Constructing Climate Migration as a Security Issue : A Postcolonial and Securitization Discourse Analysis of Climate Migration in the European Union and Pacific Islands Forum Policy Frameworks

Sammanfattning

Climate migration is becoming one of the most urgent global crises as droughts, hurricanes, and increased sea levels are forcing people to displace both internally and cross-border for stability and safety. Consequently, global governance is becoming increasingly prominent in the construction and narrative employed towards climate migration, as it is norm-setting and enables global policies. Against this background, the research aims to explore how the European Union (EU) and the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) construct the discourse of climate migration in policy documents. The purpose is to gain a deeper understanding of how international organizations construct climate migration through a postcolonial and securitization lens. A discourse analysis is conducted on two policy documents from each international organization to analyze what language and security narrative the IOs employ in terms of climate migration. The research found that there are polarizing constructions of climate migrations between the two organizations: The Pacific Island Forum obtains a coherent human security perspective. At the same time, the European Union portrays climate migration as both a security risk to Europe and a human security concern for vulnerable populations. However, both organizations highlights adaptation and resilience as the primary management strategies, which suggests a de-securitization of the discourse. The thesis concludes that there are still asymmetrical power dynamics and unjust positions accounting for the polarizing attitudes, as the European Union externalizes vulnerability by contrasting itself from the vulnerable by “othering”, but also by presenting itself as a protector over the vulnerable people in the Global South.