Filling the Governance Gap

Abstract

The expansion ability of any of the IGOs investigated depends on both political environment and the institutional apparatus they have put in place. To date, the three established IGOs discussed in the previous chapter have come up short even under increasing pressure to expand, thus leaving a governance gap. While each has produced original research detailing their interpretation of this gap, none is yet actively seeking to close it within their own organizations. Each of the previously investigated IGOs had originated for a specific purpose: UNHCR to protect refugees, IOM to facilitate migration and resettlement, and UN OCHA to fill in the gaps left by the other two. As it stands, this new challenge may necessitate an individual response of its own and, indeed, a new IGO. Why a new IGO? Because the intricacies of climate change adaptation and migration schemes as adaptation are too complicated to simply slip into another existing IGO. There is the need to identify hotspots where the environmental and economic systems are already deteriorating, negotiate resettlement sites for different peoples, and invest in alternative livelihood training for displacees and temporary assistance while this is taking place. An IGO is also appropriate because the problem will only continue to grow, necessitating a full international buy-in in order to produce suitable results; a global problem needs a real global solution.