Coping with Population Challenges

Louise Lassonde

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9780415846806
• eBook ISBN: 9781134179572
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Public Health, Administration & Care

Despite rapidly decreasing rates of population growth caused by reduced fertility in the majority of world regions, demographers are predicting that the world's population will still double by the year 2050. The question is therefore no longer the traditional one of whether the planet can support so many people, but how to provide a sustainable future for ten billion individuals. Quantitative problems have become ethical ones.

Coping with Population Challenges addresses these issues in the context of international debate and agreements since the first World Population Plan of Action in 1974 to the 20-year Programme of Action adopted at the International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo in 1994.

The author describes how the Programme of Action focalizes on women's issues, reproductive choice and the notion of the individual. However, she identifies a number of important but neglected areas of the debate that the Programme failed to address and brings to light some of the inconsistencies that need to be resolved if the Programme is to be implemented.

The author also looks at the underlying ethical dimension of all choices relating to the population issue and suggests measures and machinery for giving effect to states' commitments, including reformulating problems and defining the appropriate economic framework for solutions. The book is an excellent introduction for the non-specialist to a very topical debate, and a useful reference for researchers.

LOUISE LASSONDE is director of the Fondation du Devenir, Geneva. In her capacity as anthropologist and demographer, Dr Lassondc has worked closely with the United Nations and non-governmental organizations in many countries.

Originally published in 1997

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Chapter 1

Points of Reference

The History of the Population Debate

The population debate is not a new one. It appeared in its modern form as long ago as the eighteenth century, the specific issue being the relationship between population and means of subsistence.¹ Starting out as an intellectual matter, population eventually became the subject of international political prescriptions. Developments were spread over three main historical periods.

1853–1944: A New Subject

The first scientific population conference was held in Brussels in 1853, on the initiative of Adolphe Quetelet, to perfect census-taking methods. It was followed between 1876 and 1912 by numerous meetings dealing with the relationship between population and hygiene. In 1927, Margaret Sanger, a pioneer of family planning, organized on her own initiative a conference in Geneva which led to the creation of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population (IUSSP), the main body for professionals interested in the links between demographic phenomena and social development. During the inter-war period the experience and problems of the European continent were the sole focus of interest in the population debate. This debate took place with war on the horizon and against a background of fears about a decline in population. Until the 1950s there were two major areas of concern: migration due to localized overpopulation, and family planning, which was viewed as an individual right potentially at odds with the common interest.

1945–1965: An International Dimension

The end of the Second World War marked a turning point in the scientific and political approaches to population, and in particular saw the US emerge as the main player in both areas. According to Jean-Claude Chasteland, of the three principal population actors that appeared on the scene in the US during that period (foundations, government and scientists), the foundations² were the pioneers. This is because they were the first to consider the political and social implications of world population growth.

The other key element in this period was the establishment of the United Nations, which gave the debate an international setting. Among the specialized UN bodies created was the Population Commission, set up in 1946 to deal with population issues multilaterally. It now has a membership of over 170 states, and its secretariat is provided by the UN’s Population Division, whose main function is to prepare world population projections and carry out studies of population dynamics trends and impacts. Following the Cairo Conference, it was recently renamed the Population and Development Commission to reflect the widening of its sphere of competence.

This second stage, of great political importance, also witnessed many scientific developments: the refinement of demography’s main methodological tools; the completion of an initial study of population dynamics factors and impacts which established a link between population and socioeconomic parameters; the development of empirical research; the structured training for demographers; and the finalization of the UN Population Division’s first worldwide population projections. In 1954, the UN and the IUSSP held a conference in Rome under the auspices of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to promote the collection of statistics, most particularly in developing nations. At a completely different level, the conference’s purpose was to hold a rigorous scientific debate to correct what G. George-Picot termed in his opening address ‘erroneous beliefs’ and to sensitize decision makers to population issues. A similar conference was held in Belgrade in 1964. It drew the international community’s attention for the first time to fertility’s role as a socioeconomic factor in development. More than 450 experts participated in the Rome conference, and more than 900 in the Belgrade one.

By the end of this period the main challenge posed by demographic change had become clear. Refinement of analytical methods and the multiplicity of subsequent ideological stances would enrich the debate, but the crux of the matter would remain the same: ‘The importance of population growth over the next 25 years transcends economic and social considerations. It is at the very core of our existence’.³ These sombre words reveal that as long ago as 1959 some people were already aware of the need to view demographic change in close conjunction with changing lifestyles, the various social options and the dynamics of relations among peoples.

