POPULATION GROWTH AND SOCIOPOLITICS TENSIONS: FIVE CASE STUDIES

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• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85M00364R001803520008-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
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• Document Release Date: January 14, 2008
• Sequence Number: 8
• Publication Date: September 1, 1981
• Content Type: REPORT

Confidential Approved For Release 2008/01/14: CIA-RDP85M00364RO01803520008-8 Xc Paper:
Population Growth and Sociopolitica
Tensions: Five Case- Studies
} September 1981
The Caribbean
Population density is high in most of the Caribbean
areas and resources are limited. For some 30 years the
Caribbean countries 2 have eased social pressures by
both tacitly and openly encouraging emigration. As
some of the traditional destinations, such as the
United Kingdom, have restricted immigration, Carib-
bean emigrants-mostly illegals-have headed to-
ward the United States. This outflow may increase in
coming years as nationals already in the United
States become increasingly sophisticated in assisting
their countrymen. The Dominican Republic and Haiti
are the most likely sources of these illegals. Most of
the Caribbean's population growth will occur in these
countries; their family planning efforts are negligible,
and unemployment and underemployment-already
substantial in their capital cities-will worsen. The
continuation of such population pressures means that
' In descending order by size, the nations covered in this section are
Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Gua-
deloupe, Martinique, Barbados, Netherlands Antilles, Bahamas, St.
Lucia, US Virgin Islands, Grenada, St. Vincent, Dominica, St.
Kitu-Nevis-Anguilla, British Virgin Islands. Cayman Islands, and
Monserrat. This grouping corresponds with that used in UN
demographic studies.)
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 the number of illegal immigrants coming to the
United States will not decline substantially and that
the region will experience social and political unrest
exploitable by extremist groups, possibly the Cubans.
Population Growth. The UN projects that the popula-
tion growth rate of the Caribbean countries will
remain nearly constant at 2.1 percent per year
through the year 2000. The stability in the regional
growth rate results from the fact that very rapid
increases (2.7 percent) in Haiti and the Dominican
Republic are offset by the much slower growth (1.1
percent) elsewhere. Since Haiti and the Dominican
Republic account for 70 percent of the Caribbean
population, their population growth will dominate the
regional picture, supplying 7.5 million of the 8.8
million people added between 1980 and 2000. By
then, the present Caribbean population of approxima-
tely 17.5 million may reach 26.3 million.
The high growth rate projections for the Dominican
Republic and Haiti reflect the ineffectiveness of fam-
i!.y planning programs in the face of reduced mortality
rates. High fertility is also associated with the prac-
tice of subsistence agriculture and the grinding pov-
erty prevalent in Haiti. On the other hand, in the
more developed countries of Jamaica and Trinidad
and Tobago, government-backed birth control pro-
grams, along with heavy emigration, have lowered the
average population growth to less than 1.5 percent
annually.
Migration Abroad. Because of heavy emigration, the
region's population growth is considerably less than
that of Latin America as a whole. Population growth
in the Caribbean averaged 1.9 percent annually
between 1960 and 1970, compared to 2.8 percent for
Latin America. During this period the outflow of legal
and illegal migrants offset about 30 percent of the
natural increase in the region's total population.
Without migration the population growth rate of the
Caribbean region would have been about 2.6 percent.
Legal emigration to the United Kingdom accounted
for most of the outflow during the 1950s and early
1960s, but it slowed considerably in the mid-1960s
when the British restricted immigration. The largely
1960.
English-speaking migrants then began to move to the
United States and Canada. As a result, in 1977 the
United States received 65 percent of the legal mi-
grants from the Caribbean, up from 8 percent in
Until recently, most of these migrants to the United
States were predominantly skilled or professional
urbanites seeking better job opportunities. Migration
to the United States from the poorest Caribbean
nations was negligible because of the high cost of
transport, language barriers, and the necessity to
obtain documents and proof of financial assets. The
recent Haitian exodus indicates a change. Hurricane
Allen's destruction and the demonstrative effect of the
Cuban "boat lift" spurred between 15,000 and 20,000
poor Haitians to enter the United States illegally in
1980.
