Urbanization and Political Demand Measurement in Latin America: The Problem of Lag Effect

Abstract

A general assumption of the modernization literature is that urbanized nations constitute more socially mobilized and therefore potentially demanding political environments (Thompson, p. 477; Deutsch, p. 498). The expansion of urban centers indicates the breakdown of traditional peasant society and the natural static political order that it represents. Consequently, Huntington (pp. 53–55) and others argue that nations undergoing the process of urbanization will tend to become more violent and politically unstable unless the new demands ultimately created by rural to urban migration are satisfied in the socioeconomic sphere or managed by capable political institutions.