direct causal link between migration and climate change as migration decisions are conditioned by a complex set of push and pull forces, which constantly interact with socioeconomic and political conditions. Yet, climate-induced slow onset pressures (e.g., sea level rise and desertification) and rapid onset events (e.g., floods and heat waves) have the potential to trigger migration decisions or prompt governments to plan for the relocation and resettlement of affected populations as some environments become uninhabitable. For instance, a recent report by the World Bank estimates that about 216 million people could be internally displaced as a result of climate change by 2050.
Currently, the complex intersections of disability with migration are under-studied in both migration studies and disability studies. The climate change movement by and large has relegated disability to function as a visible evidence of environmental damage. Further, the climate change and migration discourses by and large define the vulnerability of disabled people in biomedical terms — as an inevitable consequence of impairment, rather than an outcome of exclusionary physical environments and social structures.
A social-relational understanding of disability challenges these dominant perceptions and recognizes disabled people as powerful and knowledgeable agents of change.
Climate change does not undermine human security in isolation of structural factors such as poverty, access to social security, political disempowerment and social cohesion. For instance, an extreme climate event such as flooding can exacerbate poverty, unemployment, and food insecurity, which may force people to move in search of alternative livelihoods. People’s ability to migrate is conditioned by their access to resources and social capital. Thus, people most vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change may be forced to stay rather than to migrate. Political exclusion, poverty, lack of access to assistive technology, inaccessible infrastructure, transportation and housing, and lack of information and social networks inhibit the migration of disabled people when faced with the adverse impacts of climate change. And, when disabled people are left behind, they lose crucial social and support networks. Disabled people in Bangladesh, for instance, were stuck in degraded environments and forced to contend with natural disasters as they lacked resources and social capital to migrate.
Disabled people sustain higher rates of mortality, injury, and disease during disasters and extreme weather events. Recognizing that a majority of climate-induced migration occurs within borders, already precarious disabled lives face further peril due to difficulties in evacuating, mobility and transportation barriers, inaccessibility of resettlement locations, and inadequate access to services at destination locations (e.g., social protection, sanitation, and health care). A survey conducted by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre in eight countries finds that disabled people were over-represented among non-displaced people, as they were much less likely to be safely evacuated. 54 percent of disabled people faced challenges moving to another area after being displaced, 52 percent struggled to find a place to stay, 22 percent had difficulties accessing assistance, and 68 percent encountered challenges in accessing livelihoods. Forcibly displaced people settle in camps and in slums, where infrastructure and services are inadequate, unsafe, and inaccessible, constraining the autonomy and dignity of disabled people, and particularly disabled women, who experience greater risk of sexual violence. Further, the impact of relocation on disabled people’s adaptive capacities and mobility, including their access to supports, livelihoods and other social services is often not considered in adaptation, relocation, and resettlement plans.
International immigration policies further constrain the ability of disabled people and their families to migrate in search of safer locations. These policies typically adopt a biomedical approach to disability, with disability considered a burden to the state rather than a source of social enrichment. In other words, the mobility of disabled people is curtailed on the grounds of health. For instance, disabled people in Fiji and Tuvalu have been left behind during disasters, unable to secure visas, while their families migrated to New Zealand.
Disabled people have been recognized as one of the most vulnerable groups in international climate change agreements and frameworks, including the Paris Agreement, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030. Contemporary approaches to climate change and disaster risk reduction, however, predominantly include disabled people as one category in a list of “vulnerable groups,” without probing the conditions that shape vulnerability and resilience. Due to the research and advocacy of the disability movement in the Pacific, some small-island developing states, such as Vanuatu and Kiribati, are beginning to include disabled people in their adaptation responses. For instance, Fiji, has adopted guidelines for the planned relocation of communities that recognize the importance of including, and supporting disabled people in relocation planning and implementation processes.
Disabled people are not a homogeneous group and experience climate risks to varying degrees, shaped by existing inequalities and individual and social characteristics, and their intersections. The humanitarian and development communities need to fully account for the rights of disabled people who are forced to live in environmentally degraded conditions, the structural inequalities perpetuated by the uncertain recognition of disabled migrants, and their precarious position in displacement and relocation situations. Climate adaptation strategies must foster dignity and respect for diversity, and recognize people’s capabilities and skills, rather than exacerbate pre-existing inequalities.
Divya Goyal is a young blind researcher from India with an MPhil in Development Studies from University of Cambridge on a Commonwealth Scholarship. She is currently working at the International Centre for Evidence in Disability, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
