placestats

Refugees originating vs. Urbanization

Holds up after adjusting for income

Across 192 countries, Refugees originating and Urbanization rise and fall together at r = -0.09 (on a scale from −1 to +1, where 0 means no link). There is almost no link to explain.

Comparing countries across the middle half of refugees originating, 2.4 to 128 per 100,000 people, urbanization is 0.125% of population lower at the top of that range than the bottom. Comparing only countries with similar national income, the gap reverses, to 0.128% of population the other way.

Link before adjusting (r)-0.089p = 0.219 · 192 countries
After adjusting for national income+0.117p = 0.107 · likely range [-0.03, +0.25]
p, allowing for regions0.000standard error 0.017 · 7 regions
Check for luck (q)0.013across 18,622 pairs

How to read these.r runs from −1 (one goes up as the other goes down) to +1 (they rise together), and 0 means no link. Adjusting for national income means comparing countries with the same GDP per person, so differences in wealth can’t explain the link. Income is used in percentage terms, since an extra $1,000 means more to a poor country than to a rich one. p is how likely a link this strong would be if there were really none. Below 0.05 means it is unlikely to be chance. Very small values are written in short form: 1.1e-32 means a decimal point followed by 31 zeros and then 11, so very close to zero. The likely range is where the true figure probably lies, and a range that crosses zero means the link could easily be chance. Countries in the same region tend to resemble each other, so the third figure allows for that, which gives a fairer p. The standard error is the typical size of the error in r. Finally, testing this many pairs means some will look strong by luck alone. A q below 0.05 means this link is unlikely to be one of those.

Refugees originating · per 100,000 peoplelink with income -0.50 · moderate
Urbanization · % of populationlink with income +0.65 · high

“Link with income” is how closely each measure tracks GDP per person across countries, from −1 to +1.

