Lecture Tim Dyson,iss,The Hague,The Netherlands,23 April 2009 part 5.mov — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00in particular it increases the size of
2. 0:02the population it eventually ages the
3. 0:06population so the population becomes
4. 0:08more adult in simple demographic terms
5. 0:11and above all it concentrates the
6. 0:14population in urban areas and in those
7. 0:18circumstances I believe political power
8. 0:21eventually becomes more diffused
9. 0:23diffused in society moreover the
10. 0:28resulting increase in population size
11. 0:30means that representative democracy with
12. 0:34political parties tends to supplant the
13. 0:37ideal of direct participatory democracy
14. 0:40now this is a bit of me not everyone
15. 0:44would necessarily agree with it but and
16. 0:46of course it's an extremely difficult
17. 0:47thing to prove I don't believe I've
18. 0:49proved it but nevertheless what this
19. 0:52diagram does show is abroad
20. 0:54correspondence for all world regions for
21. 0:56where we can get some sort of data
22. 0:58between the level of urbanization and
23. 1:01the trend in urbanization and a measure
24. 1:03of democracy based on the polity three
25. 1:06database I am NOT suggesting that I am
26. 1:13not suggesting that changes in
27. 1:14democratization are only brought about
28. 1:16by demographic factors and indeed in
29. 1:21certain circumstances for example this
30. 1:23long period of plateauing in these
31. 1:26measures of democracy for Europe and
32. 1:29also a similar different though
33. 1:32different period of plateauing here in
34. 1:34Latin America which I think both of
35. 1:36which can be explained in terms of other
36. 1:38factors but I think that that is an
37. 1:40argument that's worth considering well
38. 1:44finally there are strong reasons to
39. 1:46believe that the processes of the
40. 1:48demographic transition have underlined
41. 1:50much of the reduction in gender
42. 1:52differentiation that has taken place in
43. 1:54society and if there was one reading I
44. 1:58would refer you to hear it will be that
45. 2:00by Kingsley Davis and Pietro nella van
46. 2:04de Nova which is on this sheet consider
47. 2:08for example that in a pre transitional
48. 2:11society
49. 2:13as many as three quarters of all women
50. 2:16aged 15 to 49 are likely to be either
51. 2:19pregnant or lactating at any one tone
52. 2:24however as the demographic transition
53. 2:28proceeds so childbearing comes to
54. 2:31constitute a much smaller fraction of
55. 2:34women's much longer lives you've got
56. 2:38increase in life expectancy and you've
57. 2:40got a reduction in fertility
58. 2:43consequently the livelihoods of women
59. 2:46gradually become less tied to concerns
60. 2:49of the domestic demand and interestingly
61. 2:54in this context I think there are
62. 2:56reasons to think that the consequent
63. 2:58reduction in gender differentiation has
64. 3:01been a symmetrical by that I mean and
65. 3:05I'm talking really about European
66. 3:07societies and similar societies by that
67. 3:10I mean that it is women's lives that
68. 3:13have become more like those led by men
69. 3:16rather than the reverse although I would
70. 3:19like to see some change in the opposite
71. 3:21direction as well whether that takes us
72. 3:23into the future well so far I've
73. 3:27addressed the positive sides or some of
74. 3:29the positive sides of the demographic
75. 3:31transition but the transition also has
76. 3:34its problematic side for example the
77. 3:38rapid population growth rates and high
78. 3:40population growth multiples that have
79. 3:43characterized recent transitions in some
80. 3:45developing countries have raised
81. 3:47significant developmental challenges
82. 3:50this side of the unprecedented
83. 3:52population growth that has come out of
84. 3:55the demographic transition I will
85. 3:57illustrate briefly in three ways so it's
86. 4:00got its good side many good sides but
87. 4:03it's got its problems as well most
88. 4:04things tend to have advantages and
89. 4:07disadvantages if you like so here we go
90. 4:11gordana yeah
91. 4:15the first topic I will refer to in this
92. 4:19context is that after a long period of
93. 4:23agnosticism on the subject the weight of
94. 4:28current thinking among economists who
