Violence or Economics: What Drives Internal Migration in Guatemala?

Abstract

Politically motivated violence has plagued Guatemala since 1966. The first wave of terror coincided with an antiguerilla offensive launched by the government in late 1966. 2 waves of terror began in 1969 and 1970. The 4th wave of terror began in 1978 with the highest level of political violence ever. 1524 individuals were killed by the guerrillas the military and death squads during the 1966-76 period but a recent study estimated that in 1986 100000-250000 individuals had moved within Guatemala to escape political violence. Another 150000-360000 had fled guatemala to live in other countries between 31. and 7.5% of the national population. The analytical core of Harris-Todaro-type model was modified to analyze the effect of violence on the migration decision. The most common dependent variable used in reduced-form migration equations was the probability of migrating from one location to another. Source and destination unemployment were entered into the migration equation from the 1981 census. Per capita government spending was entered into the migration equation to test whether governments contribution to aggregate demand was important in attracting migrants. The first measure of violence used in the regressions was the number of politically motivated killings carried out in a department from 1966-1976. The second violence measure was per capita corpses found of individuals who had been killed for some political end. Violence did have an impact on migration flows at least when measured by assassinations. The percentage difference between per capita assassinations in origin and destination areas was statistically significant. The sign and 5-statistic on the assassinations-squared variable suggested that higher levels of violence might cause the migration response to intensify but this variable was significant only at the 20% level. Both violence variables were statistically significant and increased origin violence did spur out-migration.