1966–1994: Population at the Centre of the Political Debate

The United Nations General Assembly resolution 2211 of 1966 called for training centres to be established, and for pilot schemes to guide the developing countries in devising and implementing ‘population’ programmes. To carry out that task, in 1967 the UN set up a trust fund that began operating in 1969 under the name of the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA).⁴ In 1972, after a considerable increase in funding and the number of programmes, the Fund was placed under the direct authority of the General Assembly⁵

Between 1974 and 1994 the UN held three population conferences: in Bucharest in 1974, in Mexico City in 1984 and in Cairo in 1994. These marked a break with the past — they were political, not technical — and their purpose was not to take stock of the situation or of the lessons to be learnt from it. With each conference the scientific debate became less important, a development paralleled in other UN fora. States’ representatives discussed political trends and adopted measures designed to be implemented by each nation. The Bucharest Conference ended with the adoption of a World Population Plan of Action, which was reviewed ten years later in Mexico City without any significant changes to its structure or main thrust. The Cairo Conference adopted a Programme of Action extending over 20 years (1995–2015), which replaced the 1974 Plan.

The Ideological Context

The three population conferences were held in very different ideological contexts. The Bucharest Conference was held at the industrialized nations’ request. In the light of the proposed New World Economic Order, the issue was whether fertility reduction would promote economic development, or vice versa. The countries of the South — the G77 group — stressed the primacy of development, whereas the industrialized nations argued that without family planning and fertility reduction the South’s economies would be unable to take off.

The Mexico City Conference was held at the request of the developing countries. They were beginning to feel most acutely the effects of their high population growth, and therefore wished to draw the international community’s attention to their financial and technical assistance needs. It seemed that the Conference would be consensus-based, but suddenly the US adopted a position radically different from its approach in 1974. It argued that population growth was a ‘neutral phenomenon’ in itself, and that underdevelopment’s causes lay in excessive economic centralization, which placed artificial constraints on the market. The American argument, which was directed wholly against the communist and socialist systems, was based on the idea that population growth can be accommodated insofar as the markets function properly. The goal to be pursued — economic development — must remain the same, but population growth reduction was no longer a prerequisite. Instead of fertility reduction, the US advocated free trade, the entrepreneurial spirit, international aid and diversification of investment sources. In Cairo, however, the approach was completely different, the issues being those of the 1990s: in particular, gender inequities, action to combat poverty and, at the opposite end of the spectrum, religious- and identity-based movements.

Fault Lines

Each conference produced a different ideological fault line: North—South in Bucharest and East—West in Mexico City. In Cairo, proponents of a secular concept of society clashed with proponents of a theocratic concept. In the opinion of Joaquin Arango, the main dispute in Cairo was between the supporters of individual reproductive and sexual rights, and those who believe that states are entitled to restrict such rights in the name of cultural values and religious beliefs.⁶ The acrimony between the two sides was partly due to the subject itself: life, death and sexuality are highly emotive issues and discussing them in an international forum is a daunting task. What exacerbated matters, however, was the sheer strength of the women’s movement, which had not previously been in such a good position in international negotiations.

Mobilized as never before in the population debate, the international women’s movement made good use of that position to form a remarkably effective alliance with other interest groups. The Cairo Conference’s organizational structure provided it with the three prerequisites for success: the support of the ‘population group’, the main pressure group and the most experienced population conference participant; the support of the US Government, the most important player in the negotiations; and the support of the Conference’s Secretary-General, who was willing to bring all her influence to bear on the preparation of the Conference in order to highlight women’s problems.

Alliances between Interest Groups

The ‘population group’ is an internationally oriented movement of American origin comprising representatives of universities, government, non-governmental organizations and the media. Its relations with the women’s movement reached a turning point at the Earth Summit in Rio. Contrary to a commonly held belief, that gathering discussed the population aspect of sustainable development and even devoted a separate chapter to it in its Programme of Action, known as Agenda 21. Feminists and population group members clashed over the relevance of ‘population’ at an environment conference. The feminists alleged that the population group was preventing improvement of women’s status, because promotion of family planning amounted to accusing women — even the wombs of women (sic) — of being responsible for destroying the environment.

To reduce the influence wielded by the population group, the women’s movement agreed on a common approach with the Vatican to restrict the scope of the sole family planning recommendation in the Programme of Action. This tactical agreement was a success, particularly since the government usually quickest to advocate family planning — the US Government — did not wish to enter the fray. For domestic political reasons, the Bush administration had no desire to champion the feminist cause in the international arena. Moreover, since the population recommendations had been presented by the Conference secretariat as the political counterpart of the recommendations on production and consumption patterns, the US was unwilling to go any further than it had already gone, so as to avoid being forced to compromise in the economic sphere. After a...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Tables and Figures
• Abbreviations
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: A New Perspective
• 1 Points of Reference
• 2 A Life of Quality
• 3 Population and Development
• 4 The Gaps in the Programme of Action
• 5 Practical Measures
• 6 Review of the International Negotiations
• 7 Coping with the Challenges Facing Us
• Conclusion: Population as an Ethical Issue
• Notes and References
• Index