Showing posts from category security.
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Center for American Progress Takes on Climate Change, Migration, and Why They Matter to U.S. National Security
›July 19, 2012 // By Kayly OberIn early 2012, the Center for American Progress (CAP) released Climate Change, Migration, and Conflict: Addressing Complex Crisis Scenarios in the 21st Century. Although generally in line with climate-migration pieces before it (“It is difficult to fully understand the detailed causes of migration and economic and political instability, but the growing evidence of links between climate change, migration, and conflict raise plenty of reasons for concern”), the report strays from the usual by focusing on U.S. national security interests and four particular sub-regions of concern.
Northwest Africa
The first region examined – and the one perhaps most on the radar of security analysts at the moment – is Northwest Africa. Here the already-tenuous political stability left in the wake of the Arab Spring will most certainly be exacerbated by climate change, authors Michael Werz and Laura Conley write. “Northwest Africa is crisscrossed with climate, migration, and security challenges…rising coastal sea level, desertification, drought, and the numerous other potential effects of climate change have the potential to increase the numbers of migrants.” All of these factors combine to create what Werz and Conley define as an “arc of tension,” that will strengthen organizations that thrive on chaos, like Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which has already taken advantage of the regional power vacuum left by Muammar Gaddafi’s ouster.
CAP investigates this arc of tension more fully in a more focused, separate brief on Northwest Africa, drilling down on Nigeria, Niger, Algeria, and Morocco. They find that these countries already grapple with a complex set of issues, including population pressures, drought, land degradation, large-scale migration, and natural resource conflicts. Climate change exacerbates all of these. Particularly worrying is the threat it poses to traditional pastoral and agricultural livelihoods, which could translate into “increasing numbers of disenfranchised youth, who security experts believe are more easily recruited to assist [terrorist groups] in return for money and food.”But environmental pressures and related conflict are not new in these areas, so how do we parse out the slow-onset climate change factors from the usual variety? That question is left unanswered and remains an open – and hotly debated – problem for researchers. The multi-faceted nature of migration, in particular, makes it hard to define the exact causes of movement.
On a larger scale, flagging the environment as the principal reason for migration has its problems, especially under the umbrella of “refugee” status. According to respected migration experts, using the term “refugee” in the case of environmental or climate scenarios is incorrect, since the environment is often simply one “push” factor, while economic opportunities make for a heavier “pull.” Furthermore, applying the term refugee in this case, they say, is misleading and undermines true political refugees.
CAP uses the less polarizing term “climate migrants” in their paper, saying “no universally accepted concepts, much less legal categories, exist to describe or define climate migrants. There is agreement, however, that factors such as drought, flooding, severe weather, and environmental degradation can cause human mobility in large numbers that are certain to increase in the near future.”
South Asia
In a case like Bangladesh and India, the second sub-region to be examined, the international community is preoccupied with rising sea levels, which is considered a more concrete example of climate change affecting migration. Ultimately, as CAP notes, it’s also a security issue:In December 2008 the National Defense University in Washington, D.C., ran an exercise that explored the impact of a flood that sent hundreds of thousands of refugees into neighboring India. The result: the exercise predicted a new wave of migration would touch off religious conflicts, encourage the spread of contagious diseases, and cause vast damage to infrastructure.
While true that India is “not in a position to absorb climate-induced pressures,” as Werz and Conley write, it’s not quite true that “foreign climate migrants” would be necessarily be an immediate problem, as they suggest.
India has a history of taking in Bangladeshi migration, with an estimated 10 to 20 million illegal Bangladeshis currently living in India, according to the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, an Indian think tank. Traditionally, Bangladeshis have migrated for a myriad of socioeconomic reasons, but most alluring are land availability and a stronger Indian economy. In any case, Bangladesh-India migration would not be new phenomenon.
The environment has also been a part of the equation, but in the case of large-scale sea level rise, its effect on migration can be a bit more nuanced. As the International Food Policy Research Institute noted in its study “Environmental Migrants: A Myth?,” Bangladeshis often have “risk-sharing and informal lending arrangements” to deal with idiosyncratic shocks, which include flooding. Instead, crop failure actually has the strongest effect on mobility. This suggests that it’s not just sea level rise that observers worried about environmentally-driven migration need to track in Bangladesh, but also drought and rain-induced flooding.
