Why Do People Migrate? Evidence from Four Central American Countries, 2008–2018

• In Event: Public Attitudes, Immigration, and Refugees

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a dramatic increase in migrants from Latin America and the Caribbean. Indeed, the U.S. has begun registering over 200 thousand so-called “enforcement encounters” each month—close to record-breaking levels. While studies have extensively documented the roots and effects of immigration elsewhere, especially in the European context, there is a paucity of comparative political research that relies on large N statistical analyses focusing on Central America. As the region faces mounting challenges from economic hardship, insecurity, corruption, and democratic backsliding—all factors that, in theory, contribute to increasing migration—it remains open to debate how these factors fuel migration and if cross-country variance exists. This article takes a step in that direction. We use a decade of AmericasBarometer surveys by the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) from 2008 to 2018 (N=41,911) to conduct a cross-country examination that sheds light on the determinants of migration in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. The empirical results, which rely on probit maximum likelihood estimator and predictive margins, show that economic hardship, insecurity, and corruption variables are significant driving forces in the making of migration. In turn, support and satisfaction with democracy, in the backdrop of democratic backsliding, are weaker predictors of migration.

Author

• Lucas Perelló, Florida Atlantic University