Sea-Level Rise and the Marshallese Diaspora

The “Climate Refugee”

The “climate refugee” has captured increasing attention and denotes the individuals and communities that the impacts of climate change displace or force to relocate. The term holds no legal weight; yet, climate-related events that will trigger relocation are certain to proliferate. Climate-induced migration is therefore anticipated to increase in the coming decades.

Research and debate have focused on the relationship between climate and migration, although researchers widely recognize that a lack of clarity characterizes the climate–migration nexus. Climatic changes act in concert with other socioeconomic and political factors to drive displacement. Environmental changes generate health problems and food insecurity, and their role may be amplified when coupled with political, social, or economic tensions. The host of factors affecting timing and scale of migration translates into uncertainty and local variability. Indeed, the exact number of possible climate-displaced individuals will remain elusive, as climate change may be an indirect cause of relocation for many who are on the move.

The Marshall Islands

People with little responsibility for industrial capitalism are paying the price for global warming. The Marshall Islands, with a population of 73,376, are an archipelago of 29 low-lying coral atolls and 5 single islands in the central Pacific Ocean. ¹ With a mean elevation of 2 m above sea level, the Marshall Islands are particularly vulnerable to sea-level rise, rogue waves, severe weather, and droughts. ² Annual rainfall varies; the southern atolls receive 300–400 cm and the northern atolls 100–175 cm. ³ Dependent on thin aquifers and catchment for water, the Marshallese people face chronic water challenges. Drought is more common in the northern atolls, resulting in difficulties with sanitation and risk of water-borne diseases. The soils of the Marshall Islands are thin, sandy, alkaline, and lacking in minerals and micronutrients. Combined with poor water-retaining properties of the soil, the quantities and range of crops that can be cultivated are limited.

Traditional Marshallese culture depended on the gathering of reef and open water resources. Taro, coconut, arrowroot, and pandanus were cultivated, utilizing the fresh water lenses beneath the surfaces of many of the small islets in the Marshall Islands. At present, in the population centers of Majuro and Ebeye, most households are dependent on imported food.

The Marshall Islands were wrested from imperial Japan during World War II in 1944. As part of the Trust Territory under U.S. control, Enewetak and Bikini atolls became the detonation site of 67 nuclear devices between 1946 and 1958. ⁴ The Marshall Islands separated from the Trust Territory in 1978, and in 1986, the U.S. Congress approved the Compact of Free Association (COFA). The Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) per capita Gross Domestic Product is $2900. It has a young population with a median age of 21 in 2011. ⁵ The economy is dependent on funds provided by the U.S. government under the COFA. There are a few large employers beyond the government and the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Test Site.

The Capitalocene Age

The scientific community has begun to call the present geological age the “Anthropocene” in a nod to the effect of human activity on the physical state of the planet. Jason W. Moore suggests that how we think of a problem determines how we approach solving it. He argues that “Anthropocene” merely describes the consequences of the relationships that privilege the endless accumulation of capital: “To locate the origins of the modern world with the rise of capitalist civilization after 1450, with its audacious strategies of global conquest, endless commodification, and relentless rationalization, is to prioritize the transcendence of the relations of power, knowledge, and capital that have made—and are now unmaking—the modern world as we have known it. Shut down a coal plant, and you can slow global warming for a day; shut down the relations that made the coal plant, and you can stop it for good.” ⁶

The energy-intensive, carbon-releasing mode of production that has led to global warming is a consequence of the privileging of the accumulation of capital. Moore thus suggests that we instead call our present age the “Capitalocene.”

Many scientists fear that the planet has already exceeded the tipping point beyond which nonlinear processes will lead to catastrophic outcomes. James Hansen suggests that because the Paris Agreement has no provisions for meaningful action, the aspirational goal will not be met. ⁷ Utilizing paleoclimate data, Hansen and his colleagues predict that with a 2°C rise, the further melting of ice sheets could result in a sea-level rise that will reach “several meters” later this century. ⁸

Global Warming, Sea-Level Rise, and the Marshall Islands

The Paris Agreement, the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties (COP21), concluded in December 2015, aims to hold the increase in global average temperature to below 2°C and to pursue a 1.5°C limit above preindustrial levels. ⁹ RMI Foreign Minister Tony deBrum played a prominent role at COP21 in calling for the 1.5°C goal. ¹⁰ Science and the lack of enforcement mechanisms suggest, however, that humanity will fall short.

Naomi Klein notes that in the decades since the Kyoto Protocol (December 1997), global carbon emissions have continued to grow. Rather, with free market globalization, reflective of the dominant neoliberal ideology and enacted through investor rights agreements—the basis of the world economy has become predicated on greater and greater fossil fuel combustion as capital seeks less expensive labor, goods are shipped in ever increasing volume between continents, and the cost of environmental destruction is externalized. ¹¹

Klein notes that the TV sets in the living rooms of Americans were manufactured in China with the energy input from coal burning. Those carbon emissions are logged in China's ledger. The trucking to bring the TV to the big box outlet is logged in the U.S. ledger. However, the transoceanic shipping that brought the set from Shenzhen to Los Angeles is not logged under any country's ledger. Americans may point fingers at China, but the American consumer bears much responsibility for the emissions blamed on China.

While Marshallese have had little influence in corporate boardrooms or the negotiation of transnational investor rights agreements, they will be among the first to lose their homes to sea-level rise. Also, Marshallese have heretofore had little involvement in the industrial capitalism—but as we will note below, the diaspora has begun to participate.

