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POPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW, September 1999, Vol. 25, N° 3
MCNICOLL, Geoffrey.
Population weights in the international order.
Relative population sizes play little part in the international system. A state's economic and military power is influenced by population size, but as one factor among many. Formal relations among states exclude population from consideration by the principle of sovereign equality. Three sources of possible change in this situation are explored, in which states would be "population-weighted" to a greater degree than before. Convergence of productivity levels around the world, expected by many, would bring the economic and population rankings of states more into line. Some convergence is occurring, but selectively and for the most part quite slowly. Anticipation of its effect, however, influences the international order well in advance. A second source of change is the necessity to allocate among states the use of global commons, particularly the atmosphere as a sink for greenhouse gases. Acceptable remedies for this problem and perhaps for other global-level threats are likely to involve at least in part a per capita allocation principle. And third, population weights will tend to be more prominent in futures in which states are less important--as envisaged, for example, in the more benign scenarios of global society.
(WORLD POPULATION, NATION, INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, POPULATION SIZE, ENVIRONMENT).
English - pp. 411442.
G. McNicoll, Policy Research Division, Population Council, and Demography Program, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia.
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HOPPER, Gordon R.
Changing food production and quality of diet in India, 194798.
Systematic and critical evaluation, using food balance sheets, census population data, government surveys, food composition statistics, and estimates of the population's biological requirements, shows that the realized improvements in food supplies in India of the past five decades, while beneficial, have been insufficient to meet the nutritional needs of the average person in a population that grew from less than 350 million to nearly one billion during this period. The improvements also fall significantly short of meeting the needs of the clinically malnourished. Present per capita dietary energy intakes range from as high as 95 percent to as low as 50 percent of daily requirements. Additionally, comparison of past and present diets shows that as the composition of the diet has changed with time, its nutritional quality for many has deteriorated despite an apparent increase in overall food quantity. This has come about from changes in the production system that have emphasized wheat and rice crops at the expense of more nutritional pulses and coarse grains, and from widespread poverty that leaves high-quality animal foods beyond the means of most.
(INDIA, FOOD PRODUCTION, FOOD REQUIREMENTS, NUTRITION POLICY, DIET, POVERTY, POPULATION GROWTH).
English - pp. 443477.
G. R. Hopper, Department of Geography, University of Toronto at Mississauga, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
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CALDWELL, John C.
The delayed western fertility decline: An examination of English-speaking countries.
Fertility decline began in English-speaking countries 80 years later than in France even though per capita incomes in the former were higher and children were probably a net economic burden, at least for the middle classes. Explanations have included ignorance of contraception and the desire to keep women out of the workforce. This essay suggests that the reasons are to be found in the works of the moral reformers rather than in those of the neo-Malthusians. The Victorian family was a construct made to meet the needs of industrializing countries. The marital relationship was believed to be in danger--and probably was in danger--from discussion of genital-related contraception. The low demand for contraception meant that contraceptives remained crude and could not be discussed in most marriages. The problem would ultimately be overcome through further economic development together with educational and other social change. Nevertheless, the legitimation of marital discussion of birth control was not achieved until the subject was written about in the press and subsequently in birth control manuals sold on a much larger scale than before. This, in turn, changed the packaging and accessibility of contraceptives, making their discussion, acquisition, and use easier and a fertility decline possible.
(HISTORICAL DEMOGRAPHY, DEVELOPED COUNTRIES, FERTILITY DECLINE, DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION, FERTILITY DETERMINANTS, CONTRACEPTIVE PREVALENCE).
English - pp. 479-513.
J. C. Caldwell, Department of Demography, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia.
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BONGAARTS, John; BULATAO, Rodolfo A.
Completing the demographic transition.
Despite ongoing declines in fertility in many countries, the population of the world is experiencing a period of rapid expansion, and its size is expected to reach 10 billion by the end of the demographic transition. Three causes of this growth are identified and quantified: 1) fertility above the replacement level of two surviving children per woman, 2) continuing declines in mortality, and 3) population momentum resulting from a young age structure. A set of simple analytic expressions is proposed for estimating these factors from standard demographic indicators. Population momentum is shown to be the main cause of future growth in most countries and regions.
(DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION, POPULATION GROWTH, WORLD POPULATION, POPULATION PROJECTIONS, AGE DISTRIBUTION).
