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Population Geography
Population Geography deals with the distribution of the human population across the earth and examines the conditions that limit man to certain areas of the world. It examines how population changes affect the environment, the supply of resources, and trade patterns. Finally, population geography attempts to propose solutions to problems associated with population change.
The following diagrams and descriptions provide a mere overview of some of the population issues that can help population geographers to make predictions about population change and advice on policy to deal with population problems.
Required Reading
The following diagrams and descriptions provide a mere overview of some of the population issues that can help population geographers to make predictions about population change and advice on policy to deal with population problems.
Required Reading
unit5.pdf | |
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unit11.pdf | |
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unit12.pdf | |
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ihb_section_a.pdf | |
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The Ideas of Thomas Malthus alive and well today?
James Brander, an economist from the Sauder School of Business, argues that an updated version of Malthusian population control is the only way to achieve sustainable development. This "population debate" is as familiar as it is controversial, but Brander breaks it all down in a comprehensible way in his essay, "Sustainability: Malthus revisited?"
Brander paraphrases the entire notion of sustainable development as a debate over "whether the world will experience stable or improving living standards…or whether the current trajectory will overtax the natural environment, leading to a 'crash' in living standards." He then turns the question away from clean energy and pollution, carbon emissions and biodiversity, and raises the following question: would sustainable development even be an issue, were it not for rapid population growth?
Brander is in good company…or some sort of company, anyway. His thesis, that "continued demographic transition to lower fertility is the primary requirement for achieving sustainable development" is, basically, an updated translation of what Thomas Malthus said in his canonical "Essay on the principle of population" a mere 212 years ago. (It just goes to show you how new and revolutionary the principles of today's 'sustainable development' debate really are.) Another famous figure to warn of the dangers of overpopulation was Texas ecologist Garrett Hardin who wrote the famous book, The Tragedy of the Commons.
There are, of course, some key differences between what Malthus was arguing all those years ago and contemporary incarnations of his ideas. Malthus, like the GOP, didn't acknowledge the so-called-theory of global warming, nor did his writings account for the framework of ecology. Instead, Malthus emphasized the cyclical relationship between the amount of available natural resources and the number of people vying for them, which, he argued, resulted in a predictable waxing and waning of population demographics.
Brander argues that "the essential core of the sustainability debate is the same as the Malthusian debate of the late 18th century"…i.e. that transitioning towards a slow global growth rate is essential. He optimistically (?!) states that when it comes to sustainable development "problems are intractable only if population pressures make them intractable."
I find Brander's argument both frightening and surprisingly refreshing. Pragmatic questions of "how" and "where" and "by whom" are implicitly raised, but not addressed, allowing his argument to float, momentarily, above a looming pit of political controversy. Despite the worrisome potentialities, his matter-of-fact tone is a welcome antidote to so much writing about sustainable development, which seems to prioritize warm and fuzzy political correctness above all else, making "sustainability" into something impossible to refute, and watered-down to the point of incomprehensibility.
Source: http://www.justmeans.com/Sustainable-Development-Population-Debate/32710.html
Brander paraphrases the entire notion of sustainable development as a debate over "whether the world will experience stable or improving living standards…or whether the current trajectory will overtax the natural environment, leading to a 'crash' in living standards." He then turns the question away from clean energy and pollution, carbon emissions and biodiversity, and raises the following question: would sustainable development even be an issue, were it not for rapid population growth?
Brander is in good company…or some sort of company, anyway. His thesis, that "continued demographic transition to lower fertility is the primary requirement for achieving sustainable development" is, basically, an updated translation of what Thomas Malthus said in his canonical "Essay on the principle of population" a mere 212 years ago. (It just goes to show you how new and revolutionary the principles of today's 'sustainable development' debate really are.) Another famous figure to warn of the dangers of overpopulation was Texas ecologist Garrett Hardin who wrote the famous book, The Tragedy of the Commons.
There are, of course, some key differences between what Malthus was arguing all those years ago and contemporary incarnations of his ideas. Malthus, like the GOP, didn't acknowledge the so-called-theory of global warming, nor did his writings account for the framework of ecology. Instead, Malthus emphasized the cyclical relationship between the amount of available natural resources and the number of people vying for them, which, he argued, resulted in a predictable waxing and waning of population demographics.
