The specific Circumstances and deep‐rooted Causes of Illegal Migration between Latin American Countries
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2435.1983.tb00452.x |
| Published date | 01 April 1983 |
| Date | 01 April 1983 |
The specific Circumstances and
deep-rooted Causes
of
Illegal Migration
between Latin American Countries
BY MGR GEORGES ROCHCAU
PRELIMINARY REMARKS
The topic of the seminar is ‘Undocumented Migrants’. Although the word
indocumen-
tados
is frequently used in Latin America it does not in fact reflect the true situation.
Most of these migrants possess personal identity papers (identity cards of one sort or
another) but these papers are not sufficient in the eyes of national authorities to
permit them to reside and work in the country to which they have come. For this
reason
I
prefer the term ‘illegal migrants’.
I
shall not deal here with the problem
of
frontier migrations which, in principle, are
only of a temporary nature.
I
say ‘in principle’ because quite often they become illegal.
This type of migration has been going
on
for a very long time, whereas the type that
I
have in mind is a phenomenon of a relatively recent date. We shall see why below. Let
us simply note that frontier migrations can sometimes change direction
-
the most
typical example being those between Venezuela and Colombia. Until the end of the
Second World War, the frontier migration flow was from Venezuela to Colombia but
later this was reversed.
Neither shall
I
deal here with the often illegal situation of refugees and of those
requesting asylum
as
they only represent a small percentage of the illegal migrations
in
Latin America and their cause is quite different from those which take place for eco-
nomic reasons. Let
us
merely say that some ‘economic’ migrants also leave their coun-
try for political reasons. The most typical examples are migrants from Haiti and
El
Salvador, but as
I
wish to limit my remarks to the Latin American continent,
I
shall
not go into these here.
BASIC CAUSES
OF
ILLEGAL MIGRATION
The principal cause of migrations
-
legal or illegal
-
is,
in my view, a difference in
levels
of
living. For example:
(a)
Argentina, which in 1979(1) had a GNP equivalent
to
an annual per capital income
of
US$
2,390
has a very strong attraction for the people of Bolivia
(GNP
$550),
Para-
guay (GNF’ $1,070), Chile (GNP
$1,690)
and
-
in more recent times
-
for those of
Uruguay (GNP $2,100) although in this case political reasons for emigrating are prob-
ably
as
compelling as economic ones.
1.
All
GNPs
are for
1979
according
to
the
World Bank’s
World
Development
Report,
1981.
147
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