The Andes
The third region, the Andes of South America, also suffers from a slightly myopic security lens. Here, it’s all about melting glaciers and snowcaps. Retreating glaciers would spell disaster for countries which rely heavily on seasonal melt for agriculture and hydroelectric power. Most vulnerable are those with weak governance systems and infrastructure like Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Colombia. For reference, hydropower supplies a whopping 80 percent of Peru’s electricity. However, there are more subtle impacts that could portend bigger trouble for the region.
Regional security experts concede that higher temperatures are already affecting crop production in rural Colombia, harming the ability to consolidate the security gains made by Plan Colombia over the last decade, for example. And a recent report from EUROCLIMA, the European Union’s program on climate change in Latin America, paints an even bleaker picture for agricultural production in the face of desertification and drought:Natural ecosystems, agriculture, water resources, and human health in Latin America have been impacted by unusual extreme weather events reported in the past years. For example, droughts related to El Niño impacts on the flows of the Colombia Andean region basins (particularly in the Cauca river basin), are causing a 30 percent reduction in the mean flow, with a maximum of 80 percent loss in some tributaries. Consequently, soil moisture, and vegetation activity are strongly reduced.
Perhaps more worrying is the impact on the biodiversity in the region. Considering that Latin America represents 16 percent of the world’s surface but 40 percent of its biodiversity this could have serious implications for the biomedical field and others. In a recent Nature study, scientists discovered that in situations where glacial coverage is reduced to the point where it only covers 30 to 50 percent of the drainage basin, several species begin to disappear. They calculated that the entire melting of the glaciers in these areas would result in a huge loss of biodiversity, where between 11 and 38 percent of animal and plant species could go extinct, including many of endemic species that can be found only in these areas.
China and the Third Pole
Finally, China is now in its fourth decade of ever-growing internal migration, some of it driven in recent years by environmental change. Today, across its vast territory, China continues to experience the full spectrum of climate change-related consequences that have the potential to drive migration. CAP finds that the consequences of climate change and continued internal migration in China include “water stress; increased droughts, flooding, or other severe events; increased coastal erosion and saltwater inundation; glacial melt in the Himalayas that could affect hundreds of millions; and shifting agricultural zones” – all of which will affect food supplies and the country’s seemingly relentless pace of development. Still, the most unique factor of migration in China is the power of the central government to be the main “push factor,” as in the case of the Three Gorges Dam.
Agreeing to Agree
Though they might sacrifice some nuance in the regional breakdowns, the core of CAP’s argument for why climate migration matters to U.S. national security is solid. The United States has a “vested interest in helping ensure that areas with weak or absent governance structures – where poverty, environmental degradation, and grievances over central governments and energy production coincide – do not become future recruiting grounds for extremists,” write Werz and Conley. “The possible impacts of climate-related migration in such fragile situations could be destabilizing.” Invest in people rather than just military might; invest in poverty reduction, economic development, and alternative livelihoods.Jon Barnett on migration as adaptation
In the context of climate change, this means accepting that migration is a form of adaptation. As Jon Barnett notes in an interview with ECSP:In some circumstances it might be appropriate to [invest in traditional adaptation projects like] infrastructure and hard options where we’re very certain about the nature of the risk…but in other cases, expanding the range of choices and freedoms and opportunities that people have to deal with climate change in the future is perhaps the better strategy.
This requires higher-level thinking by states to concede that migration will happen and it isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Migration bolsters origin communities through remittances and education and technology sharing. But this thinking has yet to permeate policymaking, with obvious political reasons. Until then, states that are committed to preventing migration are actually cutting off important community responses.
Ultimately, what we consider adaptation and development needs to evolve. By investing in an integrated, multi-sector development approach, we can prevent violent responses to migration at the source rather than relying on reactionary and military solutions. Or, as CAP’s Michael Werz and Laura Conley put it more boldly, “our security can no longer be guaranteed by military strength or economic clout alone, but only by our ability to compel collective action.”
