Climate migration from a gender perspective: Legal avenues to address invisibility

Climate change evidences a clear fragilisation of human rights, especially in territories already experiencing greater exposure to the effects of climate change and less resilience due to existing socioeconomic contexts. The interconnected realities of climate change and the contexts of poverty, food insecurity and conflict have differential consequences for women and girls, exacerbated by situations of forced migration. This study reflects on international legal avenues to address, on the one hand, the lack of international legal recognition of climate migration and, on the other, the absence of a gender perspective. Legal silence renders invisible the differential vulnerability of women migrants, while the effects of climate change and gender discrimination shape their entire migration process. In order to protect women climate migrants, this contribution proposes the extension of the non-refoulement obligation and the granting of humanitarian permits as legal avenues to address invisibility