The Place of Gender in the Demography of Forced Migration

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reported the proportion of females among the 2010 global population of persons of concern as 49 percent of 33.9 million. Deviations from this overall proportion in particular places and spaces, and at different times in processes of forced migration provide the insight into the role of gender in forced migration and its demography. Issues of vulnerability, rarely resilience, however, flow from these metrics. In this paper I engage the ways in which gender informs the understandings of the demography of forced migration. Cultural values and social norms concerning gender are significant determinants of relative risk and exposure in complex humanitarian emergencies and environmental crisis which result in human flight, displacement and the search for safe haven. Failure to consider gender in the demography of forced migration weakens the relevance of demographic analysis for prevention of and response to complex humanitarian crises.