Andrew R. Morrison

Violence or Economics: What Drives Internal Migration in Guatemala?

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.

The Determinants of Urban Population Growth in Sub-Saharan Africa

Africas urban population is grouwing at an extremely high and possibly accelerating rate but urbanization does not appear to have been accompanied by the structural transformation associated with urban growth both in historical studies and in theoretical models from economic demography. This paper examines the empirical performance of a model of a stereotypical African economy that incorporates many of the stylized facts from the development literature factors of rural to urban migration. The model is tested against a cross-country sample of African nations. Further data improvements are needed but 2 findings stand out from the others: 1st only 8% of the variation in the African urban population growth rates can be explained by employment growth rates in the urban-modern sector; and 2nd that government policies are important--specifically policies designed to promote rural growth. Such policies depress urban growth rates considerably by reducing those forces which push people from rural areas.

Los efectos de la migración interna en el producto y el bienestar social: Un estudio de caso en el Perú con el enfoque de la función de producción estocástica de frontera

THE quarterly statistical summaries of the Mines Department, issued before the war, giving data for each coal-mining region in Great Britain enable us to observe the changes with time in the output per manshift worked at the coal face. The annual reports of the Mines Department contain information about the number of coalcutting machines in use in the mines and about the average weekly number of coalwinding days, month by month. From these figures, some indication of the utilisation of machines at the coal-face is possible. One method of indicating the increasing importance of machinery is to quote the changing proportions of coal cut by machinery to the total output.

Effects of Ethnic Attributes on the Quality of Family Planning Services in Lima, Peru: A Randomized Crossover Trial

Most studies reporting ethnic disparities in the quality of healthcare come from developed countries and rely on observational methods. We conducted the first experimental study to evaluate whether health providers in Peru provide differential quality of care for family planning services, based on the indigenous or mestizo (mixed ethnoracial ancestry) profile of the patient. In a crossover randomized controlled trial conducted in 2012, a sample of 351 out of the 408 public health establishments in Metropolitan Lima, Peru were randomly assigned to receive unannounced simulated patients enacting indigenous and mestizo profiles (sequence-1) or mestizo and then indigenous profiles (sequence-2), with a five week wash-out period. Both ethnic profiles used the same scripted scenario for seeking contraceptive advice but had distinctive cultural attributes such as clothing, styling of hair, make-up, accessories, posture and patterns of movement and speech. Our primary outcome measure of quality of care is the proportion of technical tasks performed by providers, as established by Peruvian family planning clinical guidelines. Providers and data analysts were kept blinded to the allocation. We found a non-significant mean difference of -0·7% (p = 0·23) between ethnic profiles in the percentage of technical tasks performed by providers. However we report large deficiencies in the compliance with quality standards of care for both profiles. Differential provider behaviour based on the patients ethnic profiles compared in the study did not contribute to deficiencies in family planning outcomes observed. The study highlights the need to explore other determinants for poor compliance with quality standards, including demand and supply side factors, and calls for interventions to improve the quality of care for family planning services in Metropolitan Lima.

Observational equivalence in the modeling of African labor markets and urbanization

Abstract This article examines the appropriateness of neoclassical and rent-seeking models of urbanization for the African milieu and demonstrates that the reduced forms of these two models may be quite similar. The models are not observationally equivalent, however, and methods of distinguishing between them are discussed. A demographic cohort shift model of African urbanization also is presented. Its excellent predictive power suggests that migration models that assume migrant homogeneity (i.e., highly aggregate migration models) ignore information that can be useful in predicting trends in migration flows.

True Commitment or Empty Rhetoric? An ARIMA Analysis of the Deconcentration of Public Investment in Peru

MORRISON A. R. (1993) True commitment or empty rhetoric? An ARIMA analysis of the deconcentration of public investment in Peru, Reg. Studies 27, 41–52. Regional policies are ubiquitous in less developed countries, yet theoretical explanations for these policies are often ignored. This essay presents theoretical explanations–inspired by world systems analysis and more traditional Marxist analysis, dependency theory and neoclassical economic theory—for regional policy and examines their appropriateness for the Peruvian case. Subsequently, the strength of the link between political rhetoric favouring deconcentration policies and the reality of such policies is examined. Have successive governments kept their promises to distribute public investment more equitably over Peruvian regions? This question is addressed with the aid of ARIMA models which allow the effect of policy interventions to be gauged in straightforward fashion. The ARIMA analysis reveals that few governments have matched their regionalist rhe...

Effects of ethnicity on the quality of family planning services in Lima, Peru

Materials and methods In a crossover randomized controlled trial conducted in 2012, a sample of 351 out of the 408 public health establishments in Metropolitan Lima, Peru were randomly assigned to receive unannounced simulated patients enacting indigenous and mestizo (mixed ethnoracial ancestry) profiles (sequence-1) or mestizo and then indigenous profiles (sequence-2), with a five week wash-out period. Both ethnic profiles used the same scripted scenario for seeking contraceptive advice but had distinctive cultural attributes such as clothing, styling of hair, make-up, accessories, posture and patterns of movement and speech. Our primary outcome measure of quality of care is the proportion of technical tasks performed by providers, as established by Peruvian FP clinical guidelines. Providers and data analysts were kept blinded to the allocation. The trial was registered with ClinicalTrials.gov NCT01885858.

Challenges for Social Policy in a Less Favorable Macroeconomic Context

Over the last decade and a half Latin America and the Caribbean have made notable advances in reducing poverty and improving social outcomes. Extreme poverty fell by more than a third from 19.3 % in 2002 to 12.0 % in 2014; and inequality, as measured by the Gini coefficient, fell from 0.56 to 0.51. In parallel, child mortality fell from 32 to 18 deaths per 100,000 children from 2000 to 2013 (see UN IGME 2014). By 2013, school attendance rates among 6–11-year-olds reached 98 %, and among 12–17-year-olds rose to 87 %. Although gaps remain across income and demographic groups, the biggest advances in reducing chronic malnutrition and improving school age-attendance profiles occurred for children from the lowest socioeconomic groups.