Environmental Issues and New Categories of Migrants: from Semantics to Geopolitics

Problems linked to the environment and global warming have favored the emergence of new definitions to qualify the migration flows they provoke: 'environmental refugees', 'eco-refugees', 'climate refugees'... An intense reflection, which is not without confusion, is under way in order to extend the statute of refugee to these migrants. Several obstacles and arguments stand in the way of such an evolution. Among them, state sovereignty remains the main point of contention with environmental stakes which, from the local to the global, do not acknowledge borders. Adapted from the source document.