Climate Migration in Latin America: A Future ‘Flood

of Refugees’ to the North?

This COHA research piece synthesizes the current developments regarding environmentally-driven human migration –and more specifically, migration caused by the environmental manifestations of anthropogenic climate change– seeking to expose its potential harmful effects in Central and South America, as well as the Caribbean. Although this region has received less media attention and academic focus than Western Africa, South East Asia or the Pacific Islands, it certainly houses the climate and non-climate factors that could cause mass human displacement.

The first section introduces the concept of environmentally-induced migration, expounding upon the current state of the debate that surrounds it and the challenges it faces. This is followed by an examination of different climate processes and natural disasters as drivers of migration in Latin America. It also addresses non-climate factors such as poor governance, poverty, overpopulation, and unequal land distribution that can compound these migratory pressures.

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