Photo credit: “Villagers going to the local market in Bogoro walk past a Bangladeshi patrol unit of the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) as the country prepares for the second round of elections. 12/Oct/2006. UN Photo/Martine Perret,” courtesy of United Nations Photo Flickr.
Sources: Center for American Progress, Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, Inter-American Development Bank, International Food Policy Research Institute, Nature, The World Bank.
Video Credit: “The Nexus of Climate Change, Migration and Security,” courtesy of the Center for American Progress. Image: “The Arc of Tension,” courtesy of the Center for American Progress. -
‘Motherland Afghanistan’ Shows Maternal Mortality Not Just A Health Issue
›Afghanistan has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world: 327 out of every 100,000 women who give birth die during childbirth. Despite some recent improvements, political, social, cultural, and economic factors present enormous challenges. Last month, the Center for Population and Development Activities hosted an online viewing and dialogue discussion of the PBS Independent Lens film Motherland Afghanistan, which follows Afghan-American filmmaker Sedika Mojadidi and her father, Dr. Qudrat Mojadid, as they return to their home country and visit the Laura Bush Maternity Ward in Kabul. The conditions they find are devastating and underscore not only the need for greater commitment to reproductive health services, but also the advancement of women’s and girl’s access to education, security, and political participation.
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Ingrid Schulze, Mongabay
Local Experts Needed to Protect Congo Basin Rainforests Amid Conflict, Development Challenges
›July 13, 2012 // By Wilson Center StaffThe original version of this article, by Ingrid Schulze, appeared on Mongabay.
This summer, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is expected to approve a new higher education strategy which the country has developed with the World Bank and other international donors. The shape of this educational reform initiative will be critical to Congo’s future in many ways. It could finally offer Congo’s long-suffering people a route into the 21st century. It will also help determine the future of the DRC’s forests.
Nearly half of the Congo Basin’s remaining rainforest is in the DRC – yet the critical role of Congolese experts in forestry, agricultural science, wildlife management and other rural sciences in protecting this forest is not widely recognized.As one Congolese graduate student observed, the DRC has a “void” in agricultural and forestry research. Due to years of war and decades of economic crisis and mismanagement, most of Congo’s colleges and universities are severely underfunded and in disrepair. The country is short of experts who can investigate the ecology and economic potential of Congo’s forests and their biota, and provide an objective basis for setting priorities for protection and use of forest resources. While universities in Kinshasa and Kisangani do have some internationally funded programs to increase the number of biologists and other specialists, the number of graduates is nowhere near what is needed. Foreign scientists and consultants are not a substitute for Congolese experts.
Moreover, competent rural science graduates who can advise local farmers, communities and administrators on forestry, sustainable agriculture, wildlife management, and rural development issues are also desperately needed. The DRC’s national agricultural extension service, which should be integral to this process, has been broken for decades. A 1990 USAID report described it as underfunded, without the means to provide farmers with proven crop varieties and advice on agricultural practices, and tasked more with imposing particular crops on farmers and collecting taxes than helping them. There is little evidence that this has changed significantly since the end of the Congo war in 2003.
Continue reading on Mongabay.
Image Credit: Depths of Forest, courtesy of flickr user Bobulix. Congo Basin map, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons user Imagico. -
World Population Day 2012: Looking Beyond Reproductive Health
›How should the seven billion or so of us on Earth mark World Population Day? Today, major global players are focusing on increasing access to family planning around the world. But there are other important aspects to population that also deserve our sustained attention.
The links between demography and development have come into the limelight over the last few months, first as advocates decried the last minute removal of reproductive rights language from the Rio+20 outcome document and now as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation prepares a massive funding push for reproductive health (starting today, not coincidentally).
“Multiple crises – food, fuel, and financial – have caused significant suffering and served as a wake-up call about the need to pay far more attention to the building blocks of sustainable development,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says in an address for today. “Reproductive health is an indispensable part of the sustainable development equation.”