Every country as a dot

Refugees originating · per 100,000 people →Urbanization · % of population →018,99215.8%100%Aruba: 0 per 100,000 people, 61.7% of populationAfghanistan: 6,093 per 100,000 people, 25.9% of populationAngola: 34.4 per 100,000 people, 71.5% of populationAlbania: 774 per 100,000 people, 58.9% of populationAndorra: 6.03 per 100,000 people, 88.9% of populationUnited Arab Emirates: 2.22 per 100,000 people, 86% of populationArgentina: 1.18 per 100,000 people, 92.4% of populationArmenia: 528 per 100,000 people, 65.9% of populationAntigua and Barbuda: 103 per 100,000 people, 24.3% of populationAustralia: 0.152 per 100,000 people, 87.7% of populationAustria: 0.362 per 100,000 people, 69.7% of populationAzerbaijan: 1,260 per 100,000 people, 58.6% of populationBurundi: 2,212 per 100,000 people, 25.7% of populationBelgium: 0.961 per 100,000 people, 87.7% of populationBenin: 8.63 per 100,000 people, 53.4% of populationBurkina Faso: 1,459 per 100,000 people, 28.9% of populationBangladesh: 18.1 per 100,000 people, 33.2% of populationBulgaria: 7.94 per 100,000 people, 74.2% of populationBahrain: 16.2 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationBahamas, The: 396 per 100,000 people, 81.3% of populationBosnia and Herzegovina: 785 per 100,000 people, 52.7% of populationBelarus: 216 per 100,000 people, 79.5% of populationBelize: 25.5 per 100,000 people, 41.6% of populationBermuda: 9.29 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationBolivia: 5.64 per 100,000 people, 71.6% of populationBrazil: 2.96 per 100,000 people, 88.2% of populationBarbados: 204 per 100,000 people, 59.7% of populationBrunei Darussalam: 1.07 per 100,000 people, 75% of populationBhutan: 911 per 100,000 people, 43.4% of populationBotswana: 15 per 100,000 people, 68% of populationCentral African Republic: 12,229 per 100,000 people, 44.6% of populationCanada: 0.897 per 100,000 people, 82.9% of populationSwitzerland: 0.0669 per 100,000 people, 85.7% of populationChile: 27 per 100,000 people, 89.2% of populationChina: 10.9 per 100,000 people, 66.3% of populationCote d'Ivoire: 99.4 per 100,000 people, 54.5% of populationCameroon: 470 per 100,000 people, 55.7% of populationCongo, Dem. Rep.: 1,043 per 100,000 people, 45.1% of populationCongo, Rep.: 203 per 100,000 people, 64.1% of populationColombia: 149 per 100,000 people, 78.8% of populationComoros: 265 per 100,000 people, 33.9% of populationCabo Verde: 2.84 per 100,000 people, 77.6% of populationCosta Rica: 7.12 per 100,000 people, 79.7% of populationCuracao: 4.31 per 100,000 people, 91.5% of populationCayman Islands: 0 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationCyprus: 1.09 per 100,000 people, 66.7% of populationCzechia: 7.48 per 100,000 people, 72.9% of populationGermany: 0.389 per 100,000 people, 82.1% of populationDjibouti: 188 per 100,000 people, 73% of populationDominica: 147 per 100,000 people, 74% of populationDenmark: 0.35 per 100,000 people, 88.8% of populationDominican Republic: 10.8 per 100,000 people, 72.5% of populationAlgeria: 19.3 per 100,000 people, 75.8% of populationEcuador: 31.3 per 100,000 people, 63.4% of populationEgypt, Arab Rep.: 20.1 per 100,000 people, 42.9% of populationSpain: 0.388 per 100,000 people, 80.5% of populationEstonia: 6.4 per 100,000 people, 70.7% of populationEthiopia: 121 per 100,000 people, 24.1% of populationFinland: 0.0889 per 100,000 people, 74.5% of populationFiji: 36.8 per 100,000 people, 59.5% of populationFrance: 0.249 per 100,000 people, 78.8% of populationMicronesia, Fed. Sts.: 0 per 100,000 people, 22.5% of populationGabon: 37.9 per 100,000 people, 92.1% of populationUnited Kingdom: 0.743 per 100,000 people, 83.3% of populationGeorgia: 455 per 100,000 people, 61.2% of populationGhana: 45.7 per 100,000 people, 58.9% of populationGuinea: 316 per 100,000 people, 38.5% of populationGambia, The: 238 per 100,000 people, 65% of populationGuinea-Bissau: 80 per 100,000 people, 46.7% of populationEquatorial Guinea: 21.9 per 100,000 people, 71.6% of populationGreece: 0.946 per 100,000 people, 79.2% of populationGrenada: 99.7 per 100,000 people, 36.7% of populationGuatemala: 187 per 100,000 people, 56.3% of populationGuyana: 40.9 per 100,000 people, 26.5% of populationHong Kong SAR, China: 3.31 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationHonduras: 858 per 100,000 people, 59.3% of populationCroatia: 447 per 100,000 people, 57.8% of populationHaiti: 1,518 per 100,000 people, 55.6% of populationHungary: 21.3 per 100,000 people, 70.7% of populationIndonesia: 3.23 per 100,000 people, 59.4% of populationIndia: 2.91 per 100,000 people, 35.7% of populationIreland: 1.3 per 100,000 people, 64.6% of populationIran, Islamic Rep.: 171 per 100,000 people, 77.4% of populationIraq: 576 per 100,000 people, 69.9% of populationIceland: 0 per 100,000 people, 94.2% of populationIsrael: 13.3 per 100,000 people, 91.6% of populationItaly: 0.45 per 100,000 people, 69.7% of populationJamaica: 93.1 per 100,000 people, 59.4% of populationJordan: 47.5 per 100,000 people, 93.2% of populationJapan: 0.0455 per 100,000 people, 92.3% of populationKazakhstan: 19.9 per 100,000 people, 62.4% of populationKenya: 23.2 per 100,000 people, 32.2% of populationKyrgyz Republic: 45.7 per 100,000 people, 34.7% of populationCambodia: 63.5 per 100,000 people, 41.1% of populationKiribati: 3.66 per 100,000 people, 63.4% of populationSt. Kitts and Nevis: 