From Polybius to Dadaab: Traumatic Urbanization in the Anthropocene

The 2007 Fourth Assessment Report published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates that 145 million people will be permanently displaced from their homes in the next 90 years due to man-made climate change. This number is more than three times the number of people displaced today by wars, famine and natural disasters and yet little is being done within the humanitarian aid regime to create strategies for feeding and sheltering this destabilizing human tidal wave. This paper explores some historic context, root causes and potential strategies for a revised approach to traumatic urbanization.