95. 4:31study the issue is expressed well in
96. 4:35this statement by Nancy Birdsall and
97. 4:38Steve Cindy and I notice you're getting
98. 4:40Steve later in this lecture series they
99. 4:44say and this is based upon a collection
100. 4:47of studies that were presented at a
101. 4:49meeting in bellagio a six or seven years
102. 4:52ago they say that and this is as it were
103. 4:55the current state of thinking amongst
104. 4:58economists who look at this issue rapid
105. 5:01population growth is found to have
106. 5:04exercised a quantitatively important
107. 5:07negative impact on the pace of aggregate
108. 5:10economic growth in developing countries
109. 5:12may I read it again rapid population
110. 5:15growth is found to have exercised a
111. 5:17quantitatively important negative impact
112. 5:20on the pace of aggregate economic growth
113. 5:22in developing countries and they go on
114. 5:25rapid fertility decline the adoption of
115. 5:30birth control and the reduction in
116. 5:31fertility rapid fertility decline is
117. 5:34found to make a quantitatively relevant
118. 5:37contribution to reducing the incidence
119. 5:39and severity of poverty there's a lot of
120. 5:43work which shows that children in larger
121. 5:46families tend to be disadvantaged in
122. 5:48terms of food education nutritional
123. 5:50status etc relative to children in
124. 5:53smaller families holding other factors
125. 5:55constant in as much as it can be done
126. 5:57okay go down a next one here's a simple
127. 6:01quick illustration of that it's the
128. 6:03cross-sectional international
129. 6:05relationship between per capita income
130. 6:08growth on the horizontal acts on the
131. 6:11vertical axis and population growth on
132. 6:13the horizontal axis and particularly if
133. 6:18these data relate to long periods of
134. 6:20time economies spent a lot of time
135. 6:22dealing with 10-year periods you've got
136. 6:24to look at long periods of time if you
137. 6:26want to look fundamental relationships
138. 6:28and particularly if you look at this
139. 6:30this actually relates to 1950 22 2018
140. 6:35but particular if you look at the period
141. 6:36since the first oil shop 1975 up until
142. 6:40the present day it's a it's a really
143. 6:42strong relationship so that's one thing
144. 6:46if one really wants to make poverty
145. 6:48history then I think that family
146. 6:50planning promoting family planning is
147. 6:52one of the ways it's one of the tools in
148. 6:54the in the kit box okay now second go
149. 7:00down the next one yeah the second many
150. 7:03countries in the world today many
151. 7:06countries in the world today are
152. 7:07concerned about how rapidly their urban
153. 7:09populations are growing because they
154. 7:11have to provide in urban infrastructure
155. 7:14sewage roads electricity housing etc etc
156. 7:18etc so rapid urban population growth is
157. 7:21seen by many developing governments as
158. 7:25being a major a major challenge rightly
159. 7:28given how fast urban growth can be but
160. 7:33as Sam Preston has observed oddly in
161. 7:38this context family planning services
162. 7:41are rarely seen as a candidate for
163. 7:44slowing urban growth there are only
164. 7:48basically two reasons why urban
165. 7:50populations grow they increase either
166. 7:52through urban natural increase or
167. 7:53through rural to urban migration and of
168. 7:56course usually it's a mixture of the two
169. 7:57but both of those proximate factors
170. 8:01behind urban growth are strongly
171. 8:03conditioned by the overall rate of
172. 8:05population growth and you can see this
173. 8:07in a very simple plot which gordana is
174. 8:10showing us now it's a very strong
175. 8:12relationship so again family planning is
176. 8:18relevant in this context I believe and
177. 8:23finally a good owner population growth
178. 8:28exerts an upward effect on co2 emissions
179. 8:31other things equal now
180. 8:37when we switch to co2 emissions you see
181. 8:41the importance of context population
182. 8:44growth always has to be seen in context
183. 8:48because this particular effect is much
184. 8:51bigger in rich countries because of
185. 8:54their much higher levels of per capita
186. 8:55emissions and I can show this with a
187. 8:59very