Researchers, international institutions and policymakers increasingly describe contemporary migration in Africa as the product of “interlocking crises”. The term captures a simple fact: human displacement rarely stems from a single cause, but from the interaction of several crises at once, tied to climate, security, the economy and society.

“Interlocking crises” recognises that today’s flows result from interconnected forces. According to analyses by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, the movement of people is often driven by a mix of conflict, poverty, climate change and food insecurity.

Migration, in other words, is no longer driven by one factor such as war or poverty, but by situations in which several crises reinforce one another.

Conflict and insecurity

Conflict remains a key driver of migration. In West and Central Africa, more than 12.7 million people have been forcibly displaced.

These conflicts no longer stand alone. In the Sahel, violence often goes hand in hand with competition for natural resources such as water and land, with structural poverty and with political instability.

In some areas, drought or desertification can sharpen tensions between communities and tip them into armed conflict and mass displacement.

The security crisis is now bound up with environmental and economic crises.

Climate change

Climate plays a central role in this interplay. It does not always cause migration directly, but it deepens existing vulnerabilities.

Over the past decade, around 250 million cases of internal displacement have been linked to climate-related disasters.

Roughly 75% of displaced people live in countries highly exposed to climate risk.

The effects include lost livelihoods in farming and livestock, food insecurity, reduced access to water and rising social tension.

In parts of the Sahel, climate-related losses can push people to join armed groups, creating a vicious circle between climate and conflict.

Climate, then, acts as a “crisis multiplier”.

Poverty and inequality

Economic crises are another key strand of this interconnected dynamic.

Migration is often driven by youth unemployment, a lack of economic opportunity and regional inequality.

These pressures are frequently worsened by conflict, which destroys local economies, and by climate change, which cuts farm yields.

The result is a multidimensional trap from which people cannot escape, where leaving becomes a survival strategy.

“Mixed migration”

International organisations now use this term for such situations.

According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), these movements bring together people travelling side by side but for different reasons: refugees, economic migrants, victims of trafficking and unaccompanied children.

A single route, in other words, can carry people with very different profiles and motives, from security fears to economic hardship to climate stress.

Interlocking crises make the old migrant categories ever harder to pin down.

Cascading effects along the routes

The interconnected nature of these crises does not stop at the point of departure. It runs the length of the journey.

Migrants are exposed to conflict zones, criminal networks, trafficking and extreme violence.

These risks track the simultaneous decline of security, economic and political conditions in transit countries.

Migration itself, as a result, becomes a prolonged crisis rather than a simple move from one place to another.

A “perfect storm”, in the language of international institutions

Some organisations use this phrase for such situations. In West Africa, a mix of crises, climate, conflict and poverty, has driven the repeated displacement of millions, often within the same areas.

Displaced populations face repeated, successive shocks, while host countries are themselves fragile. The upshot is a prolonged, systemic humanitarian crisis.

Reading migration through the lens of interlocking crises changes how we look for solutions.

Narrow approaches focus on either security (border control) or the economy (job creation) alone.

Integrated approaches, by contrast, connect the dots. International institutions call for coordinated responses across humanitarian aid, climate and security, stronger regional cooperation and action on root causes such as climate change, poverty and poor governance.

The “route-based approach”, for instance, coordinates action along migration corridors rather than tackling each issue in isolation.