1. Security issues
Session 6

3. Displacements as a source of conflicts?
Increased pressure on resources
Happens mostly within weak, fragile states
Ex: Darfur
Cumulative process: comes on top of socio- economic, poltical issues
Importance of the governance of migration

4. Evidence on climate and conflict

8. Threats to stability and security
Increase in the number of weak and fragile states
Risk for global economic development
Distributional conflict between polluters and sufferers
Human rights violations / Crises of legitimacy
Migration
Inter-state conflicts (destabilisation processes, state failures)

9. Three types of threat Civil conflicts Border conflicts
Environmental crises make states more fragile
Ex: Earthquake in Haiti
Possible conflicts for resources and for land
Crises of legitimacy of states cannot meet the demands of their populations
Border conflicts
Can be linked to migration
Can be linked to the management of common resources
Ex: India and Bangladesh
International disputes
Conflicts between polluters and victims

10. Scientific controversies
Initial works by Thomas Homer-Dixon
Emphasises the linkages between environmental degradations and social troubles.
Controversies on the security impacts of climate change
Maximalist perspective:
Randall and Schwartz 2003 ‘An abrupt climate change scenario’
Burke and al ‘Global warming increases the risk of civil wars’ PNAS
Minimalist perspective:
Buhaug 2011 ‘Climate change not to blame’ PNAS

11. The securitisation of the climate discourse

12. Instrumentalisation of the ‘climate refugees’
Climate change often presented as a security risk in order to prompt states to act on climate change:
To reduce their greenhouse gas emissions
To fund adaptation
Instrumentation of the climate-security nexus for the pursuit of an environmental agenda
Instrumentalisation of the ‘climate refugees’

13. Scientific challenges
Special issue of Climatic Change, March 2014