Brander argues that "the essential core of the sustainability debate is the same as the Malthusian debate of the late 18th century"…i.e. that transitioning towards a slow global growth rate is essential. He optimistically (?!) states that when it comes to sustainable development "problems are intractable only if population pressures make them intractable."
I find Brander's argument both frightening and surprisingly refreshing. Pragmatic questions of "how" and "where" and "by whom" are implicitly raised, but not addressed, allowing his argument to float, momentarily, above a looming pit of political controversy. Despite the worrisome potentialities, his matter-of-fact tone is a welcome antidote to so much writing about sustainable development, which seems to prioritize warm and fuzzy political correctness above all else, making "sustainability" into something impossible to refute, and watered-down to the point of incomprehensibility.
Source: http://www.justmeans.com/Sustainable-Development-Population-Debate/32710.html
The Demographic Transition Model
Stage 1
Is the most primitive of the stages where there is a high fluctuating birth and death rate. Because of this there is no great population growth. These countries or even tribes have very basic living standards such as those in the Amazon rainforest where they hardly have any education, medicaments or birth rates such that population is based on food supply, health of tribe members etc. Other factors involved are no family planning therefore many children or because of the faith of the people which may look at large families as a sign of virility etc. High death rates are due to poor levels of hygiene and nutrition with a high incidence of disease and famine
UK pre 1760, Parts of Ethiopia
Stage 2
This is a period of high birth rates, however the death rate has gone down to about 20/1000 infants who die. This results in a rise in population due to the fact that more infants are surviving. Reasons for which more people may be surviving may be better health care, improved sanitation such as water etc, more transport and medical care as well as inventions relating to this. In other words this stage involves a slight modernisation in health care raising people's living standards as well as there life expectancy.
UK 1760-1860, Peru, Sri Lanka
Stage 3
The stage in which the birth rate begins to fall whilst there is already a low death rate as well leading to a slight increase in population. The reason for the fall in births may be due to family planning, better education, lower infant mortality rate, a more industrialised way of life and the want for more material possessions as well as women being able to go out to work. In other words these countries are in the final stages of becoming like the western countries such as the states and those in Europe.
UK 1880-1940, China, Cuba, Australia
Stage 4
This is the one at which Switzerland is. There is a stable population without much change because both the death and birth rate are low and in some cases there are more deaths than births therefore leading to a possible stage five.
UK post 1940, Japan, USA
Stage 5A country such as Sweden is currently entering into the negative growth rate meaning that there are less births than deaths so that the country's population size is decreasing leading to problems. The fall in birth rate may be due to the increasing emancipation and financial independence of women. As well as single sex relationships and the present economic problem within the UK where financial concerns may lead to a lack of children. The ageing population may increase the death rate. Countries such as Romania also are experiencing a falling population with birth rates at10.7 births/1,000 population and death rates at 11.77 deaths/1,000 population. The Total fertility rate is 1.35 children born/woman with an net migration rate of -0.13 migrant(s)/1,000 population. This all equates to a loss of nearly a million people in the last 20 years.
Hungary since 1995
Several countries have tried to force the natural rate of change by initiating policies to reduce birth rates. E.g. China and Malaysia
Criticisms of the DTM Strengths include:
Source: http://www.geographylwc.org.uk/A/AS/ASpopulation/DTM.htm
Is the most primitive of the stages where there is a high fluctuating birth and death rate. Because of this there is no great population growth. These countries or even tribes have very basic living standards such as those in the Amazon rainforest where they hardly have any education, medicaments or birth rates such that population is based on food supply, health of tribe members etc. Other factors involved are no family planning therefore many children or because of the faith of the people which may look at large families as a sign of virility etc. High death rates are due to poor levels of hygiene and nutrition with a high incidence of disease and famine
UK pre 1760, Parts of Ethiopia
Stage 2
This is a period of high birth rates, however the death rate has gone down to about 20/1000 infants who die. This results in a rise in population due to the fact that more infants are surviving. Reasons for which more people may be surviving may be better health care, improved sanitation such as water etc, more transport and medical care as well as inventions relating to this. In other words this stage involves a slight modernisation in health care raising people's living standards as well as there life expectancy.
