3 Coming Out of the Country:

Population Growth, Migration, and

Urbanization
Gary S. Elbow

CHANGE IS COMING FAST IN THE THIRD WORLD. Unprecedented population

growth and its concentration in one or a few giant urban centers in each
country are the most evident signs of this change. For example, the Third
World's population is currently growing at a rate of about 1.9 percent per
year (Population Reference Bureau 1996). Since 1950, the population of the
Third World has grown by 173 percent, from 1,681 million (Merrick 1986:
12-13) to an estimated 4,600 million in 1996 (Population Reference Bureau
1996). During the same period world population rose by 129 percent, from
2,516 million to 5,771 million. Because of its faster rate of growth, the Third
World's share of global population rose from 67 percent in 1950 to 81
percent in 1996.
Meanwhile, an equally striking internal shift has occurred in many Third
World countries. This shift is the migration of millions of people from rural
areas to the region's cities. In the same 46-year period cited previously, the
percentage of urban population in the Third World rose from 17 percent
(Reitsma and Kleinpenriing 1985:169) to 35 percent (Population Reference
Bureau 1996). In numerical terms, this means that the number of city
dwellers has increased from 286 million in 1950 to 1,610 million in 1996, an
astonishing 463 percent increase! Much of this growth is concentrated in a
few megacities that dominate entire countries or regions. In the coming
decades the Third World will continue to be affected by high rates of
population growth and its concentration in urban centers.
The three phenomena noted here—rapid population growth, migration
from rural areas to the cities, and accelerated urban growth—are responses
to similar conditions and they are linked. Of course, not all new population
contributes to urban growth, and not all migration is to cities; but there is a
clear association—as population increases, people move from rural to urban
areas, and cities grow. The title of this chapter reflects this characteristic of
population dynamics in the Third World during the latter half of the
twentieth century.

Population
The population of the world in 1700 was about 680 million (Demeny
1990:42). It took the entire history of humans on earth to reach that number.
Since that time, global population has grown to about 5,771 million.
Depending on projections, the world will have between 7,135 and 9,135
million human inhabitants in the year 2025 (El-Badry 1991: 27). Just under
80 percent of the world's people live in the Third World, and the countries
with the highest rates of population growth are part of the Third World, so
that by 2025 the Third World population is projected to increase to between
82.5 and 84 percent of the world total.

World Distribution of Population Growth

Map 3.1 shows estimated rates of natural increase for the countries of the
world in 1996. Regional differences in the rate of natural increase are clearly
visible on this map. The countries with the lowest rates of population growth
are found in Europe, Russia and the other European members of the former
Soviet Union, and Anglo-America. The main exceptions are Australia, New
Zealand, and Uruguay, which are Southern Hemisphere outliers of European
culture, Cuba, and Japan, which has the lowest rate of natural increase of any
Asian country. Germany, Italy, Russia, the Balkan states, and several other
former Soviet republics and Eastern European states have negative rates of
natural increase, which means they are actually losing population if a zero
migration rate is assumed. Other countries in this group are growing so
slowly that it will take hundreds of years at the current rate for their
population to double.
The second quartile stands out as a large belt extending from Turkey
eastward to take in most of Asia, including China and India, the world's most
populous countries. Israel, Lebanon, and Tunisia are Mediterranean outliers,
along with the United Arab Emirates, Iceland, New Zealand, and Gabon, the
only Sub-Saharan African country to fall in the lower half of countries in
rate of natural increase. In the Western Hemisphere, most of the Caribbean
island states, Panama, and the South American countries of Argentina,
Brazil, Chile, Guyana, and Suriname fall into this category. Many of the
countries in the second quartile are undergoing rapid economic development
and fall into the category of "newly industrializing countries." Such
countries include Brazil, Chile, China, Indonesia, Singapore, South Korea,
Taiwan, Thailand, and Turkey. Argentina, Iceland,

MAP 3.1 Estimated rates of natural increase for countries of the world by quartile, 1996.
SOURCE: Population Reference Bureau. World Population Data Sheet (Washington, D.C.: Population
Reference Bureau, 1996).