In coming years population pressures and worsening
economic problems in some islands will result in
increased attempts by illegal migrants to enter the
United States. Paradoxically, in others, such as Haiti,
the improvement of economic conditions-if real-
ized-will encourage migration by giving more per-
sons the financial wherewithal to leave. Illegal migra-
tion to the United States gradually will become easier
as the illegals already here provide contacts and funds
for their compatriots.
Recently tightened barriers to migration within the
Caribbean will encourage the flow toward the United
States. Substantial interisland migration has been a
standard practice, primarily among islands with a
common language. Besides the traditional seasonal
migration of farm labor under "guest worker" ar-
rangements, particularly from Haiti to the Dominican
Republic, many urban workers have moved from the
poorer islands to the richer English-speaking islands,
such as the Bahamas and Trinidad and Tobago. Now,
however, the Bahamian Government has announced
that it will deport all illegals, including an estimated
20,000 to 40,000 Haitians. The Dominican Republic
reportedly has stepped up border security to slow
illegal migration. Seventy-five percent of the 80,000
Haitians who work seasonally in the Dominican Re-
public arrive illegally
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Rural-to-Urban Migration. During the next 20 years,
urban population, particularly in the region's two
largest nations, will grow rapidly because of migration
from rural areas and natural increase. The UN
projects that annual urban growth will be 3.9 percent
in Haiti and 4.9 percent in the Dominican Republic.
By the year 2000 their combined urban population
will be 9.8 million, more than double the present size.
Density is high in the Caribbean islands, ranging from
104 persons per square kilometer in the Dominican
Republic to 195 persons per square kilometer in Haiti.
If arable land were the only measure, the density per
square kilometer would exceed 750 in Jamaica and
Haiti, compared with 104 in the United States.)
Land tenure laws in many of the islands compound
rural population pressures. Adherence to the require-
ment that holdings be divided equally among heirs has
resulted in the typical family plot measuring roughly
2 hectares in the Dominican Republic and only 1.2
hectares in Haiti. Although the family farm in other
Caribbean countries is usually somewhat larger, it
affords little more than a subsistence living, and many
farmers are forced to move to the cities to improve
their situations. Despite high levels of unemployment,
wages are much higher, services are better, and health
care and education are more accessible-in the city
than in the countryside. In Haiti, because most of the
manufacturing jobs are in the capital, Port-au-Prince
is strained by the increasing influx of rural workers,
growing unemployment, and mounting pressures on
public services.
In most Caribbean nations, the ethnic homogeneity of
urban populations has reduced the potential for con-
flict. In Jamaica, however, intense political rivalry has
contributed to an increase in violent crimes and has
threatened the island's political stability. One of
Prime Minister Seaga's first tasks will be to curb the
violence, a difficult job in view of Jamaica's high rate
of unemployment and general economic disarray. F-]
Employment and the Labor Force. The UN project~25X1
that the region's labor force will grow at an annual
rate of 2.3 percent in the 1980s, slowing to 2.1 percent
during the 1990s. Again, the large populations in the
Dominican Republic and Haiti will contribute nearly
all of this growth. F_~ 25X1
During the last two decades jobs have not been
created fast enough to keep pace with the increase in
the labor force, and this trend is likely to continue
during the rest of the century. In the Dominican
Republic the nonagricultural labor force grew at 4.9
percent from 1960 to 1975, while the annual growt25X1
of nonagricultural jobs was just 4 percent. In Jamaica
only about 58,000 new jobs were created in the
nonagricultural sectors between 1960 and 1975-a
gain of 18 percent; the nonagricultural work force
increased 30 percent. In many of the countries,
employment in the industrial sectors has shown little
or no growth in the past decade.F__~ 25X1
Estimated regional unemployment last year was 25
percent, more than double the rate in 1960. Urban
unemployment is concentrated among the youth, who
have the greatest difficulty finding jobs. Moreover,
high rates of female participation add to the labor
problem. In Jamaica women hold almost half of the
nonagricultural jobs, a fairly typical share for the
English-speaking Caribbean, where the traditional
matriarchal family pattern has encouraged female
independence. F__1 25X1
In Haiti, female and child labor on family subsistence
farms frees male family members to obtain seasonal
work on coffee plantations. The Haitian assembly
industry also employs large numbers of women, and
working-age women have spurred the rural migration
to Port-au-Prince and other urban areas. In contras25X1
in the Dominican Republic the traditional bias
against female employment keeps female participa-
tion in the labor force low. 25X1
Government Population Measures. Barbados, Ja-
maica, and Trinidad and Tobago have long been
sensitive to the problems of population growth and
have supported family planning programs for many
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years. The Jamaican National Family Planning Pro-
gram was established in 1966; distribution of contra-
ceptives began in 1968. The Barbados family planning
program, among the world's first in 1955, was largely
responsible for a 22-percent decline in birth rates
during the 1960s. On the other hand, in Haiti and the
Dominican Republic, where traditional attitudes fa-
voring large families are deeply rooted, official sup-
port for family planning programs is very recent and
has come largely as a result of pressure from aid
donors.
