Social Factors of Migration from Rural to Urban Areas : with Special Reference to Developing Countries The Case of Korea

Abstract

This paper aims at elaborating social factors related to internal migration in a developing country, Korea. As of date, there is quite a lot of quality literature which provides a good overview of the current state of knowledge concerning internal migration in a comprehensive and appropriate manner. This literature pays greater attention to internal migration in developing countries. For this reason, the discussion in this paper is confined to recent Korean experience. And social factors will be taken in a broader sense, that is, as societal one in that they may cover social, economic, cultural and psychological aspects. This is so because social aspects are closely interlocked with other sectoral elements. This study will be made primarily on the basis of a literature survey covering qualitative reports as well as raw data such as population census. In this paper, internal migration is defined as the mobility of people between regions, which differs from residential mobility which happens within cities or urban areas. Furthermore, migration is conceived as implying socio-economic mobility. This point can be justified in the sense that urban-rural migration in the geographical sense is more likely to refer to job transfers from agricultural to non-agricultural activities in the socio-economic sense.