Israel, and New Zealand are Europeanized countries in the second quartile
that have well-educated populations and relatively advanced economies.
 At the other extreme, the countries that make up the most rapidly growing
quartile are found principally in Africa and the Middle East, with a few
outliers in Central and South America, Southeast Asia, and among the
Pacific Island nations. These countries all have rates of natural increase of
2.8 percent or more, and their doubling times fall at twenty-five years or
less. This means they will have twice their current population in about one
generation. The total estimated population of the fourth-quartile countries for
1996 was 768 million. With a doubling time of twenty-five years or less,
they will account for more than 1,500 million of the earth's population in
2020 (Population Reference Bureau 1996). The third quartile countries are
concentrated in Africa and Latin America, but Malaysia, Vietnam, the
Philippines, New Guinea, the Himalayan countries of Nepal and Bhutan, and
some former Soviet central Asian countries also fall within this rapidly
growing group. If current rates of growth are sustained, the population of
these countries will double in twenty-six to thirty-two years.
Many rapidly growing countries are also among the world's poorest. This
contrasts with the slow-growing countries, many of which are among the
world's richest. In terms of the relationship of financial resources to
population, in twenty-five years, the slow-growing and well to-do countries
will be able to divide their very large economic pie among only a few more
people than they have today, whereas the poverty-stricken and rapidly
growing countries will have to stretch their limited resources to serve a
population that may have grown to twice its current size or more. If both the
population and the total national income in the rapidly growing countries
were to double during the next twenty-five years, they still would have the
same per capita income as they do today. If the slow-growing countries were
to double their total national income during the same time period, their per
capita income would be approximately twice what it is now. Seen from this
perspective, rapid population growth in the Third World is a multiple
liability. It places stress on limited natural resources, adds to the demand for
infrastructure such as schools, hospitals, housing, roads, utilities, and other
costly facilities, creates unmet demand for employment, and spreads already
limited financial resources among an ever-increasing number of people.
On the other hand, some economists and many Third World government
officials note that there is a historic association of rapid population growth
with economic development in Europe and North America (Weir 1991: 41-
44). For this reason, they believe that high rates of population growth are
essential for development to be achieved in their countries, and they often
interpret efforts of representatives of First World countries such as the
United States to promote fertility reduction as a scheme to prevent poor
countries from achieving their "natural" potential through population
growth.

The Demographic Transition Model

Around the middle of this century social scientists observed an association

of population growth rates with economic development and devised a
theoretical framework, known as the Demographic Transition Model, that
seemed to fit the patterns they found (Chung 1970). According to this model,
countries pass through four stages of population growth (see Figure 3.1).1
In the first stage of the model, a country has not yet begun the process of
development. Health conditions are poor and family planning is limited or
nonexistent, so both birth and death rates are high. Since high birth and
death rates compensate for each other, the rate of natural increase is low and
population grows slowly or not at all. As of 1997, no countries remained in
stage 1, although wars and natural disasters may temporarily increase death
rates enough in some marginal countries to move them into this category.
Rwanda, an African country that suffered a devastating civil war in 1993-
1994 may be one such case, as could be neighboring Zaïre, which
experienced a growing conflict between rebels and the government in the
spring of 1997.
Stage 2 includes countries that have just begun to receive some of the
health benefits associated with development, such as uncontaminated
drinking water supplies, large-scale immunization and disease control
programs, and prenatal and postnatal medical care for mothers and their
infants, all of which cause death rates to drop. Meanwhile, the social,
economic, and cultural factors that are associated with high birth rates
remain in place. The combination of declining death rates and high birth
rates leads to extremely high rates of natural increase, resulting in a rapid
increase in the nation's population. Some authors refer to this rapid
population increase as a demographic explosion (Reitsma and Kleinpenning
1985:33).
 In stage 3, death rates are reduced about as far as possible through the
institution of disease control measures and birth rates have begun to come
down in response to improved economic and education levels and better
access to family planning information and facilities. The result is a lower
rate of natural increase. However, population continues to grow at an
accelerated rate because such a high proportion of the population is young.
These people, who may make up nearly half of the total population in some
countries, are just entering their reproductive years. Thus, even if fertility
rates are reduced (the number of children per reproductive age female), the
population will still continue to grow rapidly because of the large base of
women in their reproductive years. This phenomenon, called demographic
momentum, is characterized by birth rates that must be brought down well
below replacement levels if a rapidly growing country's population increase
is to be stopped. The countries in the third and fourth quartiles on the map of
rates of natural increase are in stage 2 or stage 3 of the demographic
transition.

FIGURE 3.1 The demographic transition model

Stage 4, is characteristic of countries with advanced industrial economies.

In this stage, birth and death rates are nearly balanced, and the rate of natural
increase is again low, as it was in stage 1. The difference is, of course, that
the balance is maintained by low birth and death rates, not the high birth and
death rates of stage 1. The countries of the first and second quartiles of Map
3.1 are approaching or have entered stage 4 of the demographic transition.
Recently, some of the poorest and most rural countries have reduced their
fertility rates, causing researchers to argue that the mainly economic-based
explanations for reduced fertility of the Demographic Transition Model do
not satisfactorily account for patterns of population growth in Third World
countries (Robey, Rutstein, and Morris 1993). These researchers note that
government policies, cultural and religious values, levels of education
(especially of women), standards of living and social mobility, and access by
women to family planning information and materials are all important
variables in determining rates of fertility and, in turn, the rates of natural
increase within individual countries. Of these factors, access to
contraceptives is the most important, accounting for 90 percent of variation
in fertility rates among countries. Stated in other words, a 15 percent
increase in contraceptive use results in women on average bearing one less
child than otherwise would be the case (Robey, Rutstein, and Morris
1993:62). Increases in contraceptive use, in turn, are closely linked to
women's economic status and level of education. Improved education and
economic status for women are often a product of government policies.
Clearly, there is a close relationship among these factors (Kalipeni 1995).

