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This paper contrasts how climate reports describe displacement with how analyses of moving after disaster have described whether people move. The paper argues that domestic structures govern displacement, and are likely to continue to. Domestically, people have different legal statuses and access to resources, which shape the ability to move. Authoritative governance documents on climate change, including the United States National Climate Assessment, argue that climate change will lead to increasing numbers of displaced people. On the other hand, demographers and economists who study where people move to after disaster have argued that climate reports overstate the risk of mass displacement, based in what has happened after past disasters. Domestic governance processes influence resettlement, and they can change. Studies of whether people move after disaster do not take into account how changes in insurance rates or other rules shaping where people live could reshape resettlement. On the other hand, analyses of governing potential climate displacement draw on international agreements and documents. has often centered on islands advocates argue will disappear, not the changing habitability of places that also depends on the resources people have. The image of disappearing islands misdirects from the risks of climate displacement in wealthier countries, where some people have extensive resources and others do not. This paper argues that the risk of displacement requires turning to follow the domestic governance processes that shape people’s decisions now. This approach fits with calls to work from people’s claims up to governance processes, rather than from processes downward.

Disasters are treated as independent events external to law. However, social processes define the beginning, end and extent of those events for mitigation, adaptation and response and recovery; those processes include the mobilization of law by people and organizations. Within the sociology of disaster, it is tempting to treat law as a problem-solving tool. Sociolegal analysis approaches law more skeptically: legal actors face problems and defer to the decisions others have made, or discount future problems as much as other institutions do and thereby contribute to problems, or offer compensation that does not ameliorate the inequality within and among countries that disaster can exacerbate. Law can signal that it is doing something about problems via national or supranational rights; for it actually to help requires legal actors to mobilize. Finally, the site of law has been displaced: from law being within public authority enacted through institutions to law as a matter of individual, self-governance set in expectation of disaster, and humanitarian assistance done through non-governmental organizations. This collection contributes analyses of individuals and organizations' action in disaster through legal processes. Los desastres se tratan como hechos independientes externos al derecho. Sin embargo, los procesos sociales definen el principio, el final y el alcance de esos acontecimientos en lo que respecta a su mitigación, adaptación, respuesta y recuperación; esos procesos incluyen la movilización del derecho por personas y organizaciones. En el ámbito de la sociología de los desastres, es tentador tratar el derecho como una herramienta para la resolución de problemas. Sin embargo, los análisis sociojurídicos se aproximan al derecho de forma más escéptica: los actores legales se enfrentan a problemas y se adhieren a decisiones que otros han tomado, o descartan problemas futuros de la misma forma que otras instituciones, aumentando así los problemas, u ofrecen una compensación que no mejora la desigualdad dentro de y entre los países, que en parte se ve agravada por los desastres. El derecho puede defender que está tratando los problemas a través del derecho nacional o supranacional; pero lo que realmente hace falta para ayudar requiere que los actores legales se movilicen. Por último, ha cambiado el lugar que ocupa el derecho: ha pasado de ser una autoridad pública, que actúa a través de instituciones, a tener carácter individual, con la prevención de desastres basada en el autogobierno, y siendo organizaciones no gubernamentales las que ofrecen la ayuda humanitaria. Este número ofrece un análisis de las acciones de individuos y organizaciones en caso de desastres, a través de los procesos legales.