Heinrich Böll Stiftung Workshop: ‘Climate Change, Resources, Migration: Old and New Sources of Conflict in Africa?’

Centre for the Book, Cape Town, 4 August 2009

The impact of climate change is likely to amplify potential instability in Africa as climate-induced migration increases and the allocation of natural resources changes. Under conditions such as poor governance, weak institutional capacity and little economic development; climate change can act as a ‘threat multiplier’ in the outbreak of violent conflict. The aim of this conference was to examine the link between climate change, resource exploitation, migration and conflict. The overriding paradigm belonged to the field of international relations and security studies. The theoretical approach taken was often a human rights-based approach (climate change as an obstacle to the fulfillment of peoples’ potential).

Given the political science content of this subject, most of the speakers were academics. Attending the conference were a number of academics, civil society representatives (NGOs), and politicians.

Although the overriding theme of the conference was climate change, only the ‘Climate Change Panel’ dealt with this issue in depth. The ‘Migration’ and ‘Resource’ panels dealt with broader developmental issues, not necessarily correlated to climate change.

Nonetheless, the insights derived from this conference could have interesting applications for local governments in Africa. The conference served to highlight the importance of building local government capacity, as they are the key actors and first-in-line to deal with resource exploitation, in-migration and climate change impacts.

The conference underlined and unpacked the root causes of climate change-induced conflict in Africa. Pointing out the complex and inextricable links between resource scarcity conflicts, migration, and climate change is a useful reminder when devising climate change adaptation strategies that these need to be carried out in conjunction with broader development goals (ie: poverty eradication). Furthermore, the insights of this conference highlight the fact that the content of adaptation strategies needs to include socio-institutional responses (for instance, migration cannot be dealt with as another sectoral issue).

Speakers included: Oli Brown, Programme Manager, International Institute for Sustainable Development, Geneva; Elvin Nyukuri, Research Fellow, African Centre for Technology Studies, Nairobi; Trusha Reddy, Researcher, Institute for Security Studies, Cape Town; Claude Kabemba, Director, Southern Africa Resource Watch, Johannesburg; Tim Hughes, Head, Governance of Africa’s Resources Programme, South African Institute of International Affairs, Cape Town; Dr Loren Landau, Director, Forced Migration Studies Programme, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg; and Kate Lefko-Everett, Researcher, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, Cape Town.