Rural exodus
Encyclopedia
Human migration
Human migration is physical movement by humans from one area to another, sometimes over long distances or in large groups. Historically this movement was nomadic, often causing significant conflict with the indigenous population and their displacement or cultural assimilation. Only a few nomadic...
of peoples from rural areas
Rural sociology
Rural sociology is a field of sociology associated with the study of social life in non-metropolitan areas. It is the scientific study of social arrangements and behaviour amongst people distanced from points of concentrated population or economic activity...
into urban areas.
In modern times, it often occurs in a region following the industrialization
Factory farming
Factory farming is a term referring to the process of raising livestock in confinement at high stocking density, where a farm operates as a factory — a practice typical in industrial farming by agribusinesses. The main products of this industry are meat, milk and eggs for human consumption...
of agriculture
Agriculture
Agriculture is the cultivation of animals, plants, fungi and other life forms for food, fiber, and other products used to sustain life. Agriculture was the key implement in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that nurtured the...
when fewer people are needed to bring the same amount of agricultural output to market and related agricultural services and industries are consolidated. Rural flight is exacerbated when the population decline leads to the loss of rural services such as stores and schools, which leads to greater loss of population as people leave to seek those features.
This phenomenon was first articulated through Ravenstein
Ernst Georg Ravenstein
Ernst Georg Ravenstein was a German-English geographer cartographer and promoter of physical exercise...
's Laws of migration in the 1880s, upon which modern theories are based.
In the United States and Canada
The term is used in the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
to describe the flight of people from rural areas in the Great Plains
Great Plains
The Great Plains are a broad expanse of flat land, much of it covered in prairie, steppe and grassland, which lies west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains in the United States and Canada. This area covers parts of the U.S...
and Midwest regions, and to a lesser extent rural areas of the northeast and southeast.
Historical trends
During the Dust Bowl
Dust Bowl
The Dust Bowl, or the Dirty Thirties, was a period of severe dust storms causing major ecological and agricultural damage to American and Canadian prairie lands from 1930 to 1936...
and Great Depression
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
of the 1930s, large numbers of people fled rural areas of the Plains and Midwest because of depressed commodity prices, high debt load, and several years of drought and large dust storm
Dust storm
A dust / sand storm is a meteorological phenomenon common in arid and semi-arid regions. Dust storms arise when a gust front or other strong wind blows loose sand and dirt from a dry surface. Particles are transported by saltation and suspension, causing soil to move from one place and deposition...
s. Rural flight from the Great Plains has been depicted in literature, such as John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck
John Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He is widely known for the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden and the novella Of Mice and Men...
's novel The Grapes of Wrath
The Grapes of Wrath
The Grapes of Wrath is a novel published in 1939 and written by John Steinbeck, who was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1940 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962....
(1939), in which a family from the Great Plains migrates to California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
during the Dust Bowl period of the 1930s.
Modern rural flight
Iowa State University
Iowa State University of Science and Technology, more commonly known as Iowa State University , is a public land-grant and space-grant research university located in Ames, Iowa, United States. Iowa State has produced astronauts, scientists, and Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners, along with a host of...
reports the number of hog farmers in Iowa dropped from 65,000 in 1980 to 10,000 in 2002, while the number of hogs per farm increased from 200 to 1,400.
The consolidation of the feed, seed, processed grain, and livestock industries has meant that there are fewer small businesses in rural areas. This decrease has in turn exacerbated the decreased demand for labor. Rural areas that used to be able to provide employment for all young adults willing to work in challenging conditions, increasingly provide fewer opportunities for young adults. The situation is made worse by the decrease in services such as schools, stores, and cultural opportunities that accompany the decline in population, and the increasing age of the remaining population further stresses the social service system of rural areas.
Abandonment of small towns
Middle ages
Rural flight has been occurring to some degree in Germany since the 11th century. A corresponding principle of German law is Stadtluft macht freiStadtluft macht frei
Stadtluft macht frei , or Stadtluft macht frei nach Jahr und Tag , is a German saying describing a principle of law in the Middle Ages...
("city air makes you free"), in longer form Stadtluft macht frei nach Jahr und Tag ("city air makes you free after a year and a day"): by custom and, from 1231/32, by statute, a serf
SERF
A spin exchange relaxation-free magnetometer is a type of magnetometer developed at Princeton University in the early 2000s. SERF magnetometers measure magnetic fields by using lasers to detect the interaction between alkali metal atoms in a vapor and the magnetic field.The name for the technique...
who had spent a year and a day in a city was free, and could not be reclaimed by their former master.
German Landflucht
In GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
Landflucht
Landflucht
Landflucht , also known as rural exodus, refers to the mass migration of peasants into the cities that occurred in Germany in the late 19th century.-Background:...
("flight from the land") refers to the mass migration
Human migration
Human migration is physical movement by humans from one area to another, sometimes over long distances or in large groups. Historically this movement was nomadic, often causing significant conflict with the indigenous population and their displacement or cultural assimilation. Only a few nomadic...
of peasants into the cities that occurred in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
(and throughout most of Europe) in the late 19th century.
