The Southern Sudan refers to that part of the country in general to the south of the Bahr El Ghazal and the tenth parallel. The external limits to this area were not finally delimited until the second decade of this century when the Lado Enclave was taken over from Belgian administration in 1910 and much of what is now eastern Equatoria was transferred from Uganda in 1914. Originally two provinces, the south was subdivided into three in 1945 and remained as such for the next thirty years. In 1972, following 17 years of civil war, a peace agreement brought the three provinces together as a semi-autonomous region within the Republic. Juba was declared the regional capital and centre of an administration and civil service with a range of a dozen or so ministries. Four years later the provinces were each split into two in the vanguard of a national programme of decentralization. As a result there is being built up today a vast hierarchy of administration ranging from the regional capital through six provinces and their capitals to more than fifty council areas.

In the context of population redistribution, it is argued here that recent population movements in the Southern Sudan have not been the product of development projects or of more underlying economic factors, but rather a result of the political history of the area and its consequences. Prior to independence (1956), development projects were few, localized and had little overall effect on population distribution.