A Concise History of World Population: An Introduction to Population Processes

by Livi-Bacci, Massimo

• ISBN13: 9780631223351
• ISBN10: 0631223355
• Edition: 3rd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-07-01
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons Inc

Summary

Since its original publication in 1992, this book has become the standard history of world population. Its underlying purpose is to explain the links between nature, culture, and population and thereby to look at ways of preventing future environmental collapse and human catastrophe. Coverage of the changing patterns of population growth, and the effects of migrations, wars, disease, technology and culture, are addressed. For the third edition, the author has included new estimates and projections on world population to the year 2050, and updated the quantitative documentation and the bibliography. He has expanded the text on the geopolitical implications of demographic increase on different regions of the world and added sections on the effects of HIV on mortality and on sustainability of an extended life span. At the same time, the features that made previous editions attractive have been retained: the informative and accessible style, the reasoned treatment of issues crucial to the future of every species, and the contemporary recasting of theory.

Author Biography

Massimo Livi-Bacci is Professor of Demography at the University of Florence

Table of Contents

List of Figures	viii
List of Tables	xii
Preface	xiv
The Space and Strategy of Demographic Growth	1	(28)
Humans and animals	1	(4)
Divide and multiply	5	(1)
Jacopo Bichi and Domenica Del Buono, Jean Guyon and Mathurine Robin	6	(3)
Reproduction and survival	9	(8)
The space of growth	17	(3)
Environmental constraints	20	(4)
A few figures	24	(5)
Demographic Growth: Between Choice and Constraint	29	(34)
Constraint, choice, adaptation	29	(2)
From hunters to farmers: the Neolithic demographic transition	31	(5)
Black Death and demographic decline in Europe	36	(6)
The tragedy of the American Indios: old microbes and new populations	42	(6)
The French Canadians: a demographic success story	48	(5)
Ireland and Japan: two islands, two histories	53	(4)
On the threshold of the contemporary world	57	(6)
Land, Labor, and Population	63	(27)
Diminishing returns and demographic growth	63	(4)
Historical confirmations	67	(5)
Demographic pressure and economic development	72	(3)
More on demographic pressure and development: examples from the Stone Age to the present day	75	(4)
Space, land, and development	79	(5)
Population size and prosperity	84	(3)
Increasing or decreasing returns?	87	(3)
Toward Order and Efficiency: The Recent Demography of Europe and the Developed World	90	(38)
From waste to economy	90	(5)
From disorder to order: the lengthening of life	95	(5)
From high to low fertility	100	(7)
European emigration: a unique phenomenon	107	(6)
A summing up: the results of the transition	113	(2)
Theoretical considerations on the relationship between demographic and economic growth	115	(4)
More on the relationship between demographic and economic growth: Empirical observations	119	(9)
The Populations of Poor Countries	128	(47)
An extraordinary phase	128	(6)
The conditions of survival	134	(7)
A brief geography of fertility	141	(6)
The conditions and prospects for fertility decline and demographic policy	147	(7)
India and China	154	(7)
Fertilia and Sterilia	161	(5)
Explaining a paradox	166	(9)
The Future	175	(31)
Population and self-regulation	175	(2)
The numbers of the future	177	(6)
On sustainability of extended survival	183	(7)
The moving limits	190	(4)
The emerging limits: Resources	194	(4)
The emerging limits: Environment	198	(4)
Calculations and values	202	(4)
Notes	206	(33)
Select Bibliography	239	(4)
Index	243