ABSTRACT
Southeast Asia is a major geographical region of the world, with a total population of almost 270 million in an area of 1.5 million square miles. The plurality of society which is so significant in the region tends also to complicate the internal migration pattern within the countries. As there are still rather few studies made of the internal migration patterns of these countries, this chapter attempts to identify and briefly discuss some of the themes on internal migration in Southeast Asia. The lack of reliable statistics for analysis is perhaps an even greater problem confronting the student of Southeast Asian internal migration. The future of research into patterns of internal migration in Southeast Asia seems to lie in studies of limited scale, in selected localities and with restricted analytical aims. Even so, over parts of the region such studies will have to await a return to normality and a re-emergence of the more meaningful basic trends.