Outlook With sharply higher oil costs, declining
commodity prices, and stagnating foreign investment,
the Caribbean's economic growth prospects are poor
and per capita incomes will fall. Migration will
remain the principal safety valve to relieve population
pressures. Rising migration will primarily include
small numbers of urban, middle class, legal emi-
grants, who leave in response to economic or political
crises, and much larger numbers of poor, illegal
migrants, who can leave only when they obtain the.
necessary resources. The former has a negligible
impact on the United States but represents a major
loss for the Caribbean; the latter will be of much
greater concern to the United States. Larger numbers
of illegal migrants, already unwelcome in the more
prosperous islands like Barbados and the Bahamas,
will set the stage for recurrent incidents.
Although the authoritarian politics in Haiti may give
the appearance of domestic quiescence, it is there, and
in the Dominican Republic, that population pressures
will be greatest. The United States, long a magnet for
the better educated Caribbean migrants, will receive
increasing numbers of rural poor from these two
countries. Despite the greater likelihood of overt
dissension in the more open political systems of the
other islands, population pressures in those islands
will continue to lessen and migration to the United
States will be far less dramatic than that from the
poor countries (figure 8).F--]
Central America
Accelerating population growth in Central America
contributed to a serious conflict between El Salvador
and Honduras and a substantial and increasing flow
Central America includes Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala,
Honduras, and Nicaragua.
of illegal aliens to the United States. Although it is
difficult to prove a direct linkage, population growth
and pressure on the land also have played some role in
the revolutionary violence now sweeping the area. The
problems associated with rapid population growth are
likely to get worse-perhaps much worse-before
they get better. Because of the age structure, the labor
force will grow more rapidly than the population as a
whole in Costa Rica, El Salvador, and Nicaragua in
the 1980s, and in all five countries during the 1990s.
Thus, the population growth rate may well understate
the magnitude of the unemployment, land, urbaniza-
tion, and migration pressures that the area will face.
As has already been the case in Nicaragua and El
Salvador, these problems play into the hands of
extremist groups, which often have the support of
elements hostile to the United States.
The Dynamics of Population Growth. The five-nation
region-roughly the size of the combined areas of the
states of Oregon and Washington--has a population
of 20 million, more than three times that of the same
two states. We expect that by the end of this decade
the population of Central America will be about 35
percent higher than it is today.
On the basis of estimates of the US Bureau of the
Census and data from a 1977 Inter-American Devel-
opment Bank (IDB) study, we expect a regional
average annual rate of population increase of 2.9
percent in the next two decades, ranging from 3.4
percent in Honduras to 2.4 percent in Costa Rica. The
regional average annual population growth rate rose
from 2.0 percent in the period 1920-50 to 3.1 percent
in the period 1950-80.F---]
Central American birth rates, among the highest in
Latin America, began to decline in the 1960s, particu-
larly in Costa Rica, where socioeconomic conditions
were improving rapidly. Death. rates, on the other
hand, had already fallen in all countries by the 1940s;
the lowest rates were in Costa Rica, and the highest in
Honduras. A continuing decline in both birth and
death rates is expected in all countries of the region,
but because about 45 percent of the population is
under 15 years of age, population will continue to
show a rapid increase in each country during the next
two decades.