English - pp. 515-529.
J. Bongaarts, Policy Research Division, Population Council, One Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, New York, NY 10017, U.S.A.; R. A. Bulatao, Panel on Population Projections, Committee on Population, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC, U.S.A.
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WILSON, Chris.
Evolutionary theory and historical fertility change.
Probably no issue divides social scientists and natural scientists more demonstrably than their attitudes on the value of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection. The present essay suggests the role that Darwinian theory can play in the study of human fertility. After examining the nature of Darwinian theory, the essay considers research carried out on fertility by biologists and anthropologists with methods based on it and possible reformulations of demographic methods and analyses that could benefit fertility research. It ends with suggestions for further research to explore the value of Darwinian approaches to demographic issues.
(EVOLUTION, FERTILITY TRENDS, HISTORY, THEORY, METHODOLOGY).
English - pp. 531-541.
C. Wilson, Demography Program, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia.
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DONAHOE, Debra Anne.
Measuring women's work in developing countries.
While an extensive literature documents the need for better measures of women's work, few attempts have been made to construct suitable work typologies that could be applied throughout the developing world. The author argues that in addition to the descriptive utility of more-comprehensive measures of women's work, important analytical gains are to be made by applying better measures of work to a variety of research questions. Conventional labor force participation measures ignore an often substantial proportion of women's total productive activity, resulting in a limited understanding of the many processes that affect and are affected by women's work. The proposition is supported by examining an issue drawn from social demography--the relationship between women's work and decisionmaking relative to fertility in contemporary Egypt.
(DEVELOPING COUNTRIES, FEMALE EMPLOYMENT, MEASUREMENT, METHODOLOGY, EGYPT, DECISION MAKING, FERTILITY).
English - pp. 543576.
D. A. Donahoe, Data Square, LLC.
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POPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW, December 1999, Vol. 25, N° 4
BANTHIA, Jayant; DYSON, Tim.
Smallpox in 19th-century India.
This study uses the large, but neglected, body of Indian historical demographic and health data to show that smallpox was a major killer in past times. At the start of the 19th century roughly 80% of India's population had no effective protection against the disease, and in these circumstances virtually everyone suffered from it in childhood. The main exception was Bengal, where the indigenous practice of inoculation greatly limited the prevalence of the disease. Smallpox case fatality in India was high--around 2530% in unprotected populations--and significantly higher than estimated for unprotected populations in 18th-century Europe. Although vaccination reached India in 1802, the practice spread slowly during the first half of the 19th century. From the 1870s onward there were considerable improvements in vaccination coverage. The study demonstrates a close link between the spread of vaccination and the decline of smallpox. Whereas at the start of the 19th century the disease may have accounted for more than 10 percent of all deaths in India, by the end of the century smallpox had become a comparatively minor cause of death as a result of improved vaccination coverage.
(INDIA, HISTORICAL DEMOGRAPHY, SMALLPOX, MORBIDITY, CAUSES OF DEATH, VACCINATION).
English - pp. 649680.
J. Banthia, Registrar General and Census Commissioner, India; T. Dyson, Department of Population Studies, London School of Economics, London, U.K.
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HEUVELINE, Patrick.
The global and regional impact of mortality and fertility transitions, 19502001.
During the second half of the twentieth century, world population grew at a record pace, both in absolute and relative terms, from 2.5 billion to 6 billion (or 1.75 percent annually). Demographers have long identified rapid mortality declines as the main explanation. This article finds that one-fourth of today's world population is alive because of mortality improvements since mid-century. Very rapid growth is unlikely to continue as substantial fertility declines also occurred in recent decades. This article finds that already by the year 2000, these fertility declines have almost exactly compensated for the impact of mortality declines from mid-century levels. This result may suggest homeostasis, but analyses of underlying trends contradict this impression. First, the impact of fertility declines will soon and significantly exceed that of mortality declines. Second, that mortality and fertility declines jointly affect the size of the world population by less than 1% conceals a significant impact on the population's age composition as well as on regional population sizes.
(DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION, WORLD POPULATION, REGIONS, FERTILITY DECLINE, MORTALITY DECLINE, AGE DISTRIBUTION).
English - pp. 681702.
P. Heuveline, Department of Sociology and the College, University of Chicago, Chicago, U.S.A.
p-heuveline@uchicago.edu.
