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Testing Lee's theory of migration in rural Al-Baha in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia

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Aldosari, Fahad (2009) Testing Lee's theory of migration in rural Al-Baha in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. PhD thesis, University of Gloucestershire.

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Official URL: https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/10576

Abstract

This study tests Lee's theory using explicit causes behind both normal and turnaround migration, under the generic headings provided in the theory itself. Thus, this study can be considered to provide a modification of Lee's theory, which simply groups factors under four headings without exact specification. The dominant factors were identified (from the extant literature and pilot interviews) and used to build an extended version of Lee's theory, which was applied in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabai (Al-Baha province). The model developed considered personal factors (psychological and emotional) as an important pillar because one of the main critiques of Lee's theory is that it does not explain personal factors explicitly. Demographic factors were excluded from inclusion as many previous studies discuss their role in migration decisions specifically. Age was the only exception to this exclusion because of its importance to both normal and turnaround migration decisions. Other dominant factors to be included Reviewing were identified from the literature. These were then benchmarked and validated with the view of respondents in KSA through a pilot study and ensure their appropriateness and to establish if there were other important factors to be added in the model. Other concepts related to Lee's theory also were investigated in this study to try to provide a full understanding of the theory and its potential explanatory power. The focus here was twofold: firstly, to help to examine and identify the level of rural development in Al-Baha, which has long been established as a key driver in migration decisions. And, secondly, it sought to establish if Lee's theory operates in Al-Baha in terms of normal migration (migration from Al-Baha to urban areas) and migration turnaround (migration from urban areas to Al-Baha). These aspects were tested using Structural Equation Modelling, a technique new to the study of migration. All of specific personal factors in normal migration and migration turnaround have a reasonable fit except one factor in migration turnaround that has a perfect fit (pull Factors & Stress) assessed using the criteria suggested by Arbuckle (2007). But according to Hair et al. (1998) recommendations on assessing models, all of models for specific personal factors did not have an acceptable fit in migration turnaround but they did have an acceptable fit in normal migration. This result also means that adding personal factors in general (unobserved variable) does not help the applicability and validity of Lee's theory in Al-Baha. In the light of these results, it was found that the models can be further improved in the future studies. This improvement may stem from: the inclusion of further variables or concepts; the refinement of the scales or their sensitivity to record more closely respondents' opinions; and, the potential further refinement of the relationships suggested in the critiques of Lee's theory. In the light of the results, the applicability and validity of Lee's theory in Al-Baha can be seen to reflect the level of rural development. This in tum means that rural social policy needs to be improved in the future to decrease the flow of Al-Baha population to urban centres in KSA. The results also indicated that Al-Baha is an attractive province in KSA in relation to migration turnaround. Such migration can be encouraged to improve the economic growth in Al-Baha and these issues should be considered before future planning in Al-Baha as should the negative consequences of migration turnaround.

Item Type:

Thesis (PhD)

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