Demographic Developments and Population Policies in Ba’thist Syria Onn Winckler Sussex
This is the first book written in English to describe and analyze demographic and socioeconomic developments in Syria within the framework of demographic developments taking I place throughout the Middle East during the later twentieth century. During the last 75 years, the Syrian population has increased almost twelve-fold — one of the highest rates in the Middle East. The demographic-economic factor is a prime factor in political decision-making and change in both inter nal affairs and foreign relations. This critical connection is traced in the light of President Asad’s policies. Chapters include: Sources for Syrian Demographic Trends and Development; Population Growth (natural increase, mortality rates and life expectancy, marriage and divorce, economic con sequences of high rates of natural increase, contraceptive use) the Spatial Distribution ot the Population (rural-to-urban migration, economic consequences of the rapid urbanization process); Syrian Migration Abroad; Demographic Policies of the Syrian Authorities; Demography, Economy and Political Change under Asad.
Onn Winckler is Lecturer in the Department of Middle Eastern History at the University of Haifa.
Contents
List of Figures and Illustrations / vii List of Tables? / viii Foreword by Professor Moshe Ma ‘oz / x Preface and Acknowledgments / xi List of Abbreviations / xiv
Introduction: The Middle Eastern Demographic Transition / 1
1 Sources for Syrian Demographic Trends and Developments / 9 Population Growth and Natural Increase / 9 Spatial Distribution of the Population / 20 Migration Trends / 20 Economic Data / 22
2 Population Growth / 24 Natural Increase of the Population / 24 Mortality Rates and Life Expectancy / 37 Marriage and Divorce / 46 Economic Consequences of High Rates of Natural Increase / 52 Contraceptive Use / 56
3 The Spatial Distribution of the Population / 61 The Rate of the Syrian Rural-to-Urban Migration Movement / 61 The Pattern of Rural-to-Urban Migration / 69 Reasons for Rural-to-Urban Migration / 73 Economic Consequences of the Rapid Urbanization Process / 81
4 Syrian Migration Abroad / 86 Permanent Migration / 86 Temporary Migration for Employment Purposes: Syrian Workers in Other Middle Eastern Countries / 88 The Scope of Syrian Migrants in Other Middle Eastern Countries / 90 The Incentives for Syrian Labor Migration / 91 Distribution of Syrian Migrants in the Host Countries / 95 Economic Consequences of Labor Migration / 103
5 Demographic Policies of the Syrian Authorities / 109 Family Planning / 109 The Spatial Distribution of the Population / 118 Labor Migration to Other Arab Countries / 135 Evaluation of Syrian Demographic Policies / 138
6 Conclusions: Demography, Economy, and Political Changes under Asad / 145
Figures 2.1 Syria: Natural Increase Rates, 1960-96. / 29 2.2 Total Fertility Rates in Syria, According to Place of Residence, and Mother’s Educational Level, 1993. / 34 2.3 Syria: Distribution of the Population (10 years and over), according to Literacy/Illiteracy, 1960-89. / 36 2.4 Infant (0-1) Mortality Rates in Syria, 1960-96. / 39 2.5 Life Expectancy at Birth in Syria, 1960-96. / 41 2.6 Per Capita Physician Ratio in Syria, 1946-93. / 43 2.7 Median Age at First Marriage for Women Aged 25-49 in Syria, 1993. / 47 2.8 Per Capita Cropped Area in Syria, 1960-94. / 55 2.9 Contraceptive Use in Syria, According to Place of Residence, and Level of Education, 1993. / 59 3.1 Syria: Distribution of the Population, According to Urban/Rural Areas, 1947-94. / 65 3.2 The Population of the Major Syrian Cities, 1932-94 (in thousands). / 71 4.1 Syrian Migrants in the Major Labor-Receiving Countries of the Middle East, 1970-92. / 94 5.1 Pre-Reform Distribution of Land Ownership in Syria. / 122 6.1 Syria: Per Capita Gross Domestic Product, 1988-97 (current prices, USS). / 153
Illustrations 5.1 and 5.2 Syrian Caricatures on the Population Explosion. / 117
Tables
