This study examines the role played by social capital in the migration of rural households from drought-stricken areas of southern Saskatchewan to the Aspen Parkland during the 1930s. During a period of extremely difficult economic and environmental conditions rural households relied heavily on social networks, and the capital generated within them, to identify and select potential migration destinations, and to integrate into a destination region very different in agro-ecological terms than the source areas. By combining archival and secondary data and findings from in-depth interviews with migration participants, an enhanced understanding was obtained of the relationship between social capital, migration, and adaptation processes during Depression-era droughts. This case study, and the insights derived from it, is a useful historical analogue from which to improve our understanding of future adaptation and migration responses to anthropogenic climate change under similar socio-economic and geographical conditions.
Laforge, JML; McLeman, R
Social capital and drought-migrant integration in 1930s Saskatchewan
Canadian Geographies-Geographies Canadiennes