Eastward development of Tibetans in China: A Gravity-Based Approach with an Application to Population

Abstract

In this thesis, a dataset of the Tibetan population in 2,857 counties of China was built using ArcGIS 10.3, with data extracted from the 3rd and 6th Chinese National Population Census. On this basis, the evolution of the spatial pattern of Tibetan population was analysed, and, in combination with the mode of the centre of gravity of the population, the migration trajectory of the Tibetan population was explored. The results demonstrate that the Tibetan population in China is mainly concentrated in the east and northeast of TAR1 and other Tibetan areas, and the aggregation scale is increasing. Meanwhile, more of the Tibetan population is moving out of Tibetan areas into the inland China2 . From 1982 to 2010, the Tibetan population in China had an overall trend of moving eastward. The centre of gravity of the Tibetan population in China moved 35.66 km in the northeast direction, the centre of gravity of the Tibetan population in TAR and other Tibetan areas moved 20.21 km in the northeast direction, and the centre of gravity of the Tibetan population outside TAR and other Tibetan areas moved 149.11 km in the southeast direction. The special natural environment of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the historical inertia of the Eastward Development of Tibetan civilisation, and the contemporary social and economic regional development differences are the main factors that promoted the eastward movement of the Tibetan population distribution.