My latest assignment was to find the technical difference between forced migration and voluntary migration. Even though they have already been defined in the first post, there are various cases that may seem hard to neatly categorize into one or the other. Therefore, we dive deeper into the definitions of each term.

Definitions:

As a review, the UNHCR defines forced migration as…” a general term that refers to the movements of refugees, internally displaced people (those displaced by conflicts, within their country of origin) as well as people displaced by natural or environmental disaster, chemical or nuclear disasters, famine, or development projects.”

The Forced Migration Review has the same definition: 
"What is forced migration? ‘Forced migration’ refers to the movements of refugees and internally displaced people (displaced by conflict) as well as people displaced by natural or environmental disasters, chemical or nuclear disasters, famine, or development projects."Note: Both the UNHCR and the Forced Migration Review do not specifically address the plight of those displaced by environmental reasons other than natural disaster or economic issues. However, I think it is reasonable to say that some people may assume it to be included, some not.


Journal of Refugee Studies:
The environmental side of this is explored in the following text - 

 

IASFM 11 CONFERENCE REPORT

Refugees and Forced Migrants at the crossroads: Forced Migration in a Changing World.

By: John Nassari

I stubbled onto this article in the Journal of Refugee Studies which summarizes a conference hosted by the Forced Migration and Refugee Studies Program of the American University in Cairo with 280 attendees.

During the conference, they questioned weather environmental changes such as: environmental degradation, and climate change was in fact part of forced migration.  The article states, “ forced migration usually entails at least one of the following factors: absolute compulsion, threat, and coercion and actual harm.” The article then also included the difficulty of describing a migrant worker, as in many cases he or she maybe experiencing one of these three examples but also pulled by economic benefits. Nassari further explains, "It was acknowledged that the line between voluntary and involuntary migration is rarely clear." I am quickly realizing that as clean as cut as we would like the definitions can be, the people and their stories are not. For example, if someone is living in fear in a war-torn country and hears of a job opportunity in a neighboring near by country, they may choose to migrate because of the situation in their present country. Wouldn't this be the normal response of any suffering human being? It seems that it would be incorrect to categorize this case as strictly either a "economic migration" or "involuntary migration."

Panelists also discussed the possibility of coining the terms “climigrant” or “climigration.” They discussed the importance of including environmental issues in the term of forced migration.


Forced Migration Review

An article in the Forced Migration Review titled "The Pervertibility of Refugee 
Status," brings up an even greater point - if someone or a certain group of people who are living in extreme poverty cross a border in hopes that it will increase their life expectancy, would it be right this as "voluntary migration?" They perhaps are not leaving with fear of persecution, but does this suddenly deem migration caused of fearing of death from starvation "voluntary?" The definitions vary from country to country, They do not account for the gray area, as in, what is not quite defined to be completely voluntary or involuntary. The author goes on to make a bold claim that because these definitions are used in policies, the states will categorize incoming asylum seekers according to their on personal resources, culture, prejudice, and economic need. 

Another Article for the Forced Migration Review, "Forced Migration and HIV/AIDS 
in Asia: Some Observations" illustrates this point with an example of Asian migrant workers. In it the author claims "The severity of the economic and social crises in the region has led thousands to leave their families and homes to go to foreign lands and engage in low-wage labour with little protection from exploitation, no legal rights and inadequate access to even basic social services." He makes a distinct point, that their risk in getting HIV/AIDS massively increases, while their access to protection decreases. Because of this, among other conditions. this type of migration is not a choice, but something forced by a matter of circumstances.