Projections into the Future

Rates of natural increase are changing rapidly in many countries, and

prediction of future population trends is a risky business (Cohen 1996).
Nevertheless, some relatively short-term patterns seem to be fairly clear. In
Africa, 44 percent of the population is under 15 years old. In Latin America
the proportion of population under 15 is 35 percent, and in Asia it is 32
percent (Population Reference Bureau 1996). This youthful profile means
that populations in the Third World, and Africa in particular, can be expected
to grow rapidly for at least a couple of generations into the future, even if
fertility rates continue to drop. In contrast, rates of natural increase in First
World countries are at or close to the no growth point and only a relatively
small proportion of the population is young (22 percent for Canada and the
United States, 21 percent for Australia, 19 percent for Europe, and 16
percent for Japan), so their populations will grow slowly. Already, just under
four out of five people live in the Third World. The stark contrast in
population growth rates between the First and Third Worlds means that this
proportion will inevitably increase in the future.
 The unprecedented rates of population growth, combined with the ever-
widening gap between rich countries and poor ones, will contribute to
increasing tensions around the world. Many writers predict a Malthusian
collapse some time in the next century if radical measures are not taken to
reduce population growth (Ehrlich and Ehrlich 1970; Ponting 1991;
Meadows, Meadows, and Randers 1992; Zuckerman and Jefferson 1996).
According to this scenario, ever-increasing population, especially in Third
World countries, will eventually outstrip the world's food production
capacity, causing widespread famine, disease, and other disasters. At the
same time, the never-ending struggle to expand agricultural land to feed the
starving masses, combined with pollution from ever-increasing industrial
development in First World countries, will destroy sensitive ecosystems,
further reducing food-producing capacity and permanently reducing Earth's
ability to support humans.
Others believe that the world can support a much larger population than at
present and see maldistribution of resources rather than overpopulation as
the key issue (Dickenson et al. 1983: 66-68; Reitsma and Klein penning
1985: 224-227; Simon 1990). Critics of the Malthusian view observe that
food production has managed to keep up with rapid population growth in the
past and see no reason why new advances in technology should not enable
the world to feed the larger populations predicted for the future (Simon
1990: 92-102). Often the arguments are couched in terms of a conflict
between biologists and ecologists, who tend to view Earth's resources as
finite and diminishing through misuse, and economists, who see technology
as the key to supporting a growing human population (Begley 1994: 27).
Both points of view are represented in recent books by Lindahl-Liessling
and Landberg (1994) and Cohen (1995) on the relationship of population to
resources. Regardless of one's viewpoint on the impact of population
growth, it seems safe to predict that the Third World, with its rapidly
increasing share of the world's people, will demand an increasingly larger
part of the world's economic pie.

Migration
Movement is a characteristic of human populations. Until the invention of
farming about 10,000 years ago, the vast majority of humans were nomadic.
They lived in temporary settlements or camps and survived by collecting the
products that were available in the local environment. As food supplies were
exhausted in one place, people moved on to other areas to find new sources.
Human populations are still quite mobile and migration is a common
process,2 In most countries of the world there are few if any controls on
internal migration, and citizens are free to move from place to place as they
wish. On the other hand, all countries defend their national borders and
attempt to control movement by non-nationals into their territory. Legal
immigrants must qualify for visas, work permits, and other documentation.
Illegal immigrants are often exploited by unscrupulous smugglers and
occasionally die in the process of trying to gain entry to the country of their
choice (Perlez 1995: A3). Even if they gain entry to the desired country,
immigrants who lack proper documents are often forced because of their
status to work for low wages at undesirable jobs, and they live in constant
fear of discovery and expulsion. In addition, international migration is far
more likely than internal migration to require that the immigrant learn a
second language, adjust to new cultural and political conditions, and
otherwise make difficult and far-reaching adaptations to the new location.

