FLOOD RELOCATION AS POLITICAL BARGAINING: CLIMATE DISPLACEMENT, LAND ACCESS AND GOVERNMENT LEGITIMACY IN THE SUDD BASIN

Background: In the Sudd Basin, however, movement also redistributes access to land, grazing routes, markets, schools and political recognition. Objective: This article interprets relocation as a form of political bargaining among displaced households, receiving communities, customary authorities, local governments and humanitarian agencies. Descriptive ratios are calculated transparently, whereas no original household survey, causal regression or Sudd-specific relocation microdata are claimed. Methods: It combines documented South Sudan flood and displacement counts with qualitative institutional analysis and proposes a transparent county-level research design. Results: Flood relocation is usually treated as an emergency logistics problem: identify threatened households, transport them to higher ground, and provide immediate assistance. Conclusion: The United Nations Climate Security Mechanism reported that over 1.4 million people were affected and approximately 380,000 displaced by the 2024 floods; the Global Protection Cluster reported 379,000 flood-related new displacements during 2024.