Professor Amira Hassan Publishes Definitive Work on Climate Migration

Professor Amira Hassan of the Department of Environmental Studies and International Affairs has published what reviewers are calling the definitive scholarly work on climate-driven migration. The Great Displacement: Climate Change and the New Geography of Human Movement, released this month by Oxford University Press, is the product of a decade of field research spanning 15 countries across South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, the Pacific Islands, and Central America.

A Decade in the Making

Professor Hassan began the research underlying this book in 2015, when she received a MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship that allowed her to spend extended periods embedded in communities directly affected by rising sea levels, desertification, and extreme weather events. Over the following ten years, she conducted over 2,000 in-depth interviews with displaced families, local officials, NGO workers, and national policymakers.

"Climate migration isn't a future scenario — it's happening right now, every day, in every region of the world. The people I spent years with are not statistics. They are farmers, teachers, mothers, and elders whose lives have been upended by forces they did nothing to create."

Key Findings

The book challenges several widely held assumptions about climate migration:

• Migration is mostly internal, not cross-border. The majority of climate-displaced people move within their own countries, often from rural areas to already strained urban centers — creating cascading challenges in housing, employment, and public services.
• The poorest are often the least mobile. While popular narratives focus on mass movements, the most vulnerable communities frequently lack the resources to relocate at all, leaving them trapped in increasingly uninhabitable areas.
• Women bear a disproportionate burden. In virtually every context studied, women and girls face heightened vulnerability during displacement — from loss of livelihoods to increased exposure to gender-based violence.
• Adaptation and migration are not mutually exclusive. Communities that receive support for both in-place adaptation and planned relocation fare significantly better than those given only one or neither option.

Impact and Reception

The book has already been adopted as required reading at more than 40 universities worldwide, including Stanford, the London School of Economics, and the University of Cape Town. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has cited the book's policy recommendations in its 2026 strategic framework, and Professor Hassan has been invited to present findings at the upcoming COP31 climate conference.

Policy Recommendations

The book's final section outlines a comprehensive policy framework that Professor Hassan calls the "Five Pillars of Climate Mobility Justice":

1. Legal recognition of climate displacement as a basis for international protection
2. Dedicated funding mechanisms for planned relocation, separate from existing disaster relief
3. Community-led decision-making in all stages of adaptation and relocation planning
4. Gender-responsive policies that address the specific vulnerabilities of women and girls
5. Data infrastructure to track and predict climate mobility patterns in real time

"Amira's work exemplifies the power of scholarship to illuminate urgent human challenges and point toward solutions," said Provost Michael Tanaka. "This is academic research at its most relevant and most humane."