The Coming Population Crash: and Our Planet’s Surprising Future
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- ISBN13: 9780807085837
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
Demography is destiny. It underlies many of the issues that shake the world, from war and economics to immigration. No marvel, then, that fears of overpopulation flared regularly over the last century, a century that saw the world’s population quadruple. Even today, baby booms are blamed for genocide and terrorism, and overpopulation is regularly cited as the primary factor driving global warming and additional environmental issues. Yet, surprisingly, it appears that the explosion is past its peak. Around the world, in developing countries as well as in rich ones, today’s women are having on average 2.6 children, half the number their mothers had. Within a generation, world fertility will likely follow Europe’s to not more than replacement levels—and by 2040, the world’s population will be declining for the first time since the Black Death, nearly seven hundred years ago. In The Coming Population Crash, veteran environmental writer Fred Pearce reveals the dynamics behind this dramatic shift. Charting the demographic path of our species over two hundred years, he starts by chronicling the troubling history of authoritarian efforts to contain the twentieth century’s population explosion, as well as the worldwide trend toward the empowerment of women that led to lower birthrates. And then, with plain reporting from around the globe, he dives into the environmental, social, and economic effects of our surprising demographic future. Now is probably the last time in history that our world will hold more young people than elders. Most dread that an aging world population will place a serious drain on national resources, as a shrinking effective population supports a growing number of retirees. But is this automatically so? Might an older world population have an upside? Pearce also shows us why our demographic future holds increased migration excise, and reveals the hypocrisy at the heart of anti-immigrant speechifying in the developed world: the simple fact is that countries with lower birthrates need workers and countries with privileged birthrates need work. And he tackles the truism that population density permanently leads to environmental degradation, taking us from some of the world’s most densely packed urban slums to rural Africa to argue that underpopulation can sometimes be the cause of environmental woes, while cities could hold the key to sustainable living. Pearce’s provocative book is essential reading for anyone who wants to know what demographics tell us about our global future, and for all persons who judge in learning from the mistakes of the past.
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The book has a lot of appealing points of view regarding the enviorment. In his social economic forcast the leader points out that birth excise of immigrants will save our pass through Social Security system which is facing bankruptcy. Fred like many sociologist fail to point that that Europe and The U.S. are now facing two sets of problems. One, an aging population that will cost lots of money in health care and retirement. Second, the third world uneducated population that goverments hope to tax, cost the same in tax dollars and welfare as a future aging population.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
I’m not sure that this is an optimistic book. The drop in world fertility certainly does lower environmental pressure, but has additional negative consequences, which are already apt apparent in the industrialized West. There will be few young people to take care of a disproportionately elderly population. Pension and medical costs will increase and the young workers may resist paying to give the ancient people a few more years of retirement. Economies will grow slowly, if at all. The destruction of the natural world will not abate, just because world population is a small less than predicted. And consumption by the rich countries, the real basis of environmental problems, won’t automatically drop. Indeed, it may increase, if lower population growth reduces commodity prices and better equipment leads to more resource use, as it permanently has before.
If there is a divine wildlife biologist in charge of the universe, He or She would consider us a frail species, disrupting all additional species, and needing strong management measures for the benefit of the ecosystem. It is excellent to see that He or She is starting on these measures. I hope it is not too late.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
At first blush this the title would indicate this is yet another Malthusian tract on mankind’s impending doom that may come to be maligned in years to come much like Paul Ehrlich’s well intentioned 1968 book The Population Bomb. There are certainly faint echoes of Ehrlich here and there in that there is a certain danger in attempting to predict the future as Ehrlich’s experience points out. Yet Pearce points towards a different outcome than Ehrlich, for Ehrlich predicted a population explosion beyond our means to feed them would provoke the impending crisis whereas Pearce posits that the population will decrease once peaking in 2040 at 8 billion due to a number of factors. We like to reflect we’ve mastered the environment yet unfolding events should be warning us the opposite is right. Pearce ongoing this theme with When the Rivers Run Dry: Water–The Defining Crisis of the Twenty-first Century and with “The Coming Population Crash” seeks to take it to its logical conclusion. What Pearce lays out certainly isn’t at all far-fetched and is hardly as chilling as the title implies, yet it’s also so plausible and understandable. Much of it is simple demographics: birth excise in developed countries have been falling for decades and are not more than the levels needed to replace the population, birth excise are also declining rapidly in developing nations, diseases such as HIV/AIDS are cutting average life expectancies in Africa and elsewhere dramatically, degrading environmental conditions will also cause us to rethink how we live. Most of this is a result of increased emphasis on family tree preparation in the 1960s and 1970s, but also on changing societal values; things that Ehrlich underestimated or missed completely. By and large politicians, governments and non-governmental organizations haven’t really acknowledged or attempted to take up the larger scale potential problems the decreasing populations may present as it’s so far off on their radars from more pressing concerns. And in reality a declining population is really more of a blessing than a curse in many respects, especially compared to the future Ehrlich predicted. Not to mentions governmental action typically compounds the problems. And there is permanently a potential problem of trying to predict a future whether it is a year or two, or decades, and Pearce certainly runs that potential risk just as Ehrlich did.
