Population movements and the third world 42
In many parts of South Asia the practice of transhumance is steadily declining. Pressures are mounting as a result of growing competition for land in upland areas, and growing shortages of labour for livestock herding and lowland farming. Because they often lack formal, legally defined access to land semi-nomadic groups also tend to be in a weak position when faced with competition for land from other sources. The result is a tendency towards permanent settlement where conditions or production systems allow. We also tend to find a decline in transhumance where improvements in transportation and communications have reduced people's reliance on the goods provided by these semi-nomadic groups. Involuntary population movements The traditional forms of movement described above would, in the main, fall into the 'impelled movement' category which was outlined in Chapter 2. Whilst in most cases there is little realistic alternative to movement, so powerful are the respective influences of environment and tradition, periodic shifts in the place of residence of several Third World societies are so deeply ingrained in the lives and cultures of those involved that it would be misleading to view them in the same context as the 'involuntary' forms of movement described below. The latter take a wide variety of forms and occur in response to a wide range of circumstances, including escape from warfare, civil conflict, revolution, discrimination, religious rivalry, natural disasters and the displacement of people by development programmes. Such difficulties have, over the millennia, forced people from their homes throughout the world. However, in recent decades involuntary movements have become particularly prevalent in the Third World. Several factors help to explain this situation. First, during the post-Second World War period, the Third World has played host (often with superpower influence) to some of the world's most violent and protracted conflicts which have been driven by clashes of ideology, ethnic interests, political factionalism and dictatorial regimes. As a result, millions of people in Central America, South-East Asia, the Middle East and much of the continent of Africa have been displaced from their homes by fighting, associated economic disruption. abuses of human rights and/or political persecution. Second, many parts of the Third World lie in regions of the globe which are particularly prone to natural disasters such as floods, drought, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, pest infestations and so on, which, on