“Rethinking Mobility in a Changing Climate”

Scientia Professor Jane McAdam AO FASSA FAAL
School of Law and Justice
UNSW Sydney

Date: Wednesday, 7 May 2025, 6.00–7.30 pm AEST
Venue: Zoom webinar (Link to follow)
Entry: No charge
All are welcome

Business of the Meeting

The Agenda for the Ordinary General Meeting will be available on the Meetings page of the website.

Summary: Every second, someone is displaced by a disaster. Each year, many more people are displaced internally by disasters than by conflict – the vast majority in the Asia-Pacific region. Climate change will amplify the problem as worsening cyclones, floods, bushfires, droughts and food insecurity force millions from their homes, potentially rendering some areas permanently unsafe. Most people will move within their own countries, including through evacuations, but some may be displaced across borders. Some may not be able to move at all; yet others may be displaced multiple times. When it comes to legal and policy responses to climate mobility, there is no one-size-fits-all approach. While the challenges of addressing climate change and disasters are immense, much can be done to alleviate displacement and its human costs – if we act now. This keynote address will examine how law and policy is responding to the challenge of climate mobility at a time when every region of the world is being impacted by more frequent and intense disasters. What do affected communities want? How could greater preparedness lead to greater protection? How can migration itself be a form of adaptation to climate change?

Professor Jane McAdam AO is Scientia Professor of Law, Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow and the Founding Director of the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW Sydney, where she leads the Evacuations Research Hub. She is a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia and the Australian Academy of Law, and an Honorary Associate of Oxford’s Refugee Studies Centre. Professor McAdam publishes widely on international refugee law and forced migration, with a particular focus on evacuations and mobility in the context of climate change and disasters. Her legal analysis has been adopted by courts, governments and UN bodies, and her work has been highly influential in the development of international, regional and national policy frameworks. Professor McAdam serves on multiple international committees and was joint Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Refugee Law (2014–24). In 2021, she was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) ‘for distinguished service to international refugee law, particularly to climate change and the displacement of people’. She won the Australian Human Rights Commission’s Law Award in 2022 and was the inaugural winner

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