76.7 per 100,000 people, 31.9% of populationKorea, Rep.: 0.226 per 100,000 people, 81.2% of populationKuwait: 67 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationLao PDR: 82.4 per 100,000 people, 40.3% of populationLebanon: 164 per 100,000 people, 91% of populationLiberia: 89.3 per 100,000 people, 56.1% of populationLibya: 230 per 100,000 people, 87.9% of populationSt. Lucia: 110 per 100,000 people, 29.1% of populationSri Lanka: 639 per 100,000 people, 20.5% of populationLesotho: 1.14 per 100,000 people, 44.7% of populationLithuania: 3.57 per 100,000 people, 69.1% of populationLuxembourg: 2.94 per 100,000 people, 94.9% of populationLatvia: 10.2 per 100,000 people, 68.6% of populationMacao SAR, China: 2.08 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationMorocco: 27.1 per 100,000 people, 63.1% of populationMoldova: 195 per 100,000 people, 43.7% of populationMadagascar: 1.95 per 100,000 people, 32.9% of populationMaldives: 11.7 per 100,000 people, 42.5% of populationMexico: 31.3 per 100,000 people, 80% of populationMarshall Islands: 0 per 100,000 people, 79.1% of populationNorth Macedonia: 104 per 100,000 people, 62.9% of populationMali: 2,063 per 100,000 people, 32.2% of populationMalta: 2.02 per 100,000 people, 95.7% of populationMyanmar: 2,779 per 100,000 people, 30.6% of populationMontenegro: 110 per 100,000 people, 65.6% of populationMongolia: 68.3 per 100,000 people, 71.1% of populationMozambique: 0.334 per 100,000 people, 37.2% of populationMauritania: 826 per 100,000 people, 61.5% of populationMauritius: 22.3 per 100,000 people, 39% of populationMalawi: 2.48 per 100,000 people, 17.6% of populationMalaysia: 6.88 per 100,000 people, 77.4% of populationNamibia: 22.1 per 100,000 people, 50.9% of populationNiger: 307 per 100,000 people, 18.4% of populationNigeria: 201 per 100,000 people, 63.8% of populationNicaragua: 504 per 100,000 people, 59.4% of populationNetherlands: 0.867 per 100,000 people, 95.9% of populationNorway: 0.356 per 100,000 people, 83.6% of populationNepal: 27.1 per 100,000 people, 67% of populationNaoero: 41.5 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationNew Zealand: 1.1 per 100,000 people, 84% of populationOman: 2.42 per 100,000 people, 79.5% of populationPakistan: 35.5 per 100,000 people, 39.5% of populationPanama: 8.2 per 100,000 people, 66.2% of populationPeru: 22.8 per 100,000 people, 85.6% of populationPhilippines: 0.691 per 100,000 people, 55.8% of populationPalau: 28.2 per 100,000 people, 79.3% of populationPapua New Guinea: 5.98 per 100,000 people, 15.8% of populationPoland: 3.59 per 100,000 people, 60.1% of populationPuerto Rico (US): 0 per 100,000 people, 94.3% of populationPortugal: 1.05 per 100,000 people, 61.5% of populationParaguay: 2.31 per 100,000 people, 70.4% of populationWest Bank and Gaza: 865 per 100,000 people, 87.4% of populationQatar: 2.34 per 100,000 people, 99.4% of populationRomania: 16.6 per 100,000 people, 52.2% of populationRussian Federation: 69 per 100,000 people, 75.3% of populationRwanda: 1,678 per 100,000 people, 30.9% of populationSaudi Arabia: 6.85 per 100,000 people, 84.6% of populationSudan: 5,460 per 100,000 people, 34.9% of populationSenegal: 68.8 per 100,000 people, 55.8% of populationSingapore: 0.732 per 100,000 people, 100% of populationSolomon Islands: 8.7 per 100,000 people, 31.3% of populationSierra Leone: 101 per 100,000 people, 45.9% of populationEl Salvador: 1,071 per 100,000 people, 75.5% of populationSomalia, Fed. Rep.: 4,539 per 100,000 people, 55.1% of populationSao Tome and Principe: 3.33 per 100,000 people, 69.2% of populationSuriname: 8.75 per 100,000 people, 65.8% of populationSlovak Republic: 11.4 per 100,000 people, 53.2% of populationSlovenia: 0.567 per 100,000 people, 56% of populationSweden: 1.2 per 100,000 people, 89.1% of populationEswatini: 17.5 per 100,000 people, 26.7% of populationSeychelles: 7.53 per 100,000 people, 45.5% of populationSyrian Arab Republic: 18,992 per 100,000 people, 72.1% of populationTurks and Caicos Islands: 29.9 per 100,000 people, 94.4% of populationChad: 72.8 per 100,000 people, 27.6% of populationTogo: 147 per 100,000 people, 44.4% of populationThailand: 0.457 per 100,000 people, 62.8% of populationTajikistan: 38.6 per 100,000 people, 26.2% of populationTurkmenistan: 24.5 per 100,000 people, 47.1% of populationTimor-Leste: 1.06 per 100,000 people, 28.8% of populationTonga: 62.6 per 100,000 people, 21.2% of populationTrinidad and Tobago: 38.1 per 100,000 people, 54% of populationTunisia: 30.1 per 100,000 people, 70.7% of populationTurkiye: 170 per 100,000 people, 89.5% of populationTuvalu: 0 per 100,000 people, 65.4% of populationTanzania: 2.26 per 100,000 people, 36.9% of populationUganda: 24.9 per 100,000 people, 31.9% of populationUkraine: 13,402 per 100,000 people, 69.6% of populationUruguay: 3.72 per 100,000 people, 95.7% of populationUnited States: 1.06 per 100,000 people, 80.2% of populationUzbekistan: 13.9 per 100,000 people, 51% of populationSt. Vincent and the Grenadines: 194 per 100,000 people, 48% of populationViet Nam: 20.3 per 100,000 people, 38.8% of populationVanuatu: 3.88 per 100,000 people, 22.3% of populationSamoa: 7.75 per 100,000 people, 17.5% of populationSouth Africa: 2.04 per 100,000 people, 63.8% of populationZambia: 1.58 per 100,000 people, 45.9% of populationZimbabwe: 39.1 per 100,000 people, 40.5% of populationCAFCYMMACMWIPNGSGPSYRUKRWSM