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Figure 8
Population Urban Populations
10 Haiti 6
Dominican
Republic Other
Dominican
Republic:
2 Jamaica
Trinidad and Tobago
I I 1 I I I I I I I I I I ! I I I I I I I I
0 1950 60 70 I 80 90 2000 0 1950 60 70 80 90 2000
Projected I I Projected
Labor Force Major Destinations of Legal Migrants
Millions Thousands
Other 60
Trinidad and
Tobago
Jamaica
Dominican
Republic
__-! I I I I I I I I I I
0
1950 60 70 I 80 90 2000
I Protected
I L. ~
I{
France.
and Others
1965 1970 1975 19 7 7 (est.)
'Other nations excluded because of different
dciimuon$ of urban areas.
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Pressure ox the Land. El Salvador, with 227 persons
per square kilometer (compared with 48 for the region
as a whole), is the most densely populated noninsular
nation in the Western Hemisphere, comparable to
such Asian nations as India and Sri Lanka. Areas
within other Central American nations are little El
Salvadors, with many of that nation's demographic
problems.
While population growth has soared, Food and Agri-
culture Organization data show that arable land has
expanded at less than 1 percent annually in each
country except Guatemala, where the increase has
been 1.6 percent a year. A factor in the expansion of
arable land is the amount of land suitable for inten-
sive agricultural use without large investments. Of
total land in Costa Rica, about 23 percent is in this
category; in Nicaragua, only 6 percent qualifies. On
this basis, Costa Rica has the lowest density, but even
there the rural population is becoming increasingly
concentrated. In each country the rural population
will grow in absolute terms, even though it is declining
as a proportion of the total.
other countries will be about 3 percent. In the 1990s
labor force growth will continue to accelerate in
Nicaragua and will remain at high levels in the other
countries.
We expect rapid expansion in the labor force even
though the percentage of the economically active is
likely to remain low, compared to that of developed
countries. The International Labor Organization esti-
mates 37 percent of the population of Costa Rica will
be in the labor force by the year 2000, while in the
other countries the share probably will be less than 33
percent. These shares reflect continued high-though
declining-percentages of the population under 15. At
present, the share of the population in the labor force
ranges from almost 34 percent in Costa Rica to about
30 percent in the other countries. If participation
increases faster than expected, labor force growth is
likely to be even greater than we project.)
Unemployment data for these countries are not a
measure of the problem, because a substantial part of
the labor force, both rural and urban, is underem-
ployed. Most heads of households find some work,
By the end of the century, between one-third and one- even if it is of extremely low productivity. One study
half of the Central American population will be shows that levels of equivalent unemployment (the
urban. Although urbanization has been slower than difference between available man-years and the esti-
elsewhere in Latin America, migration, spurred by mated requirement to produce the sectoral product) in
conditions in the countryside, has burdened urban agriculture in 1970 exceeded 50 percent in El Salva-
systems already struggling to accommodate natural dor and Guatemala, 40 percent in Honduras, 20
increases in urban population. According to an IDB percent in Nicaragua, and 15 percent in Costa Rica,
study, over the past 30 years the population in cities-of the country with the highest per capita income.
10,000 or more grew by annual rates of 4 percent or
more, well above the rates of general population
growth. Honduras, with a rate of 5.8 percent had the
highest rate of urban growth, although only a quarter
of its population lives in cities of this size. In Nicara-
gua, the most urbanized country, the share is 40
percent. The fastest urban growth in this decade,
about 4.5 percent a year, will be in Honduras and
Guatemala.
Labor Force and Employment. In the 1980s growth of
the labor force will accelerate in every Central Ameri-
can country except Costa Rica, whose average annual
rate rose from 2.6 percent in the 1950s to 4.4 percent
in the 1970s. El Salvador (3.6 percent) and Honduras
(3.4 percent) will have the highest average annual
labor force growth rates in this decade; rates in the
Social and Political Impact. Increasing pressure on
the land-exacerbated in some cases by a shift from
tenant farming to less labor-intensive plantation agri-
culture-is making rural life relatively less attractive
throughout Central America. If we use child malnu-
trition as a measure of the rural living standard, we
see that the standard has declined sharply in four out
of the five Central American countries since the mid-
1960s. Only Costa Rica, with relatively high per
capita incomes and extensive social services, has been
able to reduce malnutrition. Nicaragua, by far the
most urbanized of the five nations, had the lowest
malnutrition rate in the mid-1960s but has since seen
this rate worsen, in part, because of natural disasters
and political violence.