Causual Factors in Migration

There are two classes of stimuli for voluntary migration. Conditions that
cause people to leave the place where they live are push factors, and
attractions that draw migrants to a particular place are pull factors. Push
factors include lack of employment opportunities, political, religious, or
racial persecution, warfare, famine, epidemic disease, and natural disasters.
Pull factors are availability of economic opportunities, better social,
educational, or health conditions, religious or political freedom, personal
security, or freedom from famine, epidemic disease, or natural disasters. Pull
factors may also include personal or family matters, such as a desire to live
close to aging parents, siblings, or other relatives, or the wish to enjoy
certain amenities, such as a mild winter climate, recreational opportunities,
or retirement facilities. This latter set of pull factors is characteristic of
relatively well-to-do migrants who have the means to make choices related
to amenities; that is, within certain limits, they can afford to live where they
want to. The first group of pull factors is related to personal security and
economic conditions. They dominate among poor people from Third World
countries, who tend to migrate for causes related to survival rather than to
gain access to amenities. Typically, migrants are influenced by a
combination of push and pull factors; that is, they have reasons for wanting
to leave where they are and they believe that conditions will be better at their
destination.
Examples of involuntary or forced migration include slavery, conscription
for service in military or other institutions, and involuntary relocation of
certain ethnic or religious groups. Slavery has largely passed from the scene,
and involuntary conscription (i.e., being shanghaied) has also nearly
disappeared. On the other hand, involuntary relocation still occurs. Current
examples are Bosnian Moslems in former Yugoslavia who were driven from
their homes as a part of ethnic cleansing, Marsh Arabs in the Tigris and
Euphrates River delta who were forced to leave their homes after the
deliberate drying up of the marshlands by the Iraqi government, and Hutu
tribespeople from Rwanda who fled to neighboring countries because of
ethnic conflict in their homeland.
Involuntary migrants fleeing political repression, warfare, or disaster may
be classified as refugees. In 1993 there were an estimated 16.255 million
refugees in the world (U. S. Committee for Refugees 1994: 40-41). These
are mainly people who were displaced from their homes by wars, totalitarian
governments, or natural disasters, and they are disproportionately located in
the Third World. Palestinians who fled the newly created state of Israel after
World War II are one of the longest-persisting refugee groups. Many of these
refugees, now estimated to be nearly 2.8 million, still live in Jordan, Egypt,
Lebanon, and the occupied territories of Israel.3 Sub-Saharan Africa led the
world with 5693 million refugees in 1993. This included over 1.6 million
refugees from Mozambique, nearly 700,000 Liberians, 420,000 Somalis,
420,000 Eritreans, and 370,000 Sudanese, but the largest bloc of African
refugees in the 1990s was Rwandans, who fled the civil war in their country
in the hundreds of thousands during 1994 and only began returning in large
numbers during 1996. There are just under 5 million refugees in the Middle
East, 2.7 million in Europe (mainly from former Yugoslavia and the former
USSR), and 2.15 million in south and central Asia (over half are Afghans).
 Government policies may encourage or discourage migration. For
example, policies that promote concentration of land in large parcels to
facilitate mechanization of agriculture may displace small farmers and force
them to find new land elsewhere or to move to a city. After the end of a
decade-long civil war in 1992 the government of El Salvador requested that
Salvadorans who had fled the country, mainly to the United States, not return
home immediately because the money they sent back to family members
was an essential part of the country's foreign exchange earnings and
necessary for the national reconstruction effort. For decades the government
of the Soviet Union refused to allow Jewish citizens, especially scientists, to
emigrate to Israel, using the argument that they had access to classified
information or had jobs that were essential to the country's well being. Until
1994, the United States granted political asylum to nearly any Cuban who
applied, while denying similar status to most Haitians and Salvadorans, for
example (see Harris 1995: 93-109 for a lengthy discussion of government
efforts to control immigration).