The sustainable development connection is fairly obvious. Environmental destruction in some of the most biodiversity-rich parts of the world has complex but significant population drivers, as Wilson Center consultant Laurie Mazur explains:Human impact on the environment is mediated by a host of factors, including culture, technology, institutions, and market forces. And inequitable socioeconomic systems mean that some human beings have far greater impact than others.
“Often, the value of biodiversity becomes apparent only when it is lost,” Mazur continues. “For example, with the global decline of honeybee populations, growers can now calculate the monetary value of pollination services that were once provided for free by nature. ‘Bee pollination is worth $190 billion,’ said Pavan Sukhdev, a Yale environmental economist, in an interview with Bloomberg. ‘But when did a bee ever send you an invoice?’”
But some generalizations can be made. We live on a planet dominated and transformed by human activity. As we have become more numerous, we have also become more adept at altering ecosystems for human use, replacing species-rich natural landscapes with simpler monocultures.
In other areas, population drivers threaten more basic scarcities: food and water, which in turn impede development and cost human lives. Some of the most successful efforts to address these relationships have combined women’s empowerment, family planning, and basic health interventions with site-based conservation and livelihood efforts.
But besides reproductive rights, there are other important aspects of population that deserve attention on this day.
The demographic dividend – a concept that marries population dynamics and development economics – requires more than just fertility decline to take effect in countries. Economic and social policies that prepare and enable young people to enter the workforce are just as important.
And the Arab Spring helps illustrate the complex relationship between population and democracy. “Among the five countries where revolt took root, those with the earliest success in ousting autocratic leaders also had the most mature age structures and the least youthful populations,” writes Wilson Center consultant and demographer Elizabeth Leahy Madsen. The work of fellow Wilson Center consulting demographer Richard Cincotta shows that countries with very young age structures are prone both to higher incidence of civil conflict and undemocratic governance. What happens next in Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Syria will further test the connection between youth and democracy.
In South Asia, Madsen finds that as Afghanistan and Pakistan’s political circumstances have become more entwined, their demographic paths are more closely parallel than expected. “For Afghanistan, given its myriad socioeconomic, political, cultural, and geographic challenges, this is good news. But for Pakistan, where efforts to meet family planning needs have fallen short of capacity, it is not,” she writes in the first issue of the newly re-launched ECSP Report, “Afghanistan, Against the Odds: A Demographic Surprise.”
In more developed countries, population aging is a concern. At the Wilson Center last year, economists Andrew Mason and Ronald Lee explained the challenges that those on the other side of the “demographic divide” will face in the near future. From 2010 to 2015, 85 countries are projected to witness the largest absolute increase in history of their populations aged 60 and over, straining public welfare systems and reducing labor forces. It’s not the “catastrophe” that it has been portrayed to be in the media, they said, but like many demographic issues, it is a challenge that will require planning for.
These connections demonstrate the wide importance of population dynamics to understanding how the world works today. Demography is the study of us – all seven billion of us. Demography affects – and is affected by – economics, political stability, health, the environment, food security, foreign policy, development, and conflict. Let’s not overlook that breadth on this World Population Day 2012.
For more, be sure to read some of our additional resources from the recent archives:- Food Security in a Climate-Altered Future: More Than a Supply Problem
- Taming Hunger in Ethiopia: The Role of Population Dynamics
- Uganda’s Demographic and Health Challenges Put Into Perspective With Newfound Oil
- New Surveys Generate Mixed Demographic Signals for East and Southern Africa
- In Building Resilience for a Changing World, Reproductive Health Is Key
- Demographic Security 101 (video)
- Yemen: Revisiting Demography After the Arab Spring
- Hania Zlotnik Discusses Latest Changes to UN Population Projections (audio)
- Book Review: ‘World Population Policies’
- Tunisia’s Shot at Democracy: What Demographics and Recent History Tell Us
- Joel E. Cohen on Solving the Resource-Population Equation in the Developing World (video)
Photo Credit: UN Day Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon with students in October celebrating the seven billion mark, courtesy of Eskinder Debebe/UN Photo. -
Geoff Dabelko at the Aspen Environment Forum: “We Have to Find Ways to Do Things Differently”
›July 9, 2012 // By Graham NorwoodECSP Director Geoff Dabelko was in Colorado last month to participate in the fifth annual Aspen Environment Forum, a three-day series of discussions about some of the world’s most vexing environmental concerns, hosted jointly by the Aspen Institute and National Geographic. Dabelko took part in two panel discussions, considering recent efforts to “green” the U.S. military in one and addressing the nexus of climate change and conflict in the other.