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Central American farmers have only a limited num-
ber of responses to their worsened situation. Most
tighten their belts and continue to eke out a living in
the countryside. (In this respect, small landowners
may feel they have fewer options than do landless
peasants who have nothing to lose by moving to the
city.) Others may be moved to seize unoccupied land
elsewhere. Population pressures that led some 300,000
Salvadorans to emigrate to sparsely populated neigh-
boring Honduras between World War II and the late
1960s also contributed to the 1969 "Soccer War"
between the two countries. Desire for land may also
be a factor influencing the so far relatively small
number of peasants who support revolutionary move-
ments.
Many peasants leave the land entirely and flock to the
cities and towns where, in the process of bettering
themselves, they lower real wage rates for other
urbanites. This, in turn, encourages illegal migration
to the United States. (Lack of economic opportunity
because of the area's relatively rigid social structure
and, more recently, fear of political violence are other
factors.) In 1978, an estimated 25,000 Salvadoran
illegals successfully migrated to the United States;
15,000 came from Guatemala; and 10,000 came from
other Central American countries. Given the marked
increase of violence in the area, illegal migration has
probably risen sharply since this estimate was made.
Government Measures. Government economic poli-
cies, including land reform and resettlement efforts,
have done little to reduce the problem of unemploy-
ment-underemployment in the region. There has been
little expansion in the percentage of the labor force
employed in industry, and much of the migration
from rural areas has tended to swell the urban service
sector, which suffers from low productivity and in-
come. Furthermore, the present violence in some
countries and the threat of conflict in others deter the
investment and economic growth needed to provide
jobs. For example, in Guatemala 13 multinational
corporations have recently closed down operations.
Most of the Central American governments have paid
little more than lipservice to the need to reduce
population growth rates, and their willingness to
address this problem is not likely to increase in the
next few years. In the 1960s all countries in the region
implemented family planning programs for health
reasons. By the mid-1970s El Salvador and Guatema-
la acknowledged that these programs also should be
used to reduce population growth. The present Guate-
malan Government, however, has no official popula-
tion policy and is tackling the problem by sponsoring
migration to sparsely settled areas. The present Nic-
araguan Government makes family planning services
available but does not actively promote them.F25X1
Outlook and Implications. The Central American
countries have had a poor record in dealing with their
population growth, and we do not expect the record to
improve significantly in the next few years. Most o125X1
the countries will be unable to provide adequate
employment opportunities for the growing numbers
entering the labor force, particularly in rural areas,
where pressures on the land will intensify. Many of
these workers, particularly from El Salvador, Guate-
mala, and Honduras, will view migration to the
United States, though illegal, as their only option.
These three countries already provide roughly half of
the illegal immigrants coming to the United States
Demographic pressures will add to political pressures
both within and between nations. The Nicaraguan
revolution has increased pressures for social change
throughout Central America, but particularly in E25X1
Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, where govern-
ment policies have done little to improve socioeco-
nomic conditions for much of the population. The
Costa Rican Government, in contrast, has made a
sustained effort to improve health and education
levels, and this investment in human resources has
contributed to a sharp drop in fertility and to relative
social calm. El Salvador has partially implemented
agrarian reforms, but it is still too early to judge the
results. Similarly, the final outcome of ongoing social
and economic changes in Nicaragua is uncertain.
Even Costa Rica is vulnerable to domestic strains if
economic conditions deteriorate. Continued high
growth in population and the labor force portends 25X1
social tensions in these countries for many years
ahead (figure 9).
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Figure 9
Central America
i ! I i I I I I I I I I I I I I ~I
1920 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 2000 1920 30 40 50 80 70 80 90 2000
Urban Population
Millionsa
Population per Hectare of Arable Land
Persons
20
Total
Guatemala
EI Salvador
HOa area
Costa Ries 2
I I I I I I I i I _
1920 30 40 50 80 70 80 90 2000
I--- Projected
1981-85
E 1980
Estimated
01990
Projected
Costa El Central
Rica Salvador Guatemala Hoodam Nicaragua America
584994 9-81
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