best-fit line line after adjusting

Four ways to measure the link

MethodrpCountries
Standard (Pearson), not adjusted-0.0890.219192
By rank (Spearman), not adjusted-0.3671.6e-7192
Standard (Pearson), adjusted for national income+0.1170.107192
By rank (Spearman), adjusted for national income-0.0540.455192

The rank version uses only each country’s place in line, from lowest to highest, so a few extreme countries count for less. The adjusted and unadjusted versions use the same 192 countries: those that report both measures and GDP per person. So the gap between them comes from the adjustment, not from a change in which countries are counted. Drop in the size of r after adjusting: -0.028 (a minus sign means it grew).

How solid is it?

Leaving out one country at a time, r ranges from +0.059 (without SYR) to +0.127 (without AFG). The bar above shows that range on a scale from −1 to +1, with the solid line at the full result. The single country that moves r most: SYR (-0.058).

Fragile: this link may not hold up.
  • direction is not consistent across regions

Within each region

Countries are not separate, unrelated cases, and neighbors share a lot. A link that holds inside each region is far more believable than one that shows up only when comparing regions.

nr
East Asia & Pacific31-0.10
Europe & Central Asia48+0.25
Latin America & Caribbean36-0.04
Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan22+0.08
Sub-Saharan Africa46+0.14

By income third

If the link shows up only in the richest third of countries, it is a feature of rich countries, not a general pattern.

nr
Poorest third64+0.22
Middle third64+0.01
Richest third64-0.07

By largest religious group

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
Christians110+0.11
Muslims49+0.19

By last European coloniser

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
France25+0.43
Never a European colony21-0.12
Spain20+0.35
United Kingdom63+0.08

By official ideology

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
Nationalist25+0.65
No strong official ideology116+0.05

By party system

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
A few parties banned26+0.08
No parties banned120+0.11

Without outliers (countries far outside the middle half of countries on either measure, by more than one and a half times the width of that middle half): r = +0.035 after dropping 30 countries.

Two series, one country

Both measures over the years for one country you pick. The two charts are stacked so they share only the years along the bottom.

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Over time, within countries

Everything above compares countries with each other at one moment. This section compares each country only with itself over 36years. So a link here can’t come from anything about a country that stays the same, such as its history, geography, institutions or culture.

Within countries over time, there is no link that is clearly more than chance (r = +0.066, comparing each country only with itself over the years, and each year only with the same year elsewhere). Whatever the cross-country picture shows, countries whose refugees originating moved did not tend to see their urbanization move with it.

Across countries (adjusted)+0.117for comparison
Within countries-0.018each country vs itself
…and vs the same year elsewhere+0.066q = 0.528 · 199 countries
Year-on-year changes+0.031q = 0.681
Read with care.
  • Almost all of the second indicator's variation is between countries, so the within-country estimate rests on a small part of the data.

