Syria and climate change - did the media get it right?

In 2015 the media exploded with coverage about climate change and the conflict in Syria. Our latest report makes the case that most of the media coverage failed to properly understand the links. But none the less there are important connections that need to be explored.

A combination of global events and new research meant that the press took a sudden interest in how climate change may have played a role in igniting the conflict in Syria. Events across Europe and within Syria meant that the conflict and subsequent flows of people out of the Middle East were already one of 2015’s biggest media stories.

The sharp increase in drownings in the Mediterranean, and the refugee camp in Calais, meant the English speaking media were already devoting huge amounts of attention to the situation in Syria. Then in March 2015 Collin Kelley and his colleagues published a paper that linked the climate-driven drought Syria had experienced to the start of the violence.

At this point the media exploded with coverage about how climate change was responsible for the violence in Syria and for the resulting refugee situation across Europe. While Kelley’s research was robust and measured, the media’s coverage was not. And in seeking out a compelling story the press mostly failed to properly explain how climate, drought, migration and conflict were connected in Syria. The version of events they told fuelled anti-migrant and refugee sentiments that already exist in European society.

Media narrative

This is roughly how the media narrative went. The media argued that years of drought had destroyed much of Syria’s agriculture. And this drought was made worse by climate change. The drought, combined with widespread corruption and mismanagement by the regime had destroyed rural livelihoods.

Faced with little choice people moved from the countryside into Syria’s cities. Of course there was variation between stories, but looking at the coverage together, a clear narrative emerges.

After this point is where the media narrative gets rather vague. The story usually then goes that newly arrived migrants fought with existing residents over scarce resources. In other words this was a classic resource war, in which migrants clashed with an existing population because there wasn’t enough to go around.

The coverage really took off when Prince Charles claimed that he had predicted these kinds of climate-driven resource wars decades ago. The implication was that migrants arriving in Syria’s cities sparked violence.

This is a troubling narrative. Partly because it’s not what actually happened. But also because of the way it represented migrants. The narrative suggests that when people migrate - even internally in this case - they are likely to cause conflict.

The implication is that a climate-driven movement of people destabilised Syrian cities and led to full blown war. The suggestion is that migrants - or migration in general - has the power to lead to violence and widespread chaos. And further that climate-driven migration in the future might similarly spark violence, perhaps even inside Europe.

The nature of migration

Regrettably this plays into many of the existing untruths about the nature of migration. There is little evidence that migration leads to conflict or violence. In fact, what actually happened in Syria provides the counter-point to these views.

It’s certainly true that a severe and prolonged drought wrecked rural livelihoods in Syria’s countryside. It’s also true that this drought was made more likely by human induced climate change.

To this extent it is entirely reasonable to link climate, drought and the destruction of Syria’s rural economy. But this is where reality and the media coverage part company.