Ravenstein’s Laws of Migration

BY: Donovan Horton

Morris Kindler

Ravenstein’s First Rule

People Migrate Short Distances: People migrate short distances because it is easier, more

affordable and also more convenient.

Ravenstein’s Second Rule The process of Absorption: Absorption is the process of a population migrating to an area with

a great pull factor. This is represented in tiers, meaning that the migrants closest to the

hearth move to the hearth and the next subsequent tiers will fill in the gaps in the tiers before.

An example is in Atlanta, in 2000 the population of Georgia was roughly 8 million now the population is at a size of over 20 million.

Although Atlanta is the main pull factor of Georgia not everyone can live in Atlanta, so many people have settled in the surrounding suburbs

Ravenstein’s Third Rule

The Law of Dispersion: Opposing the Law of Absorption there is the Law of

Dispersion. This basically states that people don’t migrate in a massive

burst and that it takes time to have population move from one place to the next.

Each does not make a long trip, but instead moves to fill in available gaps.

Ravenstein’s Fourth Rule

Each Migration Flow has a compensating counter-flow:

This Rule states that if someone wishes to move into and area someone must first move out to free up the space.

This is part of this model that is slightly disproved by the making of new residencies

Ravenstein’s Fifth Rule

Long-distance migrants go to one of the great centers of commerce and industry:

Ravenstein states that if migrants disregard rules 1 and 2 then the pull factor is to be a center for major economic opportunity.

Ravenstein’s Sixth Rule

Natives of towns are less migratory than those from rural areas:

This is because towns are a modernized form of living and appeal to younger migrants to stay.

While rural areas have certain unappealing qualities that can cause for younger migrants to lose interest and migrate to a new lifestyle

Ravenstein’s Seventh Rule

Females migrate more within a country while males tend to travel internationally:

This is due to the ratio of men to women in the overseas job because the job sector is still unbalanced in certain job fields having less females then their probably should be.

Ravenstein’s Eighth Rule

Economic factors are the main cause of migration: Ravenstein noticed that most migration was for an

economic reason by correlating census data with economic data.

Ravenstein’s Ninth Rule

Large population centers grow more by Net-In Migration than by Natural Increase.

Population centers have a pull factor that attracts many people that grows in attraction as more people gather causing cities, such as Atlanta, to swell rapidly.

Ravenstein’s Tenth Rule

Migration increases in volume as transportation and Industry increases:

Transportation affects the volume of migration due to the easy accessibility of getting to certain areas

Industry is a major pull factor causing the economic opportunity to increase and therefore increasing the number of migrants coming to that population cluster.

Summary

This model mainly focuses on the natural behaviors that people exhibit being applied to migration using a statistical analysis. This model is now only somewhat relevant seeing as how the constant building of Real Estate continues and people often migrate back to rural areas or other areas away from population clusters after they retire and are no longer gaining economic opportunity. Overall though these rules are beneficial to the understanding of human migration within a country.