MIGRATORY MOVEMENTS: TYPES AND CAUSES - CULTURE VOCABULARY - 2025

The migratory movements are movements of people from one place to another that happen during a certain period of time. They always involve two concepts: emigration and immigration.

Emigration refers to that population movement in order to leave the place of residence and settle in another region or country. From the point of view of the issuing society, the people who participate in this process are considered emigrants.

For its part, immigration is the process of arrival in a country or region other than the place of origin. From the point of view of the host society, the people who participate in this movement are called immigrants.

Human migrations have occurred throughout history and in all parts of the world. In fact, according to historians and demographers, all countries in the world at some point in history have been transmitters and receivers of people.

Types

Migratory movements can be classified in different ways depending on the variable that is taken into consideration.

According to the place

Taking into account the places between which the migration takes place, we speak of internal or external migrations:

Internal migrations

They are the migratory movements that take place within the borders of a certain country. In general, this type of migration takes place from the countryside or small urban centers to larger cities.

This category includes the rural exodus, in which millions of peasants - especially adolescents and young adults - left the countryside to move to the city in search of better life opportunities. This phenomenon has been constant throughout history, intensifying with the Industrial Revolution.

External migrations

They refer to the movements of people outside their own country. Within external migrations, we speak of continental migrations, when the displacement occurs between countries of the same continent; or intercontinental, when the migratory flow occurs between countries on different continents.

According to motivation

When attention is paid to the will of migration or its causes, migrations are classified as forced or voluntary:

Forced migration

Forced migrations are the involuntary movements of people. At the origin of this type of migration there are situations that threaten life, such as wars, natural disasters, among others.

Voluntary migration

They are the migratory flows in which people leave their region or country on personal initiative, seeking a better quality of life. Generally, the motivation for this type of travel is economic.

According to the temporality

According to the temporality of the migration, these are divided temporary or permanent:

Temporary migration

They are those in which people move to another region or country for a period of time and then return to their place of origin.

Permanent migration

In permanent migrations, people move to another country or region for life. In the case of external migrations, their descendants acquire the nationality and cultural patterns of the destination.

According to the legal context

If we look at the legal context in which the migration is carried out, these are classified as legal and illegal:

Legal migrations

They are those that are produced following the rules and regulations established by the host country in its effort to regulate the movement of people to the border (migration policy).

People who settle within a country legally participate in the economy and social structure of the host country almost as residents.

Illegal migrations

They are also known as clandestine migrations. In this type of migration, people do not follow the rules and regulations established by the receiving country.

This disobedience may be due to the fact that they have entered the country undocumented or because, once they arrive in the country legally, they break the deadlines or fail to comply with the procedures required to remain in a legal situation.

People in this situation do not enjoy many of the rights to which the rest of the country's population has access and, for the most part, they are integrated into shadow economy models.

According to the place of the planet

We can also classify flows based on the place on the planet where they occur:

Migrations between underdeveloped countries

They are flows to receiving countries that present development conditions similar to the sending countries. This type of movement takes place basically between countries of the South and a great part of these are of forced origin.

Migrations between developed countries

They are flows to receiving countries that present development conditions similar to the sending countries. This type of movement occurs basically between northern countries and is mostly of voluntary origin.

Migrations between underdeveloped and developed countries

In this case, the movement takes place between countries with a low level of development towards countries with a high level of development.

People who carry out this type of movement usually have a low level of training and access jobs that are not highly valued in the host society.

Causes

Some of the reasons why people migrate are the following:

Policies

The migratory movement can be produced by political persecution that threatens the life or freedom of people who leave their place of origin. These people are called political exiles.

An example are the Spanish who left Spain after the Civil War or the Chileans who supported Salvador Allende and who, during the Pinochet dictatorship, had to leave the country.

Cultural

In voluntary migrations, an important factor when deciding to which country to emigrate is culture (religion, language, traditions, customs, etc.).

Cultural causes explain many of the migratory flows that have occurred between Latin America and Spain.

Socioeconomic

An important part of migratory movements originate from economic issues. People leave their place of origin to move to other regions or countries that offer them a better quality of life.

Examples of this type of migration is the movement of the population of Bolivians and Peruvians to neighboring countries such as Argentina or Chile.

Warfare

These are the origin of most of the forced migrations and generate massive population movements. People who enter a country or region fleeing from being exterminated are called refugees.

In this sense, Syria, Afghanistan and Africa are currently the emitters with the largest flow of refugees.

Generalized

This is the other great source of forced migratory movements. Droughts, floods, earthquakes and other phenomena have not only natural but also social impacts on the countries, generating significant displacement of people.

An example of this is the earthquake that occurred in Haiti in 2010, which has involved the displacement of many Haitians, mainly to Latin American countries.

References

1. Migratory Movements: Approaches and Evolution. Consulted on June 8, 2018, from fundacionaccesible.org.
2. Human migration. (nd). On Wikipedia. Accessed on June 8, 2018, from en.wikipedia.org.
3. Kallio, E. (2016). Human Migration. Consulted from iucn.org
4. Types of migrations. Consulted on June 8, 2018, from typesde.org
5. Castles, S. (2010). Irregular migration: causes, types and regional dimensions. Consulted from fundacionhenrydunant.org