City Location, Importance and Migration Patterns

Two cities with different connections

A city’s importance extends beyond the people who live there. It may provide jobs for its surrounding region, organise government or trade for its country, and connect businesses and people across the world. These roles also help explain why people move there.

London, in the UK, is our advanced-country case study. Lagos, in Nigeria, is our emerging-and-developing-country case study. Both attract migrants and have international influence, but migration affects their growth and character in different ways.

London: location and regional importance

London is in south-east England, on both sides of the River Thames. Most of Greater London lies north of the river. Greater London includes 32 boroughs and the separate City of London, the historic core often called the ‘Square Mile’. The City of London is especially important for finance; it is not the same as the whole capital.

London provides employment for people across the surrounding region. Many people live outside the city but travel into it for work. These commuters show that London’s economic influence reaches beyond its administrative boundary. Commuting differs from migration: commuters travel regularly without changing their home.

The concentration of businesses creates opportunities in finance, technology and other services. For example, the East End has a large technology cluster. London’s relatively high earnings and house prices also reflect the concentration of economic activity and demand to live there.

Why London matters nationally and internationally

At the national scale, London is the UK’s capital and largest city. Central government is based in Whitehall, so decisions made there affect the whole country. Its universities and research institutions attract students and skilled workers, while major railway stations and airports connect the capital with other parts of the UK and overseas.

At the international scale, London is a world city. Alongside New York and Tokyo, it is a major financial centre. Financial services and the headquarters of transnational corporations connect London to investment and business decisions around the world. A transnational corporation operates in more than one country.

London’s international importance is also cultural. Fashion, art, theatre and film attract visitors and support creative industries. Its importance therefore comes from several connected roles, not simply from having a large population.

Lagos: a coastal city with a national economic role

Lagos is on Nigeria’s Atlantic coast, beside the Bight of Benin. It developed around Lagos Island and the sheltered Lagos Lagoon, before spreading onto the mainland. This coastal setting supports ports and links between land transport and shipping.

At the regional scale, Lagos provides jobs and services for its surrounding area. Lagos Island contains the central business district, where financial and commercial activity is concentrated. The ports and industrial areas provide other employment, helping to attract people with different skills.

At the national scale, Lagos is Nigeria’s largest city and a leading centre of trade and economic activity. It is not the national capital: that role belongs to Abuja. Its busy seaport, international airport and industries make Lagos important to the movement of goods and people throughout Nigeria.

At the international scale, Tin Can Island port connects Nigeria with global shipping and trade. National and international companies, including Shell Nigeria, have an important presence in the city. Lagos also has growing fashion and film industries: Nollywood helps give the city cultural influence beyond Nigeria.

London’s national political role and Lagos’s economic role show that a city does not have to be a capital to be nationally important.

How migration changes a city’s population

Migration has two directions: people arrive and people leave. Net migration is arrivals minus departures. A city can attract many newcomers but also lose residents, so arrivals alone do not show its overall population change.

Population also changes through births and deaths. When births exceed deaths, there is natural increase. Migration and natural increase are separate processes, but they can be connected. If migrants are mainly young adults, they change the city’s age structure and may later have children there. Migration can therefore contribute to future growth as well as immediately adding residents.

London: young adults arrive, while some households leave

London attracts economic migrants from elsewhere in the UK and from overseas, particularly people in their twenties and thirties. Its jobs, universities and international business connections help explain this attraction. These arrivals contribute to a younger population than in much of the UK.

National migration is not only movement into London. Some families leave the capital, and some people move away when they retire. The combination of young adult arrivals and older residents leaving helps explain London’s distinctive age structure. A relatively youthful population also supports natural increase.

International migration has made a substantial contribution to London’s population. The 2021 Census recorded about 8.8 million residents, of whom 3.58 million, or 41%, were born outside the UK. This compares with 3.00 million, or 37%, in 2011. These figures describe residents’ places of birth, rather than how many migrants arrived during those years.

The origins of London’s overseas-born population are varied. In 2021, about 1.37 million residents were born elsewhere in Europe and 1.15 million in the Middle East and Asia. India was the largest individual non-UK country of birth, with about 323,000 residents; other important origins included Romania, Poland, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Italy and Nigeria.

These movements change London’s character as well as its size. Migrants bring languages, religious traditions, food and music, and establish businesses and community networks. This helps explain London’s cultural diversity and its connections with places across the world.

Lagos: rural migration and rapid outward growth

Much of Lagos’s national migration is rural-to-urban migration from other parts of Nigeria. Employment and higher earnings attract people: a case-study estimate places incomes in Lagos at around four times those in rural areas. This is an attraction, not a guarantee that every migrant will obtain a well-paid job.

Conditions in rural areas also encourage people to leave. Limited education and healthcare, few jobs beyond farming, and low agricultural incomes reduce opportunities. Droughts and floods can damage crops, oil pollution can degrade land, and unreliable rainfall in northern Nigeria makes farming livelihoods less secure. These pressures combine with the attraction of work in Lagos.

International migrants include people from nearby countries such as Chad and Niger. Lagos also attracts workers from the USA, UK and China who are employed by foreign businesses, including those connected with the oil industry. Migration therefore includes both people seeking better livelihoods and workers moving for particular business roles.

Many rural migrants are young adults. Their arrival adds directly to the population and contributes to a youthful age structure; births can then produce further natural increase. It is important to distinguish this later effect from migration itself.

Migration changes Lagos’s extent and character

As Lagos grew, development spread from the islands onto the mainland. By the mid-1960s, expansion associated with the oil economy extended towards Victoria Island and along major mainland transport routes. Continued inward migration helped drive wider expansion by 1990. The city has subsequently spread further north and west, including towards areas around the airport.

This outward spread is urban sprawl. It shows that growth changes the physical extent of a city, not just its population total. Rapid arrivals also increase demand for accommodation. Lagos contains wealthy gated communities, including on Victoria Island, alongside extensive informal settlements such as Makoko beside and within the lagoon. These contrasts are part of the changing urban character, although their detailed challenges are studied separately.

Migration from many parts of Nigeria and other countries has also made Lagos ethnically diverse. Different communities bring cultural traditions and languages, while international businesses strengthen overseas connections.

The central comparison is that London combines substantial inward migration with outward movement by some families and retirees, whereas Lagos’s rapid inward migration contributes strongly to youthful population growth and outward urban expansion. In both cities, economic importance attracts people, and those people then reshape the city.

Location and importance

London’s migration pattern

• Young economic migrants arrive from elsewhere in the UK and overseas.
• Some families and retirees leave: migration operates in both directions.
• Young arrivals help create a youthful population and contribute to natural increase.
• 2021: 8.8 million residents; 3.58 million foreign-born (41%, up from 37% in 2011).
• India was the largest non-UK country of birth; other origins included Romania, Poland and Bangladesh.
• Migration increases cultural diversity and international connections.

Lagos’s migration pattern

• Rural Nigerians move towards jobs and higher incomes.
• Rural pressures include limited services, few non-farming jobs, crop damage and unreliable rainfall.
• International origins include Chad and Niger; foreign businesses also attract workers from the UK, USA and China.
• Young arrivals add residents directly and contribute to later natural increase.
• Growth spreads onto the mainland, especially north and west; migration also increases ethnic diversity and demand for housing.

Essential distinction

Population growth: migration balance plus births minus deaths. Migration changes residence; natural increase results from births exceeding deaths.