Since 1998, the RMIs two urban centers and its northern atolls have suffered a number of climate-related incidents. Following a national drought emergency declared in 1997–1998, the cholera epidemic of December 2000 was associated with lingering La Niña effects. Droughts occurred in the northern outer atolls in 2001, 2007, and 2013. In Majuro, high waves flooded the capital in December 2008, June 2013, and March 2014. A dengue outbreak, with more than 1600 cases, occurred in the Marshall Islands starting in October 2011. Storm waves and particularly high tides will lead to annual flooding, salinating fresh water supplies and destroying local agriculture. Inhabitants of low-lying coral atolls may have to abandon their islands within decades, rather than in centuries. ¹² As Father Fran Hezel observes, “Perhaps the larger issue is whether life in the remote atolls remains viable in today's world.” ¹³

Outward Bound

Under the COFA, citizens of the compact nations (i.e., the Federated States of Micronesia and the Republic of Palau, in addition to the RMI) travel freely to the United States and are able to work in the United States without obtaining a visa. This makes it easier for employers to hire COFA citizens in comparison with, say, citizens of Latin American nations, whose movement and work are more highly regulated by federal laws.

As the conditions for survival become more difficult in the Marshall Islands, free entry into the United States makes migration to the United States the logical option for the Marshallese people. The COFA will expire in 2023, however, and it is unclear whether free entry will continue afterward. It would seem most reasonable for Marshallese to migrate to Hawai‘i, the only Pacific Island state, but the cost of living in Hawai‘i is prohibitive. The basic living expense for a family of four on Oahu are $79,056. ¹⁴

Until a federal court decision in 2014 allowed the State of Hawai‘i to exclude them, COFA migrants had participated in Medicaid. At present, COFA migrants 19 through 65 years old, who otherwise meet poverty levels to qualify for Medicaid, must obtain private health insurance coverage via the Affordable Care Act (ACA) mechanism. ¹⁵

The efforts of Hawai‘i policymakers to exclude COFA migrants from participation in public health insurance as well as discrimination in the wider society are making COFA migrants feel unwelcome in Hawai‘i.^16,17 Many Marshallese thus skip over Hawai‘i and head for more affordable locations in the continental United States, where they also find they are more welcome than in Hawai‘i.

An examination of the health status of migrating and displaced populations during the early phases of displacement might foretell the impacts of climate-induced migration on public health. Chronic diseases and infectious agents that can move with migrants and displaced populations are among the health concerns of climate-induced migration. In the case of the Marshallese, the history of nuclear testing and displacement within the Marshall Islands has contributed to the prevalence of diabetes in particular.^18,19 By impairing immunity, diabetes itself contributes to infectious diseases such as tuberculosis. ²⁰ Pre- and postdisplacement stressors can negatively impact maternal and child health, malnutrition, transmission of sexually transmitted infections, and mental health. In Hawai‘i, the lack of sufficient language services by healthcare providers and literacy and cultural concerns compound the challenges to migrants as well as the care systems of the receiving community.

Migration from the Marshall Islands provides a relevant analogue for the ways in which climate, migration, and health intersect. Because of the wide range of health maladies, from which Marshall Islanders suffer, ²¹ the need to access healthcare already drives out migration from the Marshalls to Hawai‘i and the continental United States. Climate change will impact similarly situated sending communities and, potentially, further increasing the costs of service to additional at-risk populations in receiving communities.

Ozark Islanders

Unable to afford the cost of living and feeling unwelcome in Hawai‘i, many Marshallese are now choosing to migrate instead to northwest Arkansas. In the early 1980s, John Moody was the first Marshallese to work at Tyson Foods in Springdale, Arkansas. ²² In the intervening decades, he assisted a large number of Marshallese to obtain employment. ²³ Tyson's 27 factories in the region currently employ 3000 Marshallese, and George's and Cargill, two other poultry processors, together employ over 1000 Marshallese. Families have followed the workers. In the Springdale School District, for the 2012–2013 school year, Hispanics composed 43.7% of students, whites composed 40.6%, and Marshallese composed 11.4%. Migrants view attending school in Arkansas as an investment in their children's education. Of note, Arkansas is not the destination for people in the RMI in need of medical attention. Arkansas has never included COFA migrants in Medicaid, nor even in its Children's Health Insurance Program. ²⁴ The difficulties with access to healthcare make it more difficult for the elderly in Marshallese families to migrate to Arkansas. ²⁵

The Health Consequences of Industrial Work

Marshallese employment is a positive development. In Arkansas, with its relatively low cost of housing, a food processing worker's paycheck can be sufficient for homeownership. On the contrary, in the absence of contracts negotiated by unions, many industrial jobs do not have health insurance as a benefit. Workers forgo employment-based health insurance if they find their contribution too expensive, especially to cover family members. Members of the extended family, to which Marshallese have close ties and for whom a worker may bear responsibility, cannot be covered through employment-based health insurance.

Even in Arkansas, a food processing worker's paycheck may be insufficient to provide a healthful diet for every member of the family. At the local farmer's market, a single organic apple costs more than a meal at Macdonald's. Accepting an historically contingent value system, specifically the Protestant work ethic, ²⁶ there is inherent dignity to work that gives one a sense of self-worth. While the Protestant part may not have been part of traditional Marshallese culture, Marshallese are now devoutly Christian (an important factor in their acceptance into Arkansas culture).

Conclusion

The unfortunate reality is that the Marshallese people, who will be among the first to suffer the loss of their home to global warming, are migrating to the new epicenter of the planet-destroying “free market” economy to survive and allow the next generation to survive. Joining the marginal proletariat of the global food industry, their work of slaughtering and packing chickens, Cornish hens, and turkeys will serve to ensure that the graves of their ancestors will be further underwater.