Three pre-concepts regarding the internal migration in Bolivia
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Hubert Mazurek
(Body part of article only, without summary, introduction and conclusion)
Pre-concept 1: the flows go from west towards east
The reference map in the majority of publications (news media as a scientific publication,
CODEPO, 2004, p. 125) is based on the annual net rate of migration (see map 1). This map
perfectly shows the rupture existing between east (or lowlands) where the net rate is positive, and west, particularly the high plateau region, where the net rate is negative; even though it is necessary to clarify the distribution contained in a series of significant exceptions: neighboring regions and the urban periphery that still keep attracting, a great part of Chaco, Chapare and Beni started to lose their population.
The conclusion about which most of the writers come to is that: “the estimated net rate of migration has allowed us to identify Pando, Santa Cruz, Tarija and Cochabamba, in this established order, as the regions of attraction, insomuch as Potosí, Oruro, Beni, Chuquisaca and La Paz as the ones of losing more population” (CODEPO, 2004, p. 141). That is true in the statistical sense but, does this mean that “there is a movement of the population from west towards east”?
In this first close up view, we will say that there are municipalities that are losing population and
others that are gaining them by means of migration, but it is not said when, how or where these
flows are directed to.
The previous analysis, which is situated at a “stock” level, in other words, the absolute quantity of people who migrate, can not be interpreted without a complementary analysis of “flows” which would indicate the origin and destination of the migrating population. 4
The first element of flow analysis, in this article’s context, is to know where the highland’s migrants go to.
Map 2 shows the amount of immigration from, and to other, municipalities located in the
highlands (municipality in gray color); it also shows the participation of the highland’s immigrants to the total immigration of the municipality.
The majority of those who migrate from the highlands go to… in the highlands and mainly in the
cities. The first destination is south of the region of La Paz and the city of El Alto where more than 80% of the immigrants come from the highlands. Some of the border sites can also be located (Villazón, Tarija, Bermejo or Yacuiba) and the Yungas. The case of Cochabamba and its periphery is also significant when talking about destinations of migration.
The city of Santa Cruz has less immigrants coming from the highlands, than the city of
Cochabamba and that doesn’t represent more than 28% of the total immigration. The rest of the
lowlands receive a low amount of people from the highlands with a proportion almost always less
than 30%.
The lowlands (including the Valley region and the cities of Cochabamba and Sucre) received
149,120 people for a total immigration of 503,141 people (29.6%), meanwhile the highlands
received 165,256 people out of a total of 229,269 immigrants (72%).
Therefore, we can propose a second question: from where do the people migrating to the lowlands come from? Map 3 answers this question. It is about the origin of the population that migrates towards the region of Santa Cruz.
This region attracts very few from the highlands, but from three different origins:
• The cities: La Paz, Cochabamba, the peripheries of these cities (except for El Alto), and in a
greater proportion the intermediate cities and the capitals of the regions (except for Cobija). 5
• Inside one of the nearby zones of attraction: south of Cochabamba, Chuquisaca, Vallegrande
area, Chaco (in these two last cases it is about a migration towards another municipality of the
region)
• Municipalities in Beni.
The pre-concept of a massive migration from west towards east does not seem to be verified;
migration of nearness or cultural migration, in the sense of a migration in the same cultural zone,
seems to be the most adequate rule. The most important migration remains in the nearby cities
which allow them to keep a cultural and economic link with their place of origin. It is an important feature of internal migration which has been maintained for several decades.
At this stage of reasoning, it is important to analyze if this cultural component (which will be taken up again at the end of this publication) is a common feature to all migration in Bolivia, particularly of migration towards cities which represents the greatest proportion.
For this purpose, we have analyzed the origin of migration from municipalities towards the 4 main cities in Bolivia: El Alto, La Paz, Cochabamba and Santa Cruz, as shown in map 4. These maps show a result of the population who have moved from their place of residence in the last 5 years. The circles show the amount of the population, an absolute result, who has migrated towards or from the corresponding city. The municipalities in a lighter gray color have a negative result of migration, while the ones in a darker gray color have a positive result.
We are able to observe four behaviors of migration towards cities which correspond to very
different cultural models:
• La Paz is a city with a negative result, mainly due to employment issues and the impossibility
of a geographical growth in the urban zone. There is a small zone of attraction remaining, to
the north of Lake Titicaca (the Quechua part) but La Paz continues to lose its population. The
emigrant’s destination is mainly the big cities of the country, and particularly El Alto due to
the phenomenon of its proximity, and Santa Cruz due to the economic attraction for
professionals. 51% of emigrants from La Paz go to three cities: El Alto, Santa Cruz and
Cochabamba. 7
• El Alto, a neighboring city, shows an opposite behavior. This city loses a very small
population (18% of the total of migrants) and attracts very few from outside of its zone of
immediate influence: south of the city of La Paz, and particularly the surroundings of Lake
Titicaca. The attraction or emigration towards other regions is represented by no more than
28% of the total of emigrants. Migration towards El Alto corresponds to a case of conformity
of a very structured cultural and economic basin, where we know that mobility is often more
important than definitive migration. A great proportion of the population still has double
residency, in their community of origin (maintaining agricultural activity) as well as in the
city (opportunity of new ways of activity).