The U.S. Department of Defense is currently pursuing an ambitious strategy to minimize its dependence on oil, aiming to produce 25 percent of its power from renewable energy sources by 2025. During the 75-minute “Is the Military a Model?” panel, Dabelko joined Sharon Burke of the Department of Defense, Sherri Goodman of CNA, and U.S. Army Major General Joseph Anderson to discuss the extent to which the military’s embrace of more efficient and alternative technologies can spur wider innovation and adoption. Many have previously cited the military’s role in developing technologies like the Global Positioning System and the internet as a reason for optimism in this regard.
The “Climate and Conflict” panel, meanwhile, addressed how and to what degree climate change might affect future conflicts. According to Scientific American, “the consensus was that climate change per se will not cause conflict, armed or otherwise, but will exacerbate existing conflicts and instabilities.”
This was Dabelko’s third trip to the Aspen Environment Forum, and he spoke enthusiastically about the event in a brief interview with genConnect, which was covering the event. “The experience has been excellent,” he remarked, highlighting the diversity of participants as one of the forum’s greatest strengths.Dabelko acknowledged that much work remains to be done to achieve environmental and energy-related goals, but praised the realistic and grounded approach of attendees: “We have a tremendous set of challenges, and we’re not yet really succeeding in addressing them. So there’s a self-reflection that what we’ve been doing isn’t necessarily getting us where we want to get, and so we have to find ways to do things differently.”
One way to improve, according to Dabelko, is to work on communications. “[We need to have] conversations about complex issues, [and we] need to understand how to make them more accessible and more simple. But ‘simple’ does not mean ‘dumb’ or ‘incorrect’…we need to get smarter about how to have these conversations with wider and [more] diverse audiences.”
Photo Credit: Geoff Dabelko, courtesy of the Aspen Institute. Video: genConnect. -
Jennifer Dabbs Sciubba, The Huffington Post
Global Threats Exist, But Also Many Global Demographic Opportunities for the United States
›July 3, 2012 // By Wilson Center StaffThe original version of this article, by Jennifer Dabbs Sciubba, appeared on The Huffington Post.
Events like the Arab Spring gave birth to a generation of demographic converts in the national security community. Many are now convinced that demography matters because demographers today can clearly show how youthful population profiles in the developing world could lead to conflicts over the next 20 years – a major concern for policymakers.
Too much focus on demography and conflict, though, means policymakers miss opportunities for cooperation.
We are used to thinking of the wealthy and stable “Global North” and the poor and tumultuous “Global South,” but a demographic divide within the developing world is emerging, a third category of states that are growing older, more urban, more prosperous, more peaceful, and active in international affairs. These states – particularly India, Brazil, and South Africa – represent opportunities for building U.S. and world security.
Even as it maintains its longstanding relationships in Europe and elsewhere in the developed world, the U.S. should be more assertive in seeking partnerships with India as both a counterbalance to China and as a global security partner in addressing piracy and terrorism and in distributing international aid.
Continue reading on The Huffington Post.
Photo Credit: Tahrir 2011, courtesy of flickr user Denis Bocquet. -
Book Review: ‘World Population Policies’ Offers Sweeping Overview of a Complex Field
›July 2, 2012 // By Elizabeth Leahy MadsenWith much attention in the international family planning community directed to the impending anniversary of the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development and the closing date of the Millennium Development Goals, the fact that 2012 is the 60th anniversary of two other milestones in population programming may have escaped notice. In 1952, the International Planned Parenthood Federation was created, and India became the first country to formulate a national policy to reduce population growth.