International Migration

There is no hard information on the number of international migrants in the

world. A1990 study by the International Organization for Migration
estimated the total number of international migrants worldwide at 80
million, including refugees. By 1992, other estimates had put the total at 100
million migrants, also including refugees. The latter estimate amounted to
less than 2 percent of the world's population in 1992 (Castles and Miller
1993:4).
Excluding refugees, the largest international migration flows are from the
Third World to industrialized areas such as the United States or western
Europe. Proximity and former colonial relationships are important influences
on the destination of migrants from the Third World to the First World.
Mexicans make up by far the largest group of foreign-born residents in the
United States; Indians, Pakistanis, West Indians, and other former colonials
make up a large share of migrants to the United Kingdom; Algerians,
Tunisians, and black Africans from former French colonies swell the
population of French cities; and the Netherlands receives migrants from its
former colonies, Indonesia and Suriname.
 Migration between Third World countries receives less publicity than
migration to northern America or Europe. Nevertheless, such migration may
be substantial. The case of Jordanian, Yemeni, Palestinian, Egyptian,
Pakistani, Filipino, and other workers in the Persian Gulf states is perhaps
the most notable example, but there are others. Hundreds of Bolivian
workers are employed in Argentina, and that country also receives
immigrants from Paraguay, Chile, and Peru. Before the collapse of the oil
economy in Venezuela, thousands of Colombians migrated across the border
to work in that country. In Africa, Ivory Coast and Nigeria have both been
recipients of migrant laborers from neighboring countries, and South Africa
depended for years on labor imported from Botswana, Lesotho, and
Swaziland. Most often, as shown in these examples, migrations from one
Third World country to another are to neighboring countries or nearby
countries within the same region.
Finally, it is worth noting that there are small but locally important flows
of permanent migrants from industrialized countries to the Third World.
There are retirement communities of United States citizens numbering in the
thousands in Mexico and Costa Rica. Elsewhere, military personnel,
employees of multinational corporations, technicians, and skilled workers
(notably, oil field workers) from industrialized countries live for years, if not
permanently, in Third World countries.
International migration has impacts on both the sending and receiving
countries. For the receiving country, migrants may fill essential jobs during
times when labor is needed. For example, the United States allowed
Mexican farmworkers to enter the country legally under the Bracero
Program, which operated between 1942 and 1964. Similar examples have
already been cited from the Middle East, where Kuwait, Saudi Arabia,
Bahrain, and other oil-rich Persian Gulf states import large numbers of
foreign workers. However, when there are economic downturns alien
workers may become a liability. At such times governments may look for
excuses to return migrant workers to their home countries, and prejudice and
jingoism may be directed against resident foreigners. Hostility manifested
against Turks living in Germany following the fall of the Berlin Wall is one
example of this phenomenon, as was the expulsion of tens of thousands of
Ghanaian workers from Nigeria during the mid-1980s. In 1991, thousands of
Jordanian and Yemeni workers were expelled from the Persian Gulf states
because their countries supported Iraq in the Gulf War.
 International migrants may have other impacts on the receiving country,
as well. Migrants often are among the most ambitious, best-educated, most
capable, and most upwardly mobile citizens of their home country, and they
may make substantial contributions to the receiving country. Some countries,
including the United States, recognize this potential benefit and structure
their immigration laws to favor admission of migrants with desirable training
or skills.
There are multiple impacts on the migrants' home countries. The loss of
skilled, well-educated young citizens who might have contributed to helping
the country achieve higher levels of economic development may be the
greatest impact. Often, immigrants have received higher education or
advanced training in the receiving country and subsequently find
employment there. The term "brain drain" came into vogue during the 1960s
to describe the loss of such highly trained and skilled professionals from
Third World countries to the First World. But international migration
probably yields more benefits than disadvantages to the sending country. The
greatest benefit is economic. It is common for international migrants to send
money to relatives who remain in the home country. These remittances may
make up a substantial part of the foreign exchange earnings of Third World
countries. A recent report notes that the members of the Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Development, which includes most developed
countries, contributed an estimated US$66,000 million in migrant
remittances during 1989 (Fornos and Burdett 1994: 5-6). Such funds are
used for home improvements, to set up businesses, to buy or improve
farmland, and for a multitude of other economically beneficial purposes.
Finally, many migrants eventually return to their country of origin. These
returnees may bring home useful skills, that were acquired during their
sojourn abroad, and most of them also bring funds with them that were saved
during their time away. Like remittances, these funds may be used to acquire
property or set up a business in the home country (Jones 1995).
There may be political benefits to sending countries, as well. In Mexico,
for example, the proximity of the United States as a source for employment
offers a safety valve that reduces political pressure on the Mexican
government to institute economic reforms. Some countries may utilize
international migration as a way of getting rid of political dissidents or
opponents of the regime in power. The migration of approximately 800,000
mostly well-to-do and politically conservative Cubans to the United States
after the Castro revolution in 1959 is but one example of many that reflect
this process (West and Augelli 1989:137).

