Household Context and Individual Departure: The Case of Escape in Three 'Unfree' East Asian Populations, 1700-1900.

In the past, many people were 'unfree' in the sense that their movement was restricted, and out-migration without permission was regarded and recorded as 'escape.' Even though such escape was common in the past, historical studies mostly neglect this form of migration. This paper examines escape in historical East Asia, focusing on the influence of household context and individual characteristics on the chances of escape, taking advantage of large-scale individual panel datasets from three adjacent unfree populations from northeast China, southeast Korea and northeast Japan in the 18th and 19th century. We not only find similar temporal, spatial, and age patterns of escape, but also similar patterns of associations between chances of escape and household context. In particular, the presence of dependent children and elderly in the household makes individuals less likely to escape. Other patterns of association also highlight the importance of gender and social class. Despite significant differences in political, social, and community context across these three East Asian populations, our empirical comparisons suggest important commonalities in terms of motivation driven by shared understandings of obligation to others.