CANCELLED

Fritz Thyssen Foundation Lecture

The Human Rights of Those Threatened by Climate Displacement. Rhetoric, Policy, and Reality

IN COOPERATION WITH FRITZ THYSSEN STIFTUNG

International organizations, governments, and advocacy organizations have recognized the inevitable effects that climate change has on forced migration. Their responses have focused on disaster risk-reduction and climate-change adaptation, as well as on creating pathways for internal and international migration. But has the evolution of these policies kept pace with realities on the ground? Moreover, do they fairly address the fact that people bearing the brunt of climate change bear little or no responsibility for their own suffering? In this talk, Eric P. Schwartz, who just ended a five-year tenure as president of Refugees International (RI), will discuss the rights of displaced persons, informed by the engagement, as co-chair, of the RI-initiated expert Task Force Report to the U.S. President on the Climate Crisis and Global Migration, entitled “A
Pathway to Protection for People on the Move.”

The lecture is followed by a discussion with Daniel Benjamin, president of the American Academy.