2.1 Syria: Natural Increase Rates, 1960-96. / 26 2.2 Syria: Age-Specific Fertility Rates, 1960-93 (per 1,000 women). / 28 2.3 Syria: Age-Specific Fertility Rates per 1,000 Women, According to Level of Education, Age, and Place of Residence, 1973-78. / 31 2.4 Syria: Crude Birth and Total Fertility Rates, According to Type of Residence, 1976-79. / 31 2.5 Mean Number of Children Ever Bom to Ever-Married Women in Syria Aged 45-49, by Background Characteristics, 1978. / 32 2.6 Mean Number of Children Ever Bom to Ever-Married Women in Syria, According to Age, Place of Residence, and Level of Education, 1978. / 33 2.7 Syria: Distribution of the Population (10 years and over), According to Sex, Place of Residence, and Level of Education, 1960-93 (in percentages). / 37 2.8 Infant (0-1) Mortality Rates in Syria, 1960-96. / 38 2.9 Life Expectancy at Birth in Syria, 1960-96. / 40 2.10 Per Capita physician Ratio in Syria, 1946-93. / 42 2.11 Syria: Crude Death Rates, According to Type of Residence, 1976-79. / 43 2.12 Infant Mortality Rates and Cmde Death Rates in Syria, According to Regions, 1965-70. / 44 2.13 Life Expectancy at Birth in Syria, According to Place of Residence and Sex, 1976. / 45 2.14 Median Age of Women at First Marriage in Syria, According to Level of Education, and Place of Residence, 1970. / 48 2.15 Syria: Percentage of Ever-Married Women, According to Age, Place of Residence, and Level of Education, 1978. / 50 2.16 Median Age of Women in Syria at First Marriage, According to Economic Activity, and Place of Residence, 1970. / 51 2.17 Distribution of Syria’s Population, by Age, 1960-94. / 52 2.18 Per Capita Cropped Area in Syria, 1960-94. / 54 2.19 Percentage of Ever-Married Women in Syria Who Heard of Any Contraceptive Method, According to Age, and Background Characteristics, 1978. / 56 2.20 Percentage of Ever-Married Women in Syria Who have Ever Used Any Contraceptive Method, According to Current Age, and Background Characteristics, 1978. / 58 2.21 Knowledge and Use of Contraceptives Among Currently Married Women in Syria, 1993 (in percentages). / 59 3.1 Syria: Distribution of the Population, According to Urban/Rural Areas, 1947-94 (in thousands). / 64 3.2 Syria: Distribution of the Population, According to Provinces, and Urban/Rural Areas, 1960-95 (in thousands). / 66 3.3 Syria: Distribution of the Population, According to Provinces, 1960-95 (in percentages). / 70 3.4 The Population of the Major Syrian Cities, 1932-94 (in thousands). / 72 3.5 Syria: Distribution of Physicians, According to Provinces, 1958-93. / 77 3.6 Number of Hospital-Beds in Syria, According to Provinces, 1958-93. / 78 4.1 Syrian Migrants in the Major Labor-Receiving Countries of the Middle East, 1970-92. / 92 5.1 Pre-Reform Distribution of Land Ownership in Syria. / 121 5.2 Changes in the Syrian Agrarian Reform Regulations, 1958-63. / 124 5.3 Area of Land Expropriated, According to the Syrian Agrarian Reform (1,000 hectares). / 125 5.4 Cultivated Lands in Syria, According to Sectors, 1972 (1,000 hectares). / 126 6.1 Syria: Per Capita Gross Domestic Product, 1988-97 (US$). / 153
FOREWORD
For several generations demographic growth in the Middle East has become one of the most crucial issues of this region. It has influenced not only socio-economic development, but also political changes both within and among the Middle Eastern countries, as well as their relations with the international community. Significantly, the demographic evolution has impacted Arab- Israeli relations too, not only with regard to Egypt, but also in the case of Jordan, as Onn Winckler has already manifested in his previous book in this series (Population Growth and Migration in Jordan, 1950-1994). Syria is another important case study of demographic growth - indeed one of the highest in the region - and of its effects on the country’s domestic change and regional position. This book traces three major demographic developments and their socioeconomic consequences in Syria during the second half of this century, notably since the Ba‘th Revolution of March 1963, i.e., rapid population growth, the rural-to-urban migration movement, and the temporary migration of Syrian labor to other Middle Eastern countries. Each of these developments is described and analyzed within the framework of the overall socioeconomic evolution of Syria. The book convincingly demonstrates that, during the last two decades, the demographic factor has constituted one of the major levers of both structural economic changes and political shifts in internal and foreign affairs in Syria under Ba‘th regime. The decisive linkage between socioeconomic development and political change is indeed highlighted in this book.
