Population and Society

Population and Society

Two levels exist within-population theory. Fundamental to demographic analysis is the mathematical and biomedical theories that predict the types of changes occurring in the biological components of demography: fertility, mortality, and the distribution of a population by age and sex. For instance, demography has played a crucial role in the development of probability, statistics, and sampling.[1] In this regard, the majority of the earliest ideas are classified as doctrine, as opposed to theory. Early thinkers were certain they had the answers and that their assertions about population growth and its implications for society were accurate. In contrast, the essence of modern scientific thought is to assume that you do not know the answer and to be willing to consider evidence regardless of the conclusion it suggests. 

In two of the more developed regions of the world 3,500 years ago, however, the possibility of populations outgrowing their resources prompted renowned philosophers to comment. The writings of the Confucian school in China discussed the relationship between population and resources in the fifth century B.C., and it was suggested that the government should relocate people from overpopulated to underpopulated areas. Nonetheless, the concept of encouraging population growth was evident in the teachings of Confucius and Plato, who wrote. [2]The Laws in 360 BCE emphasized the significance of population stability over growth. Specifically, Plato proposed a constant population of 5,040 for the ideal community of free citizens. Plato's choice of 5,040 was primarily motivated by the fact that it is divisible by twelve, a sacred number whose legacy is reflected in the 12 months of the year and dozens of other aspects of modern life. 

To analyze the demography of a specific society, it is necessary to know how many people reside there, how they are geographically distributed, how many are being born, how many are dying, how many are migrating in, and how many are migrating out. This is only the beginning.[3] The population census is the primary source of information on population size and distribution, as well as demographic structure and characteristics. Following a brief history of population censuses. The most direct way to determine the number of people is to count them; when you do so, you conduct a population census or a comprehensive enumeration of the population. According to the United Nations Statistics Division (2008), "the traditional census is one of the most complex and extensive peacetimes exercises a nation conducts. It requires mapping the entire nation, mobilizing and training an army of enumerators, conducting a massive public campaign, canvassing all households, collecting individual data, compiling vast quantities of completed questionnaires, and analyzing and disseminating the data, and distributing the results. 

The enumeration process is susceptible to several fits of rage and content errors are the two most common types of census errors. Even though a census aims to count everyone, some individuals are inevitably left out, and others are counted more than once. Children have been the focus of coverage errors in China, rather than racial/ethnic groups. Nearly 37 million Chinese children under the age of ten were omitted from the 2000 census, according to estimates. It wasn't that they couldn't be found by the census takers, but rather that they were being hidden from them.[4] The government-mandated birth quotas had been exceeded if they had been acknowledged. Local officials, not just parents, were blamed for the high birth rate, so keeping information about these children a secret was in everyone's best interest. The definition of who should be counted similarly affects coverage error. People with Chinese citizenship were accounted for only in the Chinese census in 2000. 

All other aspects of the vastly improved standard of living that is being enjoyed are directly linked to the triumph over disease and early death as one of the most significant improvements ever made in the condition of human life. A significant unintended consequence of decreasing mortality, however, is the explosion in the human population, which is expected to reach 9 to 10 billion by the middle of this century, up from just 1 billion two hundred years ago.[5] There is no way to fully comprehend your surroundings unless you know how and why the health and mortality transition occurred, as well as what it means for the future. Both morbidity (the prevalence of disease in a population) and mortality (the pattern of death) are commonly considered to be two sides to the same coin. Most people are aware of the correlation between good health and a longer life expectancy. As health improves, so does life expectancy, which is important from a societal perspective because populations with high morbidity also have high mortality rates. 

