Segmentation, network multipliers and spillovers: a theory of rural urban migration for a traditional economy

While existing theories portray migration as a single flow, the new theory highlights spillovers between and contrasts in how social networks and interactions impact on two separate, yet interconnected flows of rural urban migrants. Two empirical illustrations are deployed.

In the first, adult male and autonomous child labour migrants make up the two flows; in the second we consider two flows in rural contexts where patterns of social interactions and network access are influenced by caste.