• Cochabamba has always been a city of transition and map 3 confirms this behavior. The city
attracts the population from neighboring municipalities (peripheries of the cities, south of the
region, west of Oruro and north Potosí), mainly from the highlands and the Valley zone, and
loses population towards the lowlands. The migratory result for Cochabamba is almost invalid
(-9,060 people which is 8% of the volume of migration); losing 28,396 (27% of the total of
migrants) towards the lowlands and the Valley, gaining 20,171 people (19%) from the
highlands. It has a double behavior, as mediator between El Alto and Santa Cruz, where there
exists the conformity of a basin of migration of proximity associated with a city to city
emigration.
• Santa Cruz also has this basin of migration, but losing population towards it and not attracting
from it. The result of migration is important (54,207 people which is 30% of the total of
migrants) and the immigration comes mainly from the capital cities of this region.
Immigration from rural areas is very limited; on the contrary, Santa Cruz has a tendency of
losing population towards its own rural zone. 50% of immigration comes from seven cities:
La Paz, Cochabamba, Sucre, Trinidad, Oruro, Camiri, Montero; practically all the negative
result corresponds to an emigration towards other municipalities of the region of Santa Cruz
(Cotoca, La Guardia, San Ramón, San Carlos, Warnes, etc.) and … in the city of El Alto
(result of -758 people or 23% of migrants between Santa Cruz and El Alto).
In conclusion to this first part, it could be said that there is no real surprise: migration does not
follow a flow model from west towards east, but instead it responds to three well known
components in the study of migration: migration of proximity, most important flows from and
towards cities (principle of gravity) and attraction based on culture with conformation of basins of migration which can have more or less cultural or economic importance.
Long distance rural migration is of less importance; on the contrary migration tends to reinforce
urban poles of proximity. However there is a long distance urban migration – urban that represents the highest proportion of movement. The interpretation of these two phenomenon, still not well known, leads us to suppose that there is a migration by stage, from rural towards the nearest urban pole, and in a second stage a migration of greater reach towards a big city or a colonization zone.
What should be highlighted is the conformity of regions or basins of migration in various
geographical zones that does not always have to do with definitive migration. Multi residence is a common phenomenon in Bolivia, which allows people to have a remunerated activity in the city while maintaining a link with their community of origin and agricultural activities. Such is the case of the surroundings of Lake Titicaca towards El Alto, from Chaco towards Santa Cruz, or from the mining zones of Oruro and Potosí.
Pre-concept 2: The pattern of distribution of the population has changed and everybody lives in the lowlands
This pre-concept arises from the discourse about the major axis of the population of La Paz/El Alto – Cochabamba – Santa Cruz, taken up again by and being inside of public policies, particularly in national policies of territorial law (MDSP, 2001). At this level there is confusion between the structural axis of the four major cities and the traditional axis of territorial occupation. This traditional axis (see map 5) is structured around the inter-Andean Valley zone, from Lake Titicaca towards Villazón/Bermejo. The central axis (La Paz – Santa Cruz) has a dynamic due to the presence of big cities; however the weakness of the communication system (particularly the old road Cochabamba – Santa Cruz) leaves empty locations between these cities. The real dynamic of the lowlands is in the city of Santa Cruz and not in the rest of the territory (Santa Cruz city’s population represents 56% of the population of the region, or 40% of the population of the regions of Pando, Beni, Santa Cruz and Tarija).
On the contrary, the traditional axis shows a continuity of locations of territorial occupation which is reinforced by new axes of communication, La Paz – Tarija, nowadays it is almost fully asphalted.
The diagram of road integration allows us to think that this traditional axis can be reinforced by
priority exchanges towards neighboring countries.
The territorial occupation has not changed significantly during the course of the last century in spite of the strong dynamic from the city of Santa Cruz and of the intermediate cities that have appeared in its periphery. The dynamic of connectivity in the Bolivian region does not leave space to think about a profound modification of this outline but instead its reinforcement, in the field of international integration. However, the demographic dynamics and the observed flows of migration 9 let us also think that urban polarization and the settlements concentrated along these axes present a risk to the territorial equilibrium of Bolivia.
Pre-concept 3: Migration of the poor
Finally, the great idea of migration is that the population moves in order to get better work
opportunities, particularly for the poor who “have nothing to lose”. We have wanted to prove this hypothesis with the question: Where does the population from the poorest municipalities go to? Map 6 gives us this information: emigration from municipalities that have more than 50% of their population in a situation of homelessness, in other words, extreme poverty. Emigration is destined to the biggest cities (mainly El Alto and Sucre) and some “opportunity” zones such as colonization zones (Yungas, Chapare and north of Santa Cruz), the border cities or
mining centers. However, the amount of emigrants from the poor municipalities is minimal
compared to the total emigration in Bolivia shown in diagram 1.
Emigrants from the poorest municipalities represent 12.8% of the total of emigrants at a national level. This represents 1.1% of the total population while the total of emigrants represents 8.8% with a small variation between regions.
The majority of emigrants from poor zones migrate within their region or to the surroundings of the neighboring region: the majority is in Chuquisaca and La Paz, very few in the lowland regions; only 4.9% of the emigrants who reach Santa Cruz come from poor municipalities.
Well then, it is true that the main motivation of migration is to improve living conditions and to find an activity that will let this happen; however, the image that a population have of improving their lives does not always have to do with a certain image of development linked to the means.
Migration within the cultural territory has a strong feature, and added to this are the difficulties of finding the necessary resources for a long distance migration (reserved, as the CODEPO’s study has shown, to people with a higher level of education).
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