Water Scarcity, Human Migration, and a Turn Toward Fascism
by Peter Montague, SEHN Fellow
Editor’s note: For readability purposes, Peter’s references for the many facts presented are listed at the end of the piece, rather than embedded.
Since 1750, the average temperature over land, worldwide, has risen at least 3 degrees Fahrenheit. With a 3 degree F rise, the air over land holds about 12 percent more moisture, making rainstorms more intense, causing more floods. In addition, as the average temperature rises, heat waves grow more extreme—hotter and longer-lasting than two or three decades ago. Now the soil is warmer and therefore drier than it used to be; at the same time, plants are drawing more water out of the soil—a double whammy causing more intense and longer droughts covering larger areas.
As the air warms, more mountain snowfall turns into rain and runs off quickly, depriving crops, livestock, rivers, fish and other wildlife of the traditional slow, steady snowmelt of spring and early summer. Glaciers are melting and disappearing, depriving many human communities of their historic supply of fresh water for drinking, domestic use, and farming. Rivers fed by snow-melt and/or glacier-melt run dry, fish disappear, animals suffer, and the land is parched.
Water is life
Water is essential for all life, and it sustains the global economy, enabling manufacturing, turning energy turbines, nourishing crops and livestock. Water scarcity affects farms, firms, families, communities and nations.
Figure 1: Global water stress hotspots. Hotspot areas are those classified by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as water scarce, and by World Resources Institute as areas with high, or extremely high, water stress. Source: World Meteorological Organization, 2021 State of Climate Services – Water (Geneva, Switzerland: World Meteorological Organization, 2021), pg. 8; http://bit.ly/3iE7RCu
“We need to wake up to the looming water crisis.”
In October 2021, the Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), professor Petteri Taalas, warned the world: “We need to wake up to the looming water crisis.” Since the year 2000, flood-related disasters have increased by 134 percent compared to the period 1980-2000. During the period 2000-2019, the number and duration of droughts increased 29 percent. The trend is unmistakable.
Climate change has created a permanent water problem, worldwide
Until we remove the cause of climate change (a trillion tons of CO2 that humans have added to the atmosphere since 1750)—which California has declared a policy priority—climate change will permanently disrupt the stability and predictability of the global water cycle. (Here “water cycle” means water evaporating from the surface of the ocean, drifting over land, falling to earth as rain and snow, flowing into rivers and finally back to the ocean.) For countless generations, stability of the water cycle—meaning how much water becomes available at what time of year—has allowed farmers, foresters, families, ranchers, urban designers, and energy planners to confidently predict water needs and availability. Now those traditional water patterns can no longer be counted on.
“What we haven’t understood until now is the extent to which the fundamental stability of our political structures and global economy are predicated on relative stability and predictability of the water cycle,” says Robert Sandford of the Institute for Water, Environment and Health at McMaster University in Toronto. “As a result of these new water-climate patterns, political stability and the stability of economies in most regions of the world are now at risk,” Sandford says.
Drought: No water, no food
Drought is caused by three factors: the amount of precipitation (rain, snow), the water demand by vegetation, and the rate of evaporation from soil. Soil evaporation and water demand by plants are both regulated by temperature. Together, water demand by plants plus evaporation from soil are called “evapotranspiration.” In some cases, even when precipitation is increasing, rising temperature can create drought from evapotranspiration. A recent satellite study by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) showed that, between 2003 and 2019, evapotranspiration from all the land on Earth increased 10 percent.
Wet areas of the world are growing wetter and dry areas are growing dryer, according to a NASA satellite study. “We are witnessing a huge hydrologic change,” says Jay Famiglietti of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Embedded within the dry areas we see multiple hotspots resulting from groundwater depletion.”
Groundwater is water lying below the surface of the land; it feeds springs and wells. Famiglietti points out that groundwater is like money in the bank—it sustains societies through the lean times of little rain and snow. However, despite its critical importance, groundwater has attracted little management attention compared to surface water in rivers and lakes. The result, he says, has been “a veritable ‘free for all’: property owners who can afford to drill wells generally have unlimited access to groundwater.” As a result, groundwater is being depleted in nearly all the world’s most productive agricultural regions, including areas of China, Australia, South America, India, the Middle East, and the U.S.—in the High Plains (from Nebraska southward to Texas) and California’s Central Valley. This is a slow-motion emergency created by naturally-occurring droughts made more frequent, more extensive, and longer-lasting by climate change.
Water scarcity leads to crop scarcity, which leads to human migration and, often, conflict. In 2020, an estimated 281 million people were living in a country other than their country of birth—128 million more than in 1990 and over three times the number in 1970. Seventeen of the world’s countries—home to 25 percent of global population—are already experiencing extreme water stress. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres recently warned that climate-related food shortages are threatening peace, worldwide. “Empty bellies fuel unrest,” he said. It seems unavoidable that the number of people displaced by water and food scarcity will continue to grow.
Increasing human migration, in turn, can threaten democratic self-rule, magnifying fascist tendencies. Witness the U.S. southern border where now about two million migrants per year—including families with children—are seeking asylum or a better life. This has become the political issue catalyzing the “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement, a white Christian nationalist cult that now dominates the Republican party. One presidential candidate has even quoted Adolph Hitler, saying immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.” “Call it what it is,” said Jon Lewis, a George Washington University researcher, “This is fascism.”
References
Temperature over land has risen 3 deg. F: http://bit.ly/45d95KE
Air over land holds 12% more moisture: http://bit.ly/3SnZopk
Now heat waves are growing worse: http://bit.ly/3DLbgZ1
Soil is drier & plants are drawing more water: https://bit.ly/48T1DHf
Mountain snow is turning to rain: http://bit.ly/3jD7dWN
Glaciers are melting: https://bit.ly/48kTpGq
Rivers fed by snowmelt or glacier-melt run dry http://bit.ly/4238f2U
Quotation: “Looming water crisis” https://bit.ly/3S2o4Cu
Droughts increased 29% (2000-2019): https://bit.ly/4b2l9m4
Until we remove the cause of climate change (a trillion tons of CO2) https://bit.ly/3ZorfHT
which California has declared a policy priority http://bit.ly/45QK74x
Quotation from Robert Sandford: http://bit.ly/2Wyl4zL
Evapotranspiration is regulated by temperature: https://bit.ly/490JZku
Evapotranspiration rose 10 percent globally, 2003-2019: https://bit.ly/490JZku
NASA: groundwater depletion is making drought worse: http://bit.ly/2ZAh48P
Agricultural areas where groundwater is being depleted: https://bit.ly/47GtwRj and https://bit.ly/425IS0D
281 million people now living outside their own country: https://bit.ly/48ZJXt8
25 percent of global population lives in 17 severely water-stressed countries: http://bit.ly/3woJ3Ik
Quotation: “Empty bellies…” https://bit.ly/49dh6lj
Number of people displaced by water scarcity will continue to grow: https://bit.ly/2ZBQGeK
2 million migrants at U.S. southern border: https://bit.ly/3UEVWIo
MAGA: https://bit.ly/47A7tLV and http://bit.ly/3HREwAH
“Poisoning the blood of our country:” https://bit.ly/3TYC9n4
“This is fascism.” https://bit.ly/425PrA5