Living beings have always migrated to survive. Monarch butterflies travel up to 3,000 miles in a year from Mexico to the northern reaches of the United States and back. Whales swim thousands of miles each year to and from feeding and breeding areas. Millions of buffalo roamed Turtle Island (the name many Indigenous people use for the continent of North America) for more than 130,000 years ranging from Canada to the Appalachian Mountains. And, since our existence as a species, people too have migrated to survive.

As nature knows, when conditions become unbearable, movement becomes survival. Over the last decade, nearly 218 million people have been displaced due to a climate disaster. By 2050, nearly 1 in 7 people will have migrated due to a climate-related impact. Yet political borders ignore natural ways of movement, creating a reality that favors those in power at the expense of those trying to survive.

Borders have impacted and harmed people from the start. They privatized lands, forcibly removed Indigenous peoples, and created state laws that determined who was “legally free” and who could be enslaved. Today, borders still decide whose vote counts, who can get a good education, and who has full bodily autonomy.

Climate disasters know no borders. Processes that allow people to remain, migrate, or return with dignity create stronger societies. Rooted in 20 years of lessons from Katrina and the global climate reparations vision, Taproot Earth asserts that migration is a climate solution and that all people have the right to remain, migrate, and return.