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Demography 379
electronic computers ought to help in the development of such studies. In fact,
it is now possible to compare information obtained concerning the same person
in the course of two successive censuses.z2 By joining to this data supplied by
registry office records, it is possible to analyse arrival and departure flows. The
initial application of this method has produced very promising results.
76. However, the statistical analyses of existing documents are not enough.
All they can do is to prepare the way for more exact longitudinal studies showing
the effects of migratory movement in a person's life. Here are a few of the
questions that have so far remained unanswered. Does the migrant preserve
the fertility and life-expectancy rates of his country of origin, and if not, how
long does it take him to acquire the habits of his new country of residence?
Which are the migrants who return to their own country and under what con-
ditions is this return effected? How is the social, economic, political and cultural
integration of non-returning migrants effected ? All those preliminaries in order
at last to try to answer the basic question: Why does such and such a person leave
his homeland while another remains there?
To wn-planning
77. The overall (at the national or regional level) point of view of the planner
concerned with the greater or lesser population density in a given part of the
territory, is something altogether different. Whereas in the immediately preced-
ding paragraphs we were concerned with the development of localities (that is,
towns or urban development), here we are dealing with what is called urbaniza-
tion, which corresponds to something of another order. A country becomes
urbanized when the proportion of its inhabitants living in towns goes on in-
creasing. Although the two phenomena generally go together, one could,
strictly speaking, have urbanization without urban development. Seeing that the
more or less urban nature of localities is bound up with economic and socio-
cultural characteristics, it is the study of urbanization which throws light on a
country's all-round policy in its most varied aspects. Urban development as
such is restricted to a particular locality. We can say that while it is the mayor of
a locality who studies urban development, it is the government ministers who
study the question of a country's urbanization.
78. Very early on, human beings realized that the city was a factor making for
cultural development, and it can be said that all or just about all we call 'civili-
zation' derives from the fact that men learned to establish cities. We tend to
forget this too easily when we count the disadvantages that have also accom-
panied this creative achievement. Without wishing in the least to minimize
these disadvantages, it must be admitted that the balance is very much on the
credit side, and one of the features of the present day is the craze for the urban
type of life, which must be regarded as a fact of existence rather than as a re-
versible parameter. This brings us to the living conditions whose description,
understanding and improvement are made possible by the study of urban
development.