Hackett et al (2019) – Projections of Europe’s Growing Muslim Population Under Three Migration Scenarios
This paper modeled three future migration scenarios to see how the size of the Muslim population in Europe may change to the year 2050. Even with no future migration, Europe’s Muslim population was projected to increase, as a consequence of having a younger population and higher fertility rates than other Europeans.
World Population Prospects 2019 – Highlights
Published by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, this revision provides a comprehensive look at global demographic trends and prospects for the future. This information is essential to guide policies aimed at achieving the new Sustainable Development Goals, and for anyone that wants to obtain information on e.g. fertility level and population projection for all countries, and globally.
May (2017) – The Politics of Family Planning Policies and Programs in Sub-Saharan Africa
High African fertility levels are rooted in cultural and traditional reproductive
regimes. This overview by J.F. May examines Sub-Saharan African politics of family planning policies and programs from three different angles. He analyses the attitudes of African policymakers and the opinions of their constituencies, the role of donors and NGOs, and the shifting family planning and public health paradigms and priorities. He finds among others, that the business as-usual approach will not be sufficient to accelerate the fertility transition in the region. The current “stop-and-go” approach toward family planning programs will need to be replaced by an energetic, comprehensive, and sustained engagement of the public and private sectors to put the continent on the path of a contraceptive revolution.
Pew Research Center – The Changing Global Religious Landscape (2017)
The Pew Research Center on Religion and Public Life is a leading producer of survey data and methodologically rigorous analysis with a focus on the USA but a global scope. This report includes data on births by religion of mother in each country, and combined with age structure, death rates, and estimates of adult switching between religions, they provide forecasts of the number of people affiliated to each religion up to 2060.
Korotayev et al. (2016) – Explaining current fertility dynamics in tropical Africa from an anthropological perspective: A cross-cultural investigation
What mechanisms are sustaining tropical Africa’s high fertility? Which anthropological factors provide both social and economic foundations for the observed fertility? This cross-cultural investigation shows the four most important factors, and as well as their utility in policy recommendations aimed to reduce fertility.
Burger and DeLong (2016) – What if fertility decline is not permanent? The need for an evolutionarily informed approach to understanding low fertility
Is the demographical transition theory wrong, and fertility decline not irreversible? This paper suggests that the assumption of irreversibility is ill-founded, at least without considerable development in theory that incorporates evolutionary and ecological processes. It offers general propositions for how fertility could increase in the future, including natural selection on high fertility variants, and the escalating resource demands of modernization.
Warren (2015) – Can human populations be stabilized?
Warren argues the United Nations population projections are wrong because they assume, in spite of the absence of necessary feedbacks, that all nations will converge rapidly to replacement-level fertility and thereafter remain at that level. He shows that global average fertility rate could rise even if each country’s fertility rate is falling, and that small populations with high fertility, and migration can undermine stabilization.
Gerland et al. (2014) – World population stabilization unlikely this century
Analysis of the UN’s recently released population projections using a Bayesian probabilistic methodology reveals, contrary to previous literature, that world population is unlikely to stop growing this century. There is an 80% probability that world population, now 7.2 billion, will increase to between 9.6 and 12.3 billion by 2100.
Hopfenberg (2014) – An expansion of the demographic transition model: the dynamic link between agricultural productivity and population
The current analysis expands the classic demographic transition model, taking into account all of human history, and highlighting the basic carrying capacity foundations of fertility changes. This comprehensive model shows birth and death rates before and during agricultural expansion, followed by the classic demographic transition model.
Myrskylä et al. (2009) – Advances in development reverse fertility declines
Is the trend towards low fertility in highly developed countries really irreversible? Does high Human Development Index (HDI) always indicate low fertility? Myrskylä et al. shows that although development continues to promote fertility decline at low and medium HDI levels, at advanced HDI levels, further development can reverse the declining trend in fertility.
