Environmental Displacement in an Internal Armed Conflict Context: The Colombian Case
摘要
Internal displacement due to environmental causes has been largely overlooked in Colombia. There is no public policy to address this issue and people forced to abandon their habitual places of residence due to disaster, climate change effects, or environmental degradation are not even considered as IDPs, as the current legal definition only includes those displaced due to internal armed conflict. This situation seems about to change, as steps have been taken by authorities to recognise the existence of environmental IDPs in the country and grant them attention to their assistance and protection needs. However, devising such public policy entails a considerable challenge since, in this country, environmental displacement can neither be understood nor addressed without considering the weight of armed conflict in the disasters triggering displacement. Environmental displacement is, in at least four scenarios, the outcome of the interaction of war and disaster. This chapter explores all of them, aiming to cover a gap in the knowledge of this kind of human mobility. The reasons why acknowledging the link between these two elements is key for constructing a sound and effective public policy for environmental IDPs are also tackled.