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POTTER, Joseph E.
The persistence of outmoded contraceptive regimes: The cases of Mexico and Brazil.
Two of the most striking characteristics of contraceptive practice in the world today are the wide variation in patterns of use across countries and the tendency of the distribution of use by method to persist or narrow, even as new methods become available. The argument advanced in this article is that the disposition to commit to a reduced range of methods results from positive feedback in the process of contraceptive choice, and follows the logic of path dependence. The positive feedback derives, in large part, from social interaction among both the providers and the users of contraceptive methods. The persistence of outmoded contraceptive regimes is illustrated with the experience of Mexico and Brazil. In each case, it is argued that the conditions, events, and policies in the early stage of the adoption process have had a determinant bearing on the contraceptive practice prevailing in the late 1990s.
(MEXICO, BRAZIL, CONTRACEPTIVE USAGE, CONTRACEPTIVE METHODS, CONTRACEPTIVE PREVALENCE, TRADITIONAL CONTRACEPTION, CHOICE).
English - pp. 703739.
J. E. Potter, Department of Sociology, Population Research Center, University of Texas at Austin, Texas, U.S.A.
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GOLDSTEIN, Joshua R.; SCHLAG, Wilhelm.
Longer life and population growth.
Enthusiasm about the prospect of large increases in human life expectancy is often dampened by fears that lower mortality will increase population size, hence population pressure. A simple mathematical model of life-cycle stretching demonstrates that if increased longevity is accompanied by later childbearing, a trend that is already underway, future declines in mortality will not increase population size.
(LENGTH OF LIFE, POPULATION GROWTH, MORTALITY DECLINE, POPULATION SIZE, MATHEMATICAL MODELS, POPULATION PRESSURE).
English - pp. 741747.
J. R. Goldstein, Department of Sociology and Public Affairs, Office of Population Research, and W. Schlag, Department of Mathematics, Princeton University, 21 Prospect Av., Princeton, NJ, U.S.A.
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O'NEILL, Brian C.; SCHERBOV, Sergei; LUTZ, Wolfgang.
The long-term effect of the timing of fertility decline on population size.
Existing long-range population projections imply that the timing of the fertility transition has a relatively unimportant effect on long-term population size when compared with the impact of the level at which fertility is assumed eventually to stabilize. However, this note shows that the effect of the timing of fertility decline is a function of the eventual fertility rate: the lower the eventual fertility rate, the greater the effect of the timing of the transition becomes. This finding has important implications for projection methodology, as well as for policies related to the consequences of long-term levels of population size.
(FERTILITY DECLINE, POPULATION SIZE, DEMOGRAPHIC TRANSITION, LONG-TERM PROJECTIONS, CHRONOLOGY).
English - pp. 749756.
B. C. O'Neill, Watson Institute for International Studies and Center for Environmental Studies, Brown University, Providence, RI, U.S.A.; S. Scherbov, Population Research Centre, Faculty of Spatial Sciences, University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands; W. Lutz, Population Project, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg, Austria.
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BROCKERHOFF, Martin.
Urban growth in developing countries: A review of projections and predictions.
Comparison of the United Nations' earliest and most recent projections to the year 2000 suggests that urban and city growth in developing regions has occurred much more slowly than was anticipated as recently as 1980. A modified "urban population explosion" in developing countries since the 1970s conforms to explanatory models of urban growth developed by economists around 1980. Trends in productivity and terms of trade, in particular, have been highly favorable to agriculture as compared to manufacturing, presumably slowing migration to urban centers. Increases in national population growth rates have produced less than commensurate increases in rates of city growth, further supporting an economic and migration-related explanation for unexpectedly slow recent urban growth. Despite the efforts of the United Nations to maintain reliable statistics on urban and city populations, urban population projections should be interpreted with caution because of inadequacies of the data on which they are based. Moreover, current projections that virtually all world population growth in the future will occur in urban areas of developing countries may be misconstrued, if the forces that have retarded urban growth in recent years persist.
(DEVELOPING COUNTRIES, URBAN POPULATION, POPULATION PROJECTIONS, POPULATION GROWTH, URBAN DEVELOPMENT).
English - pp. 757778.
M. Brockerhoff, Policy Research Division, Population Council, One Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, New York, NY 10017, U.S.A.
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