Geographia Polonica (1997) vol. 69

The migratory system of Berlin after unification in the context of global restructuring

Michael Tiefelsdorf, Gerhard O. Braun

Geographia Polonica (1997) vol. 69, pp. 23-44 | Full text

The migration process within the politically unified Berlin seems to be anexcellent indicator in how far these two sub-systems have already merged socially andeconomically or have restructured under the present global economic stress. Classical questionson the behaviour of an intraurban migration system include: (i) What is the stage ofdevelopment back to an unique migration core? (ii) What is the stage of a re-developed orre-established radial pattern of stepwise out-migration flows? (iii) Is there a converging ordiverging behaviour towards an integrated intraurban migration system? (iv) How do migrantsperceive distance, and (v) are there imaginary walls that structure a migratory urban systeminto sub-systems? An origin-destination constrained interaction model and descriptive statisticsare used to address these questions. Preliminary results provide sufficient evidence todisaggregate the complexity of the migration flows into two levels comprised of local andglobal systems.

Keywords: Urban restructuring, globalisation, migration path ways, spatial interaction model, urban GIS, stage of unification

Michael Tiefelsdorf, Department of Geography and Environmental Studies Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, N2L 3C5
Gerhard O. Braun, Department of Geography - Urban Studies and GIS Free University of Berlin, GrunewaldstraBe 35, 12165 Berlin, Germany