Ravenstein's 'laws' of migration

These were formulated by E. G. Ravenstein (1885) and state that:

1. Most migration is over a short distance.
2. Migration occurs in steps.
3. Long-range migrants usually move to urban areas.
4. Each migration produces a movement in the opposite direction (although not necessarily of the same volume).
5. Rural dwellers are more migratory than urban dwellers.
6. Within their own country females are more migratory than males, but males are more migratory over long distances.
7. Most migrants are adults.
8. Large towns grow more by migration than by natural increase.
9. Migration increases with economic development.
2. Migration is mostly due to economic causes.

Ravenstein's findings stimulated an enormous volume of work, and, although the ‘laws’ have been adjusted by succeeding researchers, they have not been totally rejected. Observations of each ‘law’ as applied to Britain in the 1980s, for example, show that with respect to point 1, over half the moves made annually in England and Wales were in the same local authority area; and to point 3, that the largest urban centres received the highest number of immigrants. For an elaboration of point 6, See chain migration, and for point 9, See mobility. See also gravity model.