These and many other landmarks are highlighted in World Population Policies: Their Origin, Evolution and Impact, a new book by demographer John May that reviews several decades of policies, advocacy, and program interventions addressing the full range of diverse demographic trends seen globally.May, who spent more than two decades working on population issues at the World Bank and other international institutions before recently assuming a fellowship at the Center for Global Development, is well-positioned to provide such an ambitious overview. Although the breadth of material included in the book means that some topics receive less coverage than a specialist might wish, it serves as a sound introduction to this diverse field, and offers some particularly interesting case studies.
The book’s main chapters begin with a summary of current population trends, including a comprehensive array of figures and statistics about population size, distribution, and projections. Some important concepts, such as the demographic transition and dividend, are perhaps covered too quickly, and in such cases the book would have benefited from more than a handful of figures, charts, and graphs. May classifies regions and countries as demographic “hotspots,” where the number of people outstrips available resources, and “coldspots,” which have too few residents. He makes an ambitious suggestion that high-density countries facing resource challenges, such as Bangladesh, should consider promoting rapid fertility decline below replacement level to stop population growth, then reverse course and increase to a rate that promotes a stable population – but such a reversal from low fertility is a feat that has stymied several countries in Europe and East Asia.
Evolution of the “Population Movement”
In addition to summarizing the ways that demographic issues have been framed in the past several decades, May briefly describes the long-running debate between demographers and economists about the ways in which population is theorized to affect economic development.
Three points in this chapter were particularly striking: First, the concept of family planning as a human right dates from well before the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development. In 1968, the Tehran International Conference on Human Rights defined the ability to choose family size and spacing as a fundamental right; still, some programs, such as India’s under the Emergency-era government of the late 1970s, adopted coercive practices. Second, population policies are not limited to official initiatives targeting fertility, mortality, and migration, but also encompass implicit or “passive” policy measures that arise without advance planning or that have an unintended effect on demographic trends. Related to this, May suggests that “contextual variables” such as education, health, gender, culture, and religion can have a greater impact on population policies’ effectiveness and demographic outcomes than government structures or funding.
Although population policies are most often designed at the national level, May’s discussion of the “population movement” highlights the influence of international networks and donors on such policies. By the late 1960s, the U.S. Agency for International Development had begun funding family planning programs overseas, and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) was active. Although the United States has become less dominant over time, population programming remains a Northern-driven movement.
Beginning with a meeting in Belgrade in 1965, a series of international population conferences successfully raised the prominence of population issues on the global development agenda and built consensus around international goals, while also becoming increasingly political.
May’s cautions about such conferences are timely given this month’s London Family Planning Summit: “Consensus-building through international conferences and their preparatory meetings is often inefficient as a process, whereas such events could be used to promote learning among policymakers and experts…The gap between the conferences’ resolutions and the actual policies implemented at country level is important to remember” (110).
Growth and Aging Distinguish the Demographic Divide
In his chapter focusing on the developing world, May notes that population policies have become broader in the nearly 20 years since the Cairo conference, incorporating a reproductive rights framework while also addressing new issues such as the environment, HIV/AIDS, and poverty. But under this more holistic approach, national policies are susceptible to becoming overly diffuse, with an ambitious agenda not matched by concrete action plans.
The challenges expand to policy implementation as well. Kenya is profiled as emblematic of the difficulties facing population programs in fast-growing sub-Saharan Africa, particularly political disinterest, mismanagement, opposition from some religious groups, and commodity shortages. But when implemented well, such policies can be very successful. The book offers a thorough summary of research findings on the common features of effective family planning programs (such as leadership, monitoring performance data, and opening access to contraceptive methods at lower levels of the health system), as well as their demographic impact. Several country examples are cited to show that family planning programs reduce lifetime fertility rates by 0.5 to 1.5 children per woman, while also benefiting individual and social health, income, and well-being.