In 1870 the rural population of Germany constituted 64% of the population; by 1907 it had shrunk to 33%. In 1900 alone, the Prussian provinces of East Prussia
East Prussia
East Prussia is the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast from the 13th century to the end of World War II in May 1945. From 1772–1829 and 1878–1945, the Province of East Prussia was part of the German state of Prussia. The capital city was Königsberg.East Prussia...
, West Prussia
West Prussia
West Prussia was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1773–1824 and 1878–1919/20 which was created out of the earlier Polish province of Royal Prussia...
, Posen
Province of Posen
The Province of Posen was a province of Prussia from 1848–1918 and as such part of the German Empire from 1871 to 1918. The area was about 29,000 km2....
, Silesia
Silesia
Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...
, and Pomerania
Pomerania
Pomerania is a historical region on the south shore of the Baltic Sea. Divided between Germany and Poland, it stretches roughly from the Recknitz River near Stralsund in the West, via the Oder River delta near Szczecin, to the mouth of the Vistula River near Gdańsk in the East...
lost about 1,600,000 people to the cities, where these former agricultural workers were absorbed into the rapidly growing factory labor class; One of the causes of this mass-migration was the decrease in rural income compared to the rates of pay in the cities.
Landflucht resulted in a major transformation of the German countryside and agriculture. Mechanized agriculture and migrant workers, particularly Poles from the east (Sachsenganger), became more common. This was especially true in the province of Posen
Province of Posen
The Province of Posen was a province of Prussia from 1848–1918 and as such part of the German Empire from 1871 to 1918. The area was about 29,000 km2....
that was gained by Prussia
Prussian partition
The Prussian partition refers to the former territories of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth acquired during the partitions of Poland in the late 18th century by the Kingdom of Prussia.-History:...
when Poland was partitioned
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
. The Polish population of eastern Germany was one of the justifications for the creation of the "Polish corridor
Polish Corridor
The Polish Corridor , also known as Danzig Corridor, Corridor to the Sea or Gdańsk Corridor, was a territory located in the region of Pomerelia , which provided the Second Republic of Poland with access to the Baltic Sea, thus dividing the bulk of Germany from the province of East...
" after World War I and the absorption of the land east of the Oder-Neisse line
Oder-Neisse line
The Oder–Neisse line is the border between Germany and Poland which was drawn in the aftermath of World War II. The line is formed primarily by the Oder and Lusatian Neisse rivers, and meets the Baltic Sea west of the seaport cities of Szczecin and Świnoujście...
into Poland after World War II. Also, some labor-intensive enterprises were replaced by much less labor-intensive ones such as game preserves.
The word landflucht has negative connotations in German, as it was coined by agricultural employers, often of the German aristocracy, who were lamenting their labor shortages.
Contemporary developing countries
Today the phenomenon of rural flight is also well-known in developing countries, where many people in the countryside live below the poverty line. They migrate to cities to find employmentEmployment
Employment is a contract between two parties, one being the employer and the other being the employee. An employee may be defined as:- Employee :...
or education
Education
Education in its broadest, general sense is the means through which the aims and habits of a group of people lives on from one generation to the next. Generally, it occurs through any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts...
. In developing countries, rural exodus is a more recent and rapid process than it was in developed ones. Many of the most populated cities are now in developing countries.
Sources
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- Ravenstein, E. G. (1885): "The Laws of Migration", in London: Journal of the Royal Statistical SocietyJournal of the Royal Statistical SocietyThe Journal of the Royal Statistical Society is a series of three peer-reviewed statistics journals published by Blackwell Publishing for the London-based Royal Statistical Society.- History :...
- vol. 48, nº. June, 1885, pp. 167–227. - Ravenstein, E. G. (1889): "The Laws of Migration", in London: Journal of the Royal Statistical Society - vol. 52, nº. June, 1889, pp. 241–301.
See also
- Demographic history of the United StatesDemographic history of the United StatesThis article is about the demographic history of the United States.-Historical population:-Age at marriage:1890: Men 26.1, Women 22.01900: Men 25.9, Women 21.91910: Men 25.1, Women 21.61920: Men 24.6, Women 21.21930: Men 24.3, Women 21.3...
- DiasporaDiasporaA diaspora is "the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland" or "people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location", or "people settled far from their ancestral homelands".The word has come to refer to historical mass-dispersions of...
- LandfluchtLandfluchtLandflucht , also known as rural exodus, refers to the mass migration of peasants into the cities that occurred in Germany in the late 19th century.-Background:...
- Rural sociologyRural sociologyRural sociology is a field of sociology associated with the study of social life in non-metropolitan areas. It is the scientific study of social arrangements and behaviour amongst people distanced from points of concentrated population or economic activity...
- Suburbs
- Urban sprawlUrban sprawlUrban sprawl, also known as suburban sprawl, is a multifaceted concept, which includes the spreading outwards of a city and its suburbs to its outskirts to low-density and auto-dependent development on rural land, high segregation of uses Urban sprawl, also known as suburban sprawl, is a...
- Migration of the disadvantaged
- UrbanizationUrbanizationUrbanization, urbanisation or urban drift is the physical growth of urban areas as a result of global change. The United Nations projected that half of the world's population would live in urban areas at the end of 2008....
- Ravenstein, E. G. (1885): "The Laws of Migration", in London: Journal of the Royal Statistical Society