A wide range of official Syrian statistical data as well as other sources are used, including population censuses, demographic surveys, five year development plans, and Syrian press reports that reflect the authorities’ policies on various relevant issues. Other sources are official publications of UN agencies, the World Bank and the IMF, and reports by various commercial companies dealing with demographic and economic issues. Drawing upon these source materials and reflecting original approaches and deep insights, this book provides a unique contribution to better understanding contemporary Syrian society and politics.
Moshe Ma‘oz, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Preface and Acknowledgments
During the last three generations the Syrian population has increased rapidly - in fact - by one of the highest rates all over the Middle East and North Africa region. While in 1922, at the beginning of the French Mandate, tlie total popu-lation of the area now under Syrian sovereignty numbered 1.3 million, it increased to 15.1 million by mid-1997. With a population growth of approximately 3 percent annually, the total Syrian population was estimated to be 15.3 million by the end of 1997, at the time of the writing of this book. These figures show that within a period of less than one century, the Syrian population has increased almost twelve-fold. The main purpose of this book is to describe and analyze the demographic and socioeconomic developments, as well as policies, emerging in Syria within the framework of the demographic developments taking place throughout the Middle East and North Africa region since the Ba‘thi Revolution in early March 1963.
The Introduction includes a short description of the demographic developments of the world from the beginning of the twentieth century until the mid-1990s. After an overview of the main demographic trends in the Middle East during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Syrian population growth from the beginning of the nineteenth century through the Mandatory period and until 1997 is described, and demographic forecasts of the Syrian population to the first quarter of the twenty-first century are made.
Chapter 1 presents the sources used in this research, mainly the population censuses and demographic surveys which were conducted in Syria during the period under discussion. The accuracy and reliability of the data collected in these censuses and surveys is discussed.
Chapter 2 details the natural increase rates of the Syrian population from the late 1950s onward, including crude birth and total fertility rates; crude death rates, infant and child mortality rates, and life expectancy at birth; distribution of the population by age; rate and age at first marriage, and the stability of the marriage system; trends of contraceptive use; and the economic consequences of the high rates of natural increase.
Chapter 3 concentrates on the spatial distribution of the Syrian population, including the trend of rural-to-urban migration which took place in Syria from the late 1950s onward as part of the overall Middle East urbanization process; the reasons for the unique pattern of the Syrian urbanization process, as compared with those taking place in the other Arab countries; and the economic consequences of the rapid Syrian urbanization process.
Chapter 4 deals with the migration of Syrians to other Middle Eastern countries for purposes of employment, namely, to the Middle Eastern oil-exporting countries (the GCC countries and Libya), as well as to the neighboring countries of Lebanon and Jordan. The chapter discusses migration trends; the scope of Syrian migration to the Middle Eastern labor-receiving countries; their distribution in the host countries according to the number of workers and accompanying family members; the reasons for these migration trends; and the economic consequences of such labor migration.
Chapter 5 describes and analyzes the attitudes of the Syrian authorities towards the three main demographic trends taking place in Syria during the period under discussion, namely: the high rates of natural increase of the popu-lation; the spatial distribution of the population, particularly the trend of rural-to-urban migration movement; and the migration of Syrian workers to other Middle Eastern countries. Syrian demographic policy in each of the three components is evaluated in the latter part of the chapter.
The Conclusion traces the effects of the demographic-economic factor on the political changes in Syria from the early 1970s onward, both in internal and external arenas.
This book has evolved out of my research on the demographic developments and socioeconomic policies in the Middle East and North Africa region during the twentieth century; it focuses in particular on these developments in Syria under the Ba‘th regime. The book is largely based on my Ph.D. thesis: “Demographic Developments and Population Policy in Syria, 1960-1990,” which was written in the Department of Middle Eastern History at the University of Haifa under the supervision of Professor Gad G. Gilbar. In addition, a few parts from chapters 2,4 and 5 have already been published in English in two articles: “Syria: Population Growth and Family Planning, 1960 -1990,” Orient (Deutsches Orient Institut, Hamburg), Vol. 36, No. 4 (1995), pp. 663-72; and “Syrian Migration to the Arab Oil-Producing Countries,” Middle Eastern Studies (Frank Cass, London), Vol. 33, No. 1 (1997), pp. 107-18. Excerpts from these two articles are reproduced here.