While population policies have been often effective at shaping demographic trends in high-fertility settings, even in changing cultural norms about family size, May notes that their impact has been notably weaker in reversing the trajectory of declining fertility in developed countries. While countries such as France have maintained a fertility rate close to, albeit still below, replacement level thanks to generous paid parental leave, housing initiatives and public child care facilities, policies that try to boost low fertility through financial compensation have been particularly ineffective.
Developed countries are less likely to have formal population policies and tend to address demographic issues through incentives and disincentives implemented by multiple agencies. Aging and immigration are receiving greater attention in such countries, along with low fertility rates. Population aging raises policy concerns that are both economic and social, and May focuses largely on the benefit of reducing incentives for early retirement. He notes that thanks to improvements in health and life expectancy, “today’s 65-year-old persons are young compared to their counterparts” of previous generations (180). Despite their economic soundness, government efforts to raise retirement ages are widely unpopular, and France’s newly elected president has promised to cut the retirement age from 62 to 60 for some workers.
What Comes Next
Some observations are intriguing and could have been further detailed. For example, May notes a recent “fragmentation” of organizations working on population issues, and suggests that “too many institutions and NGOs appear to support their own limited mandates as they also struggle for resources that are less abundant” (5). Decentralization and integration within health systems is a growing trend that could have been discussed in more detail, along with the legacy of pronatalist laws and attitudes by colonial powers in Africa, the effect of recent European efforts to tighten immigration policies, and the achievements of forums designed for collaboration on population policy issues (for example, the United Nations Commission on Population and Development or the Reproductive Health Supplies Coalition).
Looking towards the future, May foresees continued integration of demography with related development issues, such as poverty reduction and equitable growth, gender and youth perspectives, environmental issues, and conflict prevention. He notes a few challenges, including sub-Saharan Africa’s lag in fertility decline and the overall ineffectiveness of policies aimed at addressing the pressures of urbanization on infrastructure and resources.
In high-fertility settings, May recommends that instead of framing reproductive health writ large, policies should more specifically target family planning and women’s empowerment, including education and income-generation opportunities as well as legal rights. Bangladesh is presented as a model for other countries, as a setting where cultural change and economic development laid the groundwork for successful family planning outreach efforts. Most of all, May entreats government leaders to maintain a policy focus on population issues, regardless of where they stand in the demographic divide.
Elizabeth Leahy Madsen is a consultant on political demography for the Wilson Center’s Environmental Change and Security Program and senior technical advisor at Futures Group.
Photo Credit: “Crowded Shopping District,” courtesy of flickr user EnvironmentBlog. -
Gwen Hopkins, Aspen Institute Global Health and Development
Aspen Ideas Festival Takes on “The Population Challenge”
›The original version of this article, by Gwen Hopkins, appeared on the Aspen Ideas Festival blog.
The pictures flash quickly: lush sea vegetation replaced by empty grey-blue seabed as carbon bubbles out of undersea vents. Reservoirs depleted too quickly, never to refill. Forests and mountains leveled for coal, deep sea oil rigs ablaze, the arctic ice cap visibly retreating. Dennis Dimick is answering the question posed to him with a litany of evidence collected by National Geographic: Does population matter?
Yes, he says – a lot.
Kicking off the Our Planet: The World at Seven Billion track, on a panel called “The Population Challenge,” Washington Post staff writer Joel Achenbach moderated a conversation between Dimick and Helene Gayle, president and CEO of CARE USA, following Dimick’s presentation about how the earth’s human population has made its presence known.
Dimick explains that this new geologic era has been dubbed Anthropocene, the age of man, as we “transform the planet to perpetuate our lifestyle.” That’s a lifestyle powered first and foremost by what he calls “the new sun” – coal, oil, and gas, or in Dimick’s words, “ancient plant goo.” These transformations are deep and widespread – and according to Dimick, growing worrisome in their magnitude. While there is searing inequity – “few have a lot, and a lot have few” – those that lead the consumption have, for example, caught 90 percent of the big fish in the sea already, and burn in one year a quantity of fuel that took a million years to coalesce underground. “If everyone in the world lived like Americans do, we’d need four planets.”
Continue reading on the Aspen Ideas Festival blog.
Photo Credit: Aspen Institute.