Internal Migration

Until recently, data on internal migration in Third World countries were

difficult to obtain (Man, Serow, and Sly 1990: 7-8). They are still hard to
compare because they are collected by the government of each country and
are not standardized. However, it seems likely that there are several times
more people who migrate from one place to another within their country
than there are international migrants. Whatever the total number of internal
migrants there may be, their movement has transformed Third World
countries.
Internal migration may involve several different types of move. People
may move from one rural area to another, they may colonize previously
undeveloped areas that are made accessible by new roads, they may move
from the countryside to nearby small towns, from small towns to large cities,
go directly from rural areas to cities, or migrate from large cities to small
towns or rural areas. Most of the attention to internal migration focuses on
rural to urban migration because of the rapid growth of cities. However, one
should not overlook rural to rural migration. This form of migration is
usually expressed in colonization of formerly unpopulated or relatively
underutilized areas, in particular tropical forests. This has led to a general
association of population growth with deforestation of tropical rain forests in
Latin America, Africa, and Asia, although it should be noted that clearing of
tropical forests may also be a product of lumbering or expansion of cattle
ranching, and only peripherally related to population growth (Williams
1990).
One can get an impression of the extent of rural-to-urban migration in
Third World countries by referring to the data in the opening paragraphs of
this chapter, reflecting the unprecedented increase in urban population
during the twentieth century, which can only be accounted for by massive
rural-to-urban migration.
The consequences of urban migration on the receiving areas are discussed
in the following section on urbanization. The impacts on the sending areas
are varied. Migrants tend to be young adults in the 20-29 year age range
(Man, Serow, and Sly 1990: 12). Removing sizable numbers of young men
from the rural population may cause shortages of agricultural labor. On the
other hand, it also relieves pressure on resources, which may be a serious
problem in rural areas of some Third World countries. Since it is usually the
more aggressive and adventuresome who migrate, their potential
contribution is lost to the home community. Also, aged parents may be left
with fewer options for survival in their old age if all or most of their children
emigrate to the city. However, many of these consequences are subtle and
probably have a much smaller impact on the sending area than immigration
has on the cities.

Urbanization
Fifty years ago, at the end of World War II, New York, London, Tokyo, and
Paris headed the list of the world's largest urban agglomerations (Table 3.1).
All of these urban centers were in industrialized countries. Only three Third
World urban centers, Shanghai, Buenos Aires, and Calcutta, made the list of
the ten largest cities of the world, and Buenos Aires was marginally Third
World at the time. In 1989, the list of the world's largest cities included
Mexico City, Sao Paulo, Seoul, Bombay, Calcutta, and Buenos Aires, all of
which are in Third World countries. By 2035, the list will include only one
city in a currently industrialized country, Tokyo/Yokohama, and it
TABLE 3.1 World's Ten Largest Urban Agglomerations, 1950,1989, and projected to 2035
will be the smallest of the lot (Table 3.1). As the table suggests, Third World
cities are currently growing at unprecedented rates and are projected to do so
for the next several decades. How and why has this transformation come
about and what does it mean for the countries in which these cities are
located and for the rest of the world?

Levels of Urbanization

Map 3.2 shows the percentage of urban population for the countries of the
world by quartile. Just as with rates of natural increase, which are discussed
at the beginning of this chapter, there are striking regional differences in
levels of urbanization in the Third World. Latin America stands out as the
most urbanized part of the Third World whereas Africa and Asia are the least
urbanized. The low level of urbanization in some of the world's most
populous countries—China, India, Indonesia, and Bangladesh, for example
—is striking. Not revealed in the map is a strong correlation between per
capita gross national product and percent urban population (Gilbert and
Gugler 1982: 8). This suggests a relationship between a country's level of
development and growth of cities. However, differences in regional history
since the beginning of the colonial era are also involved, along with other
factors.

Characteristics of Third World Cities

Third World cities share a number of distinguishing characteristics. These

include a tendency for primate city dominance, maintenance of established
circulation patterns, high rates of urban unemployment, the presence of
squatter settlements, and an active informal economy (Jones 1990: 222-227).

Primate Cities. Primate cities dominate their country or region. They are at
the top of the urban hierarchy and are at least twice as populous as the
country's next largest city.4 National capitals are often primate cities (some
examples are London, Paris, Mexico City, Buenos Aires, Abidjan, and
Jakarta). As this list shows, not all primate cities are in the Third World; in
fact, some of the First World's most famous cities fall into this category.
Still, the phenomenon tends to be strongly identified with the Third World.
Why does this type of urban hierarchy appear in Third World countries
and what does it mean? One answer to this question is that many Third
World countries have highly centralized governments. These governments
are housed in the capital and largest city. The concentration of government
activities, in itself, is a spur to urban growth because it creates
MAP 3.2 Percent urban population for countries of the world by quartile, 1996

jobs that attract migrants from rural areas. In addition, the national
government has vast control over fiscal resources, which it tends to spend
disproportionately in the capital city and surrounding areas, even though this
money often comes from distant provinces. The wealthiest and most
prestigious families, from which come many of the business, cultural, and
political leaders of the country also tend to live in the capital city. Their
economic and political power further enhances the primate city. Primate
cities also offer a wide range of advantages to business and industry, which
tend to locate there for access to government officials, financial backing
from big city banks, skilled labor, customer access, transportation facilities,
and supplies. Thus, the primate city attracts power and resources at the
expense of the rural areas and smaller cities, which are isolated by poor
transportation, underserved by national government institutions, lacking in
educational and health facilities, and short on employment opportunities, all
of which further inhibit their development.
Once a dominant primate city emerges, it is very difficult to reverse the
process of accelerated and focused growth. Some countries have attempted
to decentralize industry, government functions, and funds for government
projects from the primate city to the provinces, but resistance is great and the
results are rarely satisfactory. Putting resources into designated growth pole
areas is another strategy that has been used to slow the growth of the primate
cities, but this also is rarely successful. The projected 2035 populations
shown in Table 3.1 suggest the extent of the problem.

