Environmental change and migration: A review of West African case studies
van der Land, Victoria, Romankiewicz, Clemens and van der Geest, Kees, "Environmental change and migration: A review of West African case studies" in Routledge Handbook of Environmental Displacement and Migration ed. McLeman, Robert and Gemenne, François (London and New York: Routledge, 2018), 163-177.
Document type:
Book Chapter
Collection:
-
Attached Files (Some files may be inaccessible until you login with your UNU Collections credentials) Name Description MIMEType Size Downloads Vanderland_etal_2018_MIG_ENV_WAFRICA_PREPRINT__META.pdf Vanderland_etal_2018_MIG_ENV_WAFRICA_PREPRINT__META.PDF application/pdf 610.00KB -
Author van der Land, Victoria
Romankiewicz, Clemens
van der Geest, KeesBook Editor McLeman, Robert
Gemenne, FrançoisChapter Title Environmental change and migration: A review of West African case studies Book Title Routledge Handbook of Environmental Displacement and Migration Publication Date 2018 Place of Publication London and New York Publisher Routledge Start page 163 End page 177 Language eng Abstract West Africa has been a prominent region for research on the linkages between environmental change and migration. To a large extent, this has been motivated by the great Sahel droughts of the 1970s and 1980s. Most studies start from the assumption that environmental factors, such as rising temperature, increasing rainfall variability, land degradation and periodical droughts, affect people’s livelihoods, particularly in rural areas. This chapter provides a review of case studies on the linkages between migration and environmental change in the region, with a focus on drylands. It illustrates that the concepts, methods and results applied differ considerably between the case studies and make it difficult to draw conclusions on the environment-migration nexus. This review shows that even from environmentally fragile areas, people have many different reasons to migrate, which often go beyond risk prevention and adaptation to environmental stress. Many studies find that environmental factors are often not the main driver of migration in the region; instead, individual characteristics, structural conditions, social determinants, better prospects or individual aspirations strongly influence migration decisions and patterns. Nevertheless, temporary migration is a well-established activity to diversify income and the financial support of the migrants is crucial for most households in rural areas. Permanent out-migration of entire households seems to be rare in the region. UNBIS Thesaurus WEST AFRICA
DROUGHTKeyword Human mobility
drylands
Environmental changeCopyright Holder Routledge Copyright Year 2018 Copyright type All rights reserved ISBN 9781138194465
9781315638843 -
Citation counts Search Google Scholar Access Statistics: 1016 Abstract Views, 753 File Downloads - Detailed Statistics Created: Tue, 17 Apr 2018, 21:10:42 JST by Aarti Basnyat on behalf of UNU EHS