Death can only be postponed to ever-older ages with advances in health and medical care; it cannot be prevented. There are two main ways to achieve the goal of delaying death to the earliest possible age, preventing or limiting the spread of disease; and curing people of disease when they are ill.[6] At the time of the communist revolution following World War II, China provided an example of a country that was extremely poor and had a low life expectancy of no more than 40 years. By the mid-1970s, life expectancy had increased to more than 60 years as a result of public health measures and the implementation of a very basic health care system. Since then, rising incomes in China have contributed to an increase in the average female life expectancy to 77 years. The fact that islands and other countries with small territories have been able to lower their mortality rates more quickly than countries with larger territories shows that geography does make a difference. Countries like Costa Rica and Sri Lanka have benefited from the expansion of Europe because it has opened up more opportunities for death control technology transfer. 

The fertility transition is the transition from high fertility to low or very low fertility, which is completely under the control of a woman. This has been referred to as "family building by design" rather than "family building by chance." There is almost always an earlier start to childbearing and a later end to childbearing as part of the transition.[7] Unwanted parenthood can be broken up through this process, which benefits both men and women by allowing them to time and space their children out, which in turn benefits both them and their offspring's health. In other words, as mortality decreases and the survival of both children and their parents are guaranteed, people want smaller families, and the more options they have to achieve this goal, the better their chances of success. Why, when, and how fertility declines from high to low levels are the central questions of the fertility transition. 

The decline in fertility in Asian societies with a strong preference for men has been rapid. While son preference in the mid-modality has the most significant impact on abortion rates for female fetuses because it increases the likelihood that they will be aborted, it also results in the "missing females" in China.[8] In the 1980s, there was a lot of speculation and worry about female infanticide as a possible explanation for the disappearances. The one-child policy in China seemed to have a high probability of causing a couple to kill or abandon a newborn female infant so that they could use their one-child quota for the birth of a boy. According to new research from China and Korea, the majority of the "missing" women were likely aborted based on their gender because of sex discrimination in abortion clinics and a failure to record some births, rather than because of infanticide. One of the primary reasons rural Chinese couples desire a son is a belief that a son is their best option for long-term financial support, as daughters typically marry and move in with their husband's family after they get married themselves. Because parents no longer have to worry about having a son to care for them in old age, the sex ratio at birth in rural Chinese counties where government pension plans were put in place in the 1990s has decreased. European patterns of primogeniture, which were designed to preserve a family's wealth by passing it on only to the oldest son, also included a male preference. 

Transnational migration is a part of the migration transition, which is itself a part of the broader demographic transition because it brings together people who have probably grown up with very different views on the world and approaches to life. Increased populations alter the people-to-resource ratio, requiring a variety of local adjustments.[9] While human migration has occurred throughout history, it has taken on a new dimension due to the availability of cheap ground, water, and air transportation as well as the rapid decline in mortality. People can migrate within their own country or between countries (international migration). People moving from rural to urban areas is a common occurrence during the demographic transition. Since mortality and fertility have historically been controlled in urban areas before being disseminated to rural areas, migration has an impact on demographic change. Humans are being replaced by machines because of rural population growth and declining mortality, creating a paradoxical situation wherein enough food must be grown to feed a growing population. Consequently, as the world's population increases, people become less useful in agriculture. Since these changes in rural and urban economies tend to have a positive effect on population movement from rural to urban areas when they occur simultaneously, it is a good thing. 

As a result of political and ideological factors, the government has also used government-led efforts to move people within a country. To witness the mass exodus from China's three gorges dam project or Indonesia's efforts to relocate people from the crowded island of Java is outlined in these two examples of mass exodus.[10] Even though it is often forced, internal migration is almost always well thought out beforehand. People's needs are anticipated in advance, and migration is presumably expected or at least advertised to improve the lives of those involved, although the trauma associated with migration often has the opposite effect. Presumably expected or advertised migration. 

When a young population has slightly more males than females, it is called the "age transition." When a population gets older, it is called the "age transition." There are powerful social, economic, and political forces at play between the age and sex structure's bumps and dents.[11] To summarize: age and sex structure serve as a record of history and an indicator of the future because of the interplay between fertility, mortality, and migration. Your demographic perspective shows that age and sex structures are not only generated by population processes but are also influenced by them. All social institutions are impacted by shifts in gender and age demographics, and this is not an exaggeration. Because of the way society assigns social roles and frequently organizes people into groups based on their age, age and gender play a significant role in society's workings Sex, on the other hand, is a biological characteristic that does not change over time but whose meaning changes with time. Gender roles are subject to shift, and they frequently do. 