UK 1760-1860, Peru, Sri Lanka
Stage 3
The stage in which the birth rate begins to fall whilst there is already a low death rate as well leading to a slight increase in population. The reason for the fall in births may be due to family planning, better education, lower infant mortality rate, a more industrialised way of life and the want for more material possessions as well as women being able to go out to work. In other words these countries are in the final stages of becoming like the western countries such as the states and those in Europe.
UK 1880-1940, China, Cuba, Australia
Stage 4
This is the one at which Switzerland is. There is a stable population without much change because both the death and birth rate are low and in some cases there are more deaths than births therefore leading to a possible stage five.
UK post 1940, Japan, USA
Stage 5A country such as Sweden is currently entering into the negative growth rate meaning that there are less births than deaths so that the country's population size is decreasing leading to problems. The fall in birth rate may be due to the increasing emancipation and financial independence of women. As well as single sex relationships and the present economic problem within the UK where financial concerns may lead to a lack of children. The ageing population may increase the death rate. Countries such as Romania also are experiencing a falling population with birth rates at10.7 births/1,000 population and death rates at 11.77 deaths/1,000 population. The Total fertility rate is 1.35 children born/woman with an net migration rate of -0.13 migrant(s)/1,000 population. This all equates to a loss of nearly a million people in the last 20 years.
Hungary since 1995
Several countries have tried to force the natural rate of change by initiating policies to reduce birth rates. E.g. China and Malaysia
Criticisms of the DTM Strengths include:
- The model is Eurocentric, and assumes that all countries will pass through the same stages. Some
LEDCs appear to skip stages, e.g. China’s one child policy implemented in 1980 resulted in a rapidly
declining birth rate. - It does not take migration into account as a component of population growth/decline.
Some LEDCs appear to be stuck in stage 2. Their death rates have fallen, but their birth rates remainhigh, due to cultural or religious reasons. - The relationship between population growth and economic development, seen in MEDCs, has been
much more tenuous in the LEDW. - Some countries in the LEDW had a much larger base population than those in Europe at the start of the transition, so the impact of population growth during stage 2 and early part of stage 3 has been far greater.
- Model irons out major fluctuations caused by naturaldisasters, wars etc.
- Originally no fifth stage in the model
- It does not take in the recent phenomena such as AIDS. With 2/3 of the children of sub Saharan African countries are projected to have HIV infection by the time they have reached age 50, the impact of their demographic development is obvious;
- It does not consider the positive and indeed negative roles that governments may play;
- Or the role of migration
- it is easy to understand and countries can be compared;
- it can be applied globally to all countries;
- it provides a starter for all demographic studies
- The model provides a useful generalisation of population change over time.
- It can be used to compare rates of growth between different countries at a given point in time.
- Can be a useful predictive tool, so that future changes can be forecasted.
- It can be used to estimate population structure.
- had a higher birth rate in the first two stages;
- had a much stepper fall in the death rate;
- start with a larger population;
- see a steep fall in fertility in stage 3;
- see governments playing a more significant role in population management, as opposed to the economics of the country.
Source: http://www.geographylwc.org.uk/A/AS/ASpopulation/DTM.htm
Understanding Population Pyramids
View more presentations from Lina Trullinger.
Resources
1. http://www.learner.org/courses/envsci/unit/text.php?unit=5&secNum=0
2. http://www.populationeducation.org/
3. http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/informationGateway.php
4. http://www.ined.fr/en/
5. http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/immigration/
6. http://www.scalloway.org.uk/popu.htm
7. http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/Fu_HDI.pdf
8. http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDR_2010_EN_Table1_reprint.pdf
2. http://www.populationeducation.org/
3. http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/idb/informationGateway.php
4. http://www.ined.fr/en/
5. http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/immigration/
6. http://www.scalloway.org.uk/popu.htm
7. http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/Fu_HDI.pdf
8. http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDR_2010_EN_Table1_reprint.pdf