Concluding remarks: on the politics of climate change, migration and human rights

From 2011 to 2015, the author had the good fortune to chair a major European research initiative called 'Climate Change and Migration: Knowledge, Law and Policy, and Theory'. This chapter represents a small but important slice of the wider COST dialogue on climate change and migration. Two important observations can be drawn from the foregoing comparison between Bronen and Mihr. The first concerns the value of postcolonial theory in coming to terms with the politics of constructing climate change, migration and human rights as a universal site of knowledge formation. The second important observation that is at stake in the discussion about climate change, migration and human rights is that it contains a full-fledged politics of place. The chapter explains that act of assuming responsibility for those who migrate because of climate change on the grounds that such a migration violates their human rights adopts a universal ethical responsibility in relation to the migrant