Circulation. Urban residents in Third World countries often retain close ties
to family and friends in the places they left. Return trips on weekends and
for holidays are very common, as are visits for birthdays, religious events,
and other special occasions. Such movements are referred to as circulation.
Circulation patterns are revealed in other ways, as well. People from the
country may move temporarily to the city to live with relatives who have
previously established themselves there. Teenagers or college-age youths
may live with relatives while they go to school, but plan eventually to return
to the smaller towns from which they came. Many unskilled workers move
to the city temporarily to try their hand at finding a job. As long as they have
work they stay, but when the work runs out, they return home again.
Employed workers may return home on weekends to be with family and
never establish a formal, permanent residence in the city. These patterns are
present in industrialized countries, too, but they appear to be considerably
more common in the Third World. However, data on circulation are hard to
obtain because censuses fail to ask the questions that would reveal the extent
of the practice (Jones 1990:222).

Squatter Settlements. High levels of unemployment, underemployment, and

poverty are common to all Third World cities. Since economic necessity is
the primary attraction that pulls migrants from rural areas to the city, it
stands to reason that they arrive in the city with very limited financial
resources. One way to cope with the problem of survival is for the migrant to
live with relatives or friends who are already established. For this reason,
having contacts in the city may be a key element in an individual's decision
to move there. This relationship is reflected in the existence of areas in the
city that house concentrations of migrants from the same village, city, or
province; and regionally based social organizations may be formed to help
migrants adjust to the city (Doughty 1970: 32-34). But sooner or later, the
new migrant must face the problem of finding a place to live. Generally, the
only choice for the new arrival, who probably is earning a marginal salary at
best, is to locate an old house in a city-center slum in which to rent or share a
room. In many countries, the only choice for those without a job may be to
live on the street. Eventually, if the migrant stays in the city and has a family,
he or she will need to find permanent quarters. For most working-class and
even many marginal middleclass individuals this probably means living in a
squatter settlement.
Squatters look for a vacant piece of land within the city, or more
commonly, at the outskirts, and put up a shack with whatever materials may
be available. A single squatter has little chance of avoiding eviction, but if
dozens or even hundreds of families organize themselves and arrive at the
same time on a piece of land, it can be very difficult to eject them. This
applies especially to land that is owned by the government (Reitsma and
Kleinperining 1985:193). Often, the public seeing news broadcasts or
newspaper photographs of police or the army driving poverty-stricken
squatters from unused government land has a higher political cost than the
government is willing to pay. Even if the land taken over by squatters
happens to be privately owned, the government may find it politically
advantageous to expropriate the property in the name of the squatters and
compensate the owners.
However, all this takes time, often many years, and sometimes it is never
accomplished. In the interim, the squatters have no title to their land, and
they cannot legally obtain public services such as potable water, sewers and
garbage collection, paved streets and sidewalks, bus service or electricity.
Sometimes such services are pirated by running electric wires from nearby
power lines, tapping city water mains, or other means of access, but these
temporary solutions are not really satisfactory, either for the squatters or for
the city government. As a result of the lack of services and poor housing,
sanitary conditions in the squatter settlements are often terrible and mortality
rates high.
Squatter settlements create other problems, as well (Reitsma and
Kleinpenning 1985:192-194). Often they are built in areas that are
physically unsuitable for development because they are on steep slopes, are
in poorly drained marshes, along flood plains that are subject to periodic
flooding, or for other reasons. As a result, squatter settlements are often the
victims of natural hazards such as landslides or flooding, and they may cause
problems for formal residential areas nearby. For example, squatter
settlements on steep slopes may contribute to flooding of downslope areas
through increased runoff. At best, the squatter settlements create a demand
for services that the cities are hard-pressed to meet. Also, squatters divide up
land informally in their settlements and they rarely leave sufficient land for
streets, which are not very important for people who cannot afford cars and
who might prefer to discourage government vehicles from entering. This
may make it very difficult to lay water and sewer lines into the settlements,
and it may prohibit the construction of streets. At best, the cost of providing
the services may be increased by the conditions of the squatter settlement.
Despite all their problems, squatter settlements have defenders
(Dickenson et al. 1983:189-190; Turner 1970:1-19). They provide a way of
incorporating new migrants into the city, they offer low-cost housing at no
direct economic cost to the state (but, as noted previously, there may
eventually be considerable indirect costs), and they may contribute
substantially to grassroots organization of poor urban dwellers to help
themselves. In the latter case, squatter settlement residents often improve
their houses, beginning with the flimsiest of shacks and ending up with
relatively substantial dwellings that they could never afford to buy even in
the poorest of formal neighborhoods in the city. Eventually, according to
their defenders, squatter settlements evolve into stable, residential areas with
longtime residents. Most social scientists seem to believe that the benefits of
squatter settlements outweigh the disadvantages for Third World cities.