But Pearce isn’t gloom and doom as he does see the upsides to this particular problem. And certainly readers will take from the book what they want. Some may reflect a population decline may not be such a terrible thing cost-effectively; others may be apprehensive about shrinking economies and diminished futures. There are certainly times where a less crowded, less polluted planet sounds like a excellent thought! Not to mention mankind is a pretty hardy and adaptable species. I’m somehow certain we’ll find a way to manage a decline should it come. Certainly appealing and thought provoking.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
I judge books by how dog-eared they are when I end them and whether I buy copies to press into the hands of colleagues and friends. This book soars in both categories.
I’ve been active in population politics and recently wrote about the theme in my own book (Whole Planet Discipline). I wish to hell I’d had Pearce’s book in hand when I was writing, because he produces no end of vital news on the theme, including the deep streak of eugenics incorrect theory that has nearly poisoned the theme ever since Malthus. (Applause to HG Wells for seeing through the pious racism back when everyone thought it was obvious truth.)
This is a fantastic book on a crucial theme.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
It is common wisdom that the world has too many people and thus faces an uncertain future from resource constraints (Peak Oil, food shortages, etc..) and pollution (global warming, ozone etc). But as Fred Peace shows in this simple to read and refreshingly optimistic book, the answer to our problems may lie in the simple numbers of demography. Pearce starts with a history of population control, beginning with Malthus in the 18th century, which lead to Eugenics thinking of the early 20th century which lead to the Holocaust and then to the sterilization programs in India by the UN and 1-child policies in China – all of which have been disasters and essentially nationalistic and/or racists at the core. Along the way he shows uncomfortable relations with the environmental movement and Malthusian/eugenics thought.
As it turns out, population control has been naturally in the works on its own. In countries all over the world, birth excise are on the decline as woman choose to have 0 to 2 children, which is near or not more than replacement excise. The reasons are not by design, it just sort of happened, a result of increased affluence and urbanization brought on by the green revolution of the 60s, and increased access to and awareness of birth control. Agreed a choice, women don’t want huge families, they’d rather invest resources in a few healthy children and pursue their own life interests. The numbers tell the tale and Pearce’s book is full of page after page of incredible perspectives that really changes how one sees the world. In fleeting, most likely we will reach “Peak Population” by 2040, that is, the total number of humans on the planet will peak at around 8 billion and then start to decline, rapidly. There are already some days on planet planet when more people die than are born.
Pearce has written a fascinating and optimistic book, we really need it in this time of gloomy predictions about the future. Demography very well may be the saving grace of the human race. Or I should say, women may save the day by choosing not to have huge families. My only complaint is he doesn’t look at the potential downsides of a declining and aging population – on market economies, tax bases, standards of living, etc.. and what conditions in the future could cause a reversal of increased birth excise, such as what happens during baby booms. Nothing is assured, but assuming the macro trends stay in place – globalization, urbanization, woman’s liberation – the population problem, and conversely environmental and resource problems, may just have a excellent chance of resolving themselves with time, and we may look back on this period as an overpopulated transition to a more stable and gentle older age.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5