The sex ratios in India and China appear to be increasing rather than decreasing. It is generally accepted that the high sex ratio is a sign of prenatal and postnatal discrimination against females. More than half of the sex ratio imbalance in India is due to differences in vaccinations, malnutrition, and treatment when ill; while selective abortions, which are now possible thanks to ultrasound technology that can identify the sex of a fetus, are responsible for recent increases in the sex ratio.[12] As a result of the one-child policy, people in China can only have one child, and they strongly prefer that child to be a boy. This puts them in an impossible situation. As a result, China has one of, if not the highest, birth sex ratios in the world, raising concerns that an excess of young men in comparison to women could lead to an increase in violence and conflict. This is one of the most under-recognized "megatrends" of our time, and it could have an enormous impact on national and international politics in the next century. 

Urban areas are places where people's lives are centered on non-agricultural pursuits rather than farming. Here, urban refers to a place with a high density of people and no agriculture, whereas rural refers to a place where there is no farming. A 5,000-person farming community should not be considered urban, but a 2,500-person tourist spa or an artist colony should be considered urban.[13] The term "urban" carries a fair amount of nuance. The size of the population, the size of the land area, the population to space ratio, and the structure of the economy and society all play a role.  

Reactionary family-building decision rules appropriate for highly uncertain environments will eventually be replaced by more deliberate and forward-looking strategies that require longer time horizons as a result of the demographic transition. Household formation and living arrangements are frequently debated around the world.[14] Many of these debates don't focus on the demographic shifts that fueled this social revolution. Massive mortality declines, followed by massive fertility declines, and accompanied by massive migration, particularly to urban areas, along with the dramatic transition in the age structure caused primarily by the decline in fertility, mean that no social system can remain unchanged. 

According to the policy's mission statement, population policies are intended to manage population growth and foster economic growth. There has been a 5.8% increase in China's population since the year 2000, while the population grew by 11.7% between the censuses of 1990 and 2000.[15] The population policy has contributed to economic growth and alleviated environmental and economic pressures. There are many other benefits to this, such as improving women's social status and enhancing children's educational attainment. A high price has been paid for these advantages in terms of the sex imbalance in marriage and rapidly increasing old age as well as other social and political issues. There are now major social issues as a result of these issues, which were never expected to be as bad as they are. 

                                                              Bibliography

  [1] Lecture notes, “Demographic perspective”- chapter three – parts one to five.  

 [2] Lecture notes, “Demographic perspective”- chapter three – parts one to five.  

 [3] Lecture notes, “Demographic data”, chapter four – parts one to five.   

[4] Lecture notes, “Demographic data”, chapter four – parts one to five.   

[5] Lecture notes –“The Health and Mortality Transition”, chapter five – parts one to five.   

[6] Lecture notes –“The Health and Mortality Transition”, chapter five – parts one to five.   

[7] Lecture notes –“The Fertility Transition”, chapter six – parts one to five.   

[8] Lecture notes –“The Fertility Transition”, chapter six – parts one to five.  

 [9]Lecture notes, “The Migration Transition”, chapter seven – parts one to five.   

[10] Lecture notes, “The Migration Transition”, chapter seven – parts one to five.   

[11] Lecture notes “The age Transition”, chapter eight – parts one to five.   

[12]Lecture notes “The age Transition”, chapter eight – parts one to five.   

 [13]Lecture notes “The Urban Transition”, chapter nine – parts one to five.   

[14] Lecture notes, “The Family and Household Transition”, chapter ten – parts one to five.  

 [15] Peng, Tey Nai. "Population Growth, Distribution and Composition." Demographic and Socioeconomic Changes in Sabah (2022): 1.