This research was conducted with the support of the Jewish-Arab Center and the Research Authority of the University of Haifa, as well as with the help of Ms. Ruth and Mr. Carl Barron, for which I am very thankful.
I am deeply indebted to Professor Gad G. Gilbar, the Rector of the University of Haifa, who was not only the Supervisor for my Ph.D. thesis, but also encouraged me to publish this book, as well as to Professor Moshe Ma oz, the former Director of the Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, for his willing-ness to write the Foreword and for his useful comments on various topics in the book.
Also my heartfelt gratitude goes to Dr. Ibrahim Geries, the head of the Jewish-Arab Center at the University of Haifa, Mr. Eliezer Rafaeli, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Center, and to Ms. Zvia Haimovitz, the administrative manager of the Center, for their help in publishing the book. I am also sincerely thankful to my colleagues, Dr. Michael Eppel and Dr. Uri M. Kupferschmidt, for their useful comments on various chapters of the book. I also extend my gratitude to Dr. Mordechai Kedar from Bar-Ilan University, for providing me with the two illustrations which appear in chapter 5. In addition, I would like to thank Ms. Sharon Woodrow for editing the manuscript, Mr. Joshua Rubin for arranging the tables and figures, and Mr. Ori Slonim for his useful help in collecting the material for the research. Finally, I am grateful to the librarians at the Middle East Documentation Unit at Durham University, the Cairo Demographic Center, the Newspaper Archives of the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University, and the University of Haifa Library.
Introduction: The Middle Eastern Demographic Transition
The most important demographic development in the world-1 during the twentieth century has been rapid population growth. In 1900, the world’s population was estimated at 1.65-1.71 billion.1 By 1994, it was estimated that the world’s population numbered 5.6 billion,2 representing an increase of 230 percent during less than one century.
The history of the world’s population is divided into three main stages of the “Demographic Transition.” The first stage, with high crude birth and death rates, ruled most of human history. It seems that until the middle of the nineteenth century, the average total fertility rate was about six. Nevertheless, because mortality levels were also very high, the natural increase rates of the world’s population were very low, and sometimes even negative during periods of starvation or epidemic diseases.
The second stage of the “Demographic Transition” began to occur toward the end of the eighteenth century with the beginning of modernization, accompanied by improved public health methods, including preventive medicine, better nutritional habits, and higher per capita income. These developments were all outcomes of the “Industrial Revolution” and thus occurred only in western European countries. However, they led to a marked reduction in mortality rates, gradually raising the average life expectancy from under 40 years to more than 60 years. Nevertheless, the decline in death rates was not followed immediately by a parallel decrease in the fertility rates. As a result, the growing gap between high fertility rates and falling death rates led to a sharp increase in population growth in western European countries, as compared with previous centuries.
The third stage of the “Demographic Transition” was marked by the begin-ning of a decline in fertility rates caused by the forces of modernization. Eventually, falling fertility rates converged with low death rates, leaving little or even no population growth in many industrialized countries.3 However, most of the world’s countries, including those of the Middle East and North Africa …
Onn Winckler
Demographic Developments and Population Policies in Ba’thist Syria
Sussex
Sussex Academic Press Demographic Developments and Population Policies in Ba’thist Syria Onn Winckler
Foreword by Professor Moshe Ma‘oz The Harry S. Truman Research Institute for the Advancement of Peace
The right of Onn Winckler to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1 First published 1998 in Great Britain by Sussex Academic Press Box 2950 Brighton BN2 5SP
and in the United States of America by Sussex Academic Press 5804 N.E. Hassalo St. Portland, Oregon 97213-3644
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Winckler, Onn. Demographic developments and population policies in Ba‘thist Syria I Onn Winckler: foreword by Moshe Ma'oz p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1 -902210-16-6 (alk. paper) 1. Demography—Syria. 2. Syria—Population policy. 3. Syria—Economic conditions. 4. Syria—Social conditions. I. Title. HB3633.7.A3W558 / 1999 304.6'095691—dc21 99-10160 CIP
Printed by Biddles Ltd, Guildford and King’s Lynn This book is printed on acid-free paper
