Intervening obstacles refer to the problems and barriers a migrant encounters while migrating from one place to another. The intervening obstacles between place or origin and destination also control the volume and characteristics of migration. The obstacles may be in the form of legal, geographic, and political barriers. For example, political animosity between certain nations discourages migration between two nations.
Fig. 1: Push & Pull Factors and Intervening Obstacles
Personal Factors
These factors include religion, caste, class, income level, educational attainment, health, age, personal perception of a foreign country, etc.
Personal factors determine a person’s ability to migrate. For instance, old people can not survive alone in a foreign nation, whereas young people can.
Similarly, income level determines the migration distance, i.e., local, national and international. In the case of India, only rich people migrate to Western countries, whereas the poor and middle-class people only migrate to Southeast Asia or the Arabian Peninsula.
The factors at place of origin and destination may be push factors (negative) and pull factors (positive). It is the interplay between push and pull factors, along with obstacles between the place of origin and destination, that determines migration volume.
Lee’s Hypotheses of Migration
After analysis of these factors of migration, Lee propounded three sets of hypotheses as follows.
Regarding the Volume of Migration
The migration volume refers to the total number of people who have left their birthplace to reside in another area, temporarily or permanently.
- The diversity of an area encourages migration. New areas provide new opportunities and attract a greater number of immigrants. For example, many Europeans migrated to America during the colonial period for better opportunities. If conditions in various places are homogeneous, people are unlikely to migrate.
- Diversity of People increases the likelihood of people migrating. Here, diversity of people refers to the specialization of different ethnic groups in different occupations. Lee gives the example of colonial America, where Greek chefs, German craftsmen, Jew traders and Irish labourers were in demand across the country. Therefore, they migrated to different parts of America due to demand for their special knowledge and work.
- Intervening obstacles negatively affect the volume of migration. For instance, the U.S. banned immigration from many countries during Trump’s presidency. Similarly, the Berlin Wall hampered migration between East and West Germany.
- Business cycles affect the volume of migration differently during economic recession and expansion. During economic expansion, businesses grow fast and recruit new workforce to ensure a timely supply of goods. So, immigration increases to places with high economic growth. During recession, businesses lay-off workers and unemployment spreads, therefore, people emigrate from areas of economic recession.
- Volume and rate of migration increase between backward and developed regions with time. Such migration only stops when legal barriers are imposed. Otherwise, the destination becomes overcrowded.
- Development is positively related to the volume of migration. Here, development refers to improvement in the educational level, industrial development, modes of transport and communication. Further, the development also reduces the impact of intervening obstacles on migration volume.
Regarding Streams of Migration
Mostly, migration tends to take place within well-defined streams. People use pre-established routes and networks to migrate to specific destinations. For example, less educated Indians use the. Mexico border to enter the U.S. and then seek asylum. Similarly, early immigrants guide their brethren to follow their footsteps to better places.
There is a counter-stream to every stream of migration. This means that some migrants return to their birthplace temporarily or permanently.
Push factors at the places of origin of migrants are more successful in inducing emigration. This law denotes that people generally avoid migration if their socioeconomic condition is good at the place of origin despite the availability of a better life elsewhere. They migrate primarily because of exacerbation of socio-economic conditions at their birthplace, e.g., the war in Syria forced millions of people to migrate to Europe.
If place of origin and destination are similar, the streams of migration become inefficient, therefore, equal number of people go to and from place of origin and destination.
The migration stream is highly efficient if the intervening obstacles are great. This means that people will only bother to tackle great problems for migration to a specific destination when the reward is very high. For example, Indians and Pakistanis spend millions of Rupees and endanger their life in Mexico to reach the U.S. because they earn very well in that country.
Economic growth increases the efficiency of the migration stream, and recession reduces it. The migrants benefit more at the destination during economic growth due to fast industrial production and wage growth. Contrarily, recession raises unemployment and reduces the wages of migrants.
Characteristics of Migrants
Migration is selective. It means that push and pull factors only determine the volume and direction of flow. However, the individuals respond differently to these factors, therefore, the composition of migrants is not random but selective. For example, in India, men tend to migrate for work to cities more than women due to patriarchal society.
Pull factors induce positive migration. This denotes the migration of people to distant places without any obligation or compulsion. Such migration takes place largely due to better opportunities at the destination, not due to bad conditions at home. Such migrants are highly educated and professionals.
Push factors induce negative migration. This denotes that the bad conditions in the hometown force the people to leave for better opportunities elsewhere. Therefore, the migrant group is not selective, instead a large chunk of population migrate from their birthplace.
Push and pull factors operate together. Therefore, migration tends to be bi-directional. People tend to arrive and depart to a given place due to various reasons. Take the example of a town with a large manufacturing base but a lack of educational facilities. Here, the college-going age group will leave while the workers will arrive.
Intervening obstacles filter out the negative selective migrants. This means that the uneducated, economically weak or incapable people are not able to reach their destination due to various geographic, legal and political barriers.
The propensity to migrate depends on the life cycle or age of the people. For instance, Indian women migrate to their in-laws’ homes after marriage. Similarly, students and workers migrate for better educational and work avenues.
The characteristics of migrants depend on the culture of the place of origin and destination. The migrants keep many cultural traits from their birthplace and learn new things from their destination.
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