The Informal Economy. A final observation on Third World cities is that one
invariably sees people on the street selling newspapers, cigarettes, candy,
and other items, offering to shine shoes, watch a car or wash it, or perform
other services. These street peddlers and sellers of services are part of the
informal economy. Unable to find work in the formal sector (i.e., working in
a store, factory, or some other regular job for a salary) they are forced to eke
out a living as they can. Most members of the informal sector are poorly
educated and lack skills, so they have few alternatives to living from the
informal economy. However, relatively well-educated and skilled people
may also be found in the informal economy. Government red tape and
bureaucratic hurdles in some countries may make obtaining the business
licenses required for legal operation so troublesome and time consuming that
shop owners and small manufacturers ignore the law. In other cases jobs in
the formal sector are so poorly paid that clever, hardworking individuals
may earn more in the informal sector, and a few informal workers manage to
earn quite a good living. However, it is far more common to find that
economically marginal people for whom there are no other alternative
sources of income make up the vast majority of informal sector workers.
The informal sector in some countries accounts for an important part of
earned income. One problem with assessing the importance of the informal
sector is that income is not reported, so it is difficult to find out how many
people are involved and what their incomes are. Since members of the
informal sector do not report their income to the government, nor pay taxes
on it, they are ineligible to receive social security and other benefits received
by workers in the formal sector. Nevertheless, few would argue that informal
workers are not an important part of the urban economy of Third World
countries.

Conclusion
The processes of population growth, migration, and urbanization affect the
development of Third World countries in myriad ways. Rapid population
growth demands scarce resources to provide schools, hospitals, houses, and
other infrastructure for the ever-increasing throngs. Also, the country's
limited resources must be divided among more and more individuals, which
means that the national economy must grow constantly just to keep up with
the increase. Population growth also places stress on natural resources such
as forest land, which must be sacrificed to make way for new farms to feed
additional mouths.
Migration is one result of overpopulation in rural areas. Adventurous
migrants may enter the international migration stream, but most move within
their home country. Urban areas receive many of these internal migrants,
who contribute to growth of cities. In the cities, migrants struggle to find
jobs, locate housing, and establish themselves. Common characteristics of
Third World cities reflect this situation. These characteristics include the
presence of squatter settlements and a large informal sector.
 Primate cities are common in the Third World. These cities dominate the
urban hierarchy and may absorb a disproportionate share of the national
resources. As a primate city continues to grow and pull resources from
outlying rural areas and smaller cities, it creates more poverty in the
peripheral areas and draws even more migration to itself. Diverting more
resources to peripheral areas to break this cycle has not been notably
successful in the past, so new strategies will likely be needed to divert
growth away from the traditional primate centers.
Meanwhile, population growth is slacking off in many Third World
countries. This may mean that rates of natural increase have peaked and will
slowly begin to decline. However, because of demographic momentum,
Third World population will continue to increase rapidly well into the
twenty-first century. Also, regional differences in rates of population growth,
urbanization, and economic development will continue to differentiate Third
World regions and countries. One cannot apply the same generalizations
about population growth to China and India, or to Argentina and Mexico.
Nor can levels of urbanization in Africa be equated with Latin America.
These differences must be considered in any evaluation of future
developments in the Third World. It remains to be seen if the projections of
future world population and metropolitan area size presented in this chapter
will prove to be accurate, and chances are they will not be. But whatever the
future brings, the answers lie in the dynamics of Third World population
growth, migration, and urban expansion.

Notes
1. Some demographic transition models, such as that developed by Chung, identify three stages of
population growth rather than four as used in this chapter. In those models stages 2 and 3 are
combined.
2. Not all human mobility is classified as migration. Migration must include a relatively long-term
change of residence. Repetitive movements, such as commuting to work or school, or
temporary changes of residence to attend school, a training program, or for work do not
constitute migration. These short-term and often habitual movements are referred to as
circulation. Mike Parnwell (1993: 11-28) provides a comprehensive review of migration forms
and the terminology applied to them.
3. As a result of negotiations between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, Palestinians
in Gaza and certain West Bank communities are now partly self-governing and may no longer
be classified as refugees.