SCMR conference poster

The Sussex migration community engaged in a lively debate on the relationship between migrants and climate change, at the 10^th Annual Conference of the Sussex Centre for Migration Research (SCMR), a University Centre of Excellence.

This year's event was entitled: 'Re-thinking Migration and Inclusion in a Divided World'. It took place on 18 October 2023, and was attended by over 150 scholars, students and practitioners.

World-leading authority Professor Mary Waters, from Harvard University, delivered the keynote on: ‘Climate Change and Integration’. Building on eighteen years of detailed research, following the hardships of people displaced by the Hurricane Katrina disaster in New Orleans that caused enormous destruction and significant loss of life, Mary Waters advocates a people-focussed sociological approach. She argues that climate change impacts and political responses exacerbate inequalities, while community and social networks will be crucial resources for displaced people to try to rebuild their lives, in the face of environmental disasters.

Professor Paul Statham, Director of SCMR, stated:

“Political and media debates usually focus on guestimates of vast numbers of people moving across the globe due to climate change. This focus on numbers, can be misleading and feed into fears about mass migration. Instead, Mary’s new approach demonstrates that social science has a contribution to make, by focussing on people and how community remains an important part of any policy attempt to serve those living directly with the consequences of migration due to environmental disasters.”

The keynote by Mary Waters will be published in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration (JEMS), the top-ranking scholarly journal edited from Sussex, in January 2025.

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