It is difficult to predict whether the metropolitan centres will increase their share of the national population or not. On the one hand, the tendency towards deconcentration within the metropolitan region will reduce their national population share. On the other hand, given falling fertility rates in the countryside and small towns, much will depend on whether the metropolitan areas will continue to attract migrants. This will be determined in part by the economic performance of their respective nations. Cityward migration was slowed in the 1980s by economic recession.
Economic revival is likely to encourage more people to move to the cities.
Clearly, the demographic forecasts prepared at the beginning of the 1980s were very wide of the mark. Latin America's major cities will not grow to the size once forecast. At the same time, a gradual recovery in the quality of urban life, even if it is still generally below the level reached before the onset of the economic crisis, promises to accelerate the pace of population expansion. In addition, the largest cities have recovered some of their economic advantages over most smaller centres. They have increasingly become centres of science and technology and of information management for their countries.