6,248 country-years (one country in one year), 199 countries, 1990–2025, about 31 years each on average. Share of the variation that happens within countries over time: 49% for Refugees originating, 4% for Urbanization. The margins of error allow for each country appearing many times, and for each year’s value being close to the year before.

Year-to-year changes are a cautious test, not a final answer. Looking only at changes from one year to the next removes each country’s own trends. But it also makes measurement mistakes louder, which pulls the results toward zero. A near-zero result here is weak evidence of no link, not proof.

With one measure years behind the other

0.10−0.1-100+10years Urbanization trails Refugees originating →lag -10: r = -0.004 (n = 4,853)lag -9: r = 0.006 (n = 5,019)lag -8: r = 0.018 (n = 5,187)lag -7: r = 0.032 (n = 5,345)lag -6: r = 0.046 (n = 5,508)lag -5: r = 0.059 (n = 5,668)lag -4: r = 0.063 (n = 5,828)lag -3: r = 0.070 (n = 5,948)lag -2: r = 0.071 (n = 6,059)lag -1: r = 0.066 (n = 6,157)lag +0: r = 0.066 (n = 6,248)lag +1: r = 0.067 (n = 6,048)lag +2: r = 0.060 (n = 5,845)lag +3: r = 0.053 (n = 5,649)lag +4: r = 0.047 (n = 5,454)lag +5: r = 0.041 (n = 5,259)lag +6: r = 0.036 (n = 5,071)lag +7: r = 0.030 (n = 4,878)lag +8: r = 0.022 (n = 4,691)lag +9: r = 0.013 (n = 4,490)lag +10: r = 0.004 (n = 4,301)

Same year (lag 0): +0.066. A peak away from zero does not show which comes first. These series change slowly — this year’s value is close to last year’s. That makes the curve smooth and nearly symmetric, whatever produced the data. Even a sharp peak at one lag (a gap of some years) would not prove that one measure changes the other.

The data


per 100,000 people
% of population		Years
Syrian Arab Republic SYR18,99272.1%2025
Ukraine UKR13,40269.6%2025
Central African Republic CAF12,22944.6%2025
Afghanistan AFG6,09325.9%2025
Sudan SDN5,46034.9%2025
Somalia, Fed. Rep. SOM4,53955.1%2025
Myanmar MMR2,77930.6%2025
Burundi BDI2,21225.7%2025
Mali MLI2,06332.2%2025
Rwanda RWA1,67830.9%2025
Haiti HTI1,51855.6%2025
Burkina Faso BFA1,45928.9%2025
Azerbaijan AZE1,26058.6%2025
El Salvador SLV1,07175.5%2025
Congo, Dem. Rep. COD1,04345.1%2025

UNHCR Refugee Data Finder; rate per population from Our World in Data
World Bank, World Development Indicators

Sources

Refugees originating

Refugees originating from the country, per 100,000 people

United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees · via Our World in Data · CC BY 4.0 · updated annual

People recognised as refugees abroad, compared with the population of the country they left. It is zero for most of the world and in the thousands for a dozen countries at war. So it is put on a log scale (which squeezes very large values together) wherever it is used for adjusting, and its links lean on those few countries. The "leave one out" check shows by how much. It has a "better" direction and sits under governance. But it is an outcome of governance, not a measure of it, so it is kept out of the governance score.

Urbanization

Urban population (% of total population)

World Bank · CC BY 4.0 · updated quarterly

How this was computed

Data used: most recent value in 2010-2025; values come from 2023–2025. To adjust for income, each measure is first predicted from GDP per person (in percentage terms, on a log scale) with a straight-line fit. Only what is left over is then compared. This is called a partial correlation. The line is drawn the standard way (ordinary least squares), which picks the line that comes closest to all the countries at once. The error margins allow for countries in the same region resembling each other, using 7 World Bank regions. The q-value corrects for testing all 18,622 pairs at once, using the Benjamini–Hochberg method. Underlying data last updated V-Dem v16; V-Party v2. How the country data works · explore Refugees originating and Urbanization

This page shows that two measures go together. It does not show that Refugees originating changes Urbanization, or the reverse. These figures also describe countries, not individual people. See the ecological fallacy.

More links with Refugees originating or Urbanization