Summary population, climate change and society (Van Bavel)

POPULATION, CLIMATE CHANGE AND SOCIETY
1| INTRODUCTION
written examen, multiple choice & open questions
- Half earned with questions related to demographic methods
- Half earned with questions about concepts, theories and trends
- One essay question

GOAL OF THE COURSE
 gaining knowledge on how the ongoing process of climate change has
been and is still connected with major changes in society
 populations are affecting climate change and how they are impacted by
climate change

to gain insights you need:
- concepts and theoretical perspectives
- methods and techniques of observation

DEMOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVE
How are human populations affecting and have been affected by climate change?
= demographic dimension
This depends on how populations are organising themselves across space
and time
= sociological dimension
(the demographic perspective is the major focus in this course)

HUMAN SOCIETY ≠ HUMAN POPULATION
 society needs population  population needs society
 society is not only composed by human beings
- people come and go, but society stays the same




POPULATION PROJECTION
Population projections have been a key contribution to the analysis of climate
change  lab weeks


DEMOGRAPHY
= science that analyses:

 population size, composition and (geographical) distribution


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,  causes and consequences of changes in
- natality (= number of births)
- fertility (=vruchtbaarheid)
- mortality (=death rate)
- migration
• population = collection of humans observed in some time frame and space
transversally = cross-section
longitudinally = over a time
period, evolution
Demografie
= studie van de omvang, structuur en spreiding van de bevolking, en hoe
de bevolking in tijd
Verandert door geboorten, sterfgevallen, migratie en veroudering

Demographers Switch around countries  Europe: the population of the largest
country goes to the country with the biggest area…




THE FUNDAMENTAL DEMOGRAPHIC BALANCING EQUATION
= start of everything in demography:



 2 ways of entering a population:
- born into it
- in-migration
social mobility = migration that includes a change in the
social label
 2 ways of leaving a population:
- Death
- Out-migration




N(T) population (number of people alive in the population at time
T)
N(0) number of people alive in the population at time 0
B[0,T] number of births in the population between time 0 and time T


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, D[0,T] number of deaths between time 0 and T
I[0,T] number of in-migrations between time 0 and T
O[0,T] number of out-migrations between 0 and T

 Unit of time = number of years  time period in which births, deaths and
migration are occurring is T years


Demographic statistics
= Refer to same two kinds of time perspectives – cross-sectional and longitundal
 STOCK STATISTICS: size and composition at time T
- N(T) = N(0)

 FLOW STATISTICS: changes in population over a period of time,
demographic processes during a time interval (population movement)
- B[0,T] – D[0,T] natural increase
- I[0,T] – O[0,T] net migration

The demographic balancing equation is a relation between stock-
statistics and flow-statistics

LEXIS DIAGRAM !!

Vertical
Direction, elapsed time since the
occurrence of an event:
if the event is birth, than the vertical
axes is age
- age of graduation
- age of marriage
- age of giving birth

horizontal
years (time), as time goes on



Children born in 1990 who died at the age of 1?
- B = false  none of b occurs to people who have celebrated their first
birthday, they have died at the age of 1
- C = correct, they reach 1 (life line, 45°)

Children whose parents got divorced in 1990 while the were 2 years old?
- A = correct, event happens in 1990 while they are 2 years old




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, 2| THE WORLD POPULATION EXPLOSION: CAUSES, CONTEXT AND FUTURE
PROSPECTS
 human growth population in number
 today: 8 billion people

DEMOGRAPHIC BALANCING EQUATION




= the relation between STOCK-statistics & FLOW (or population movement, or
population change)




Mostly expressed “per capita”
The balancing equation of population change breaks down the changes in the
size of population into four flows
 each flow = sum of events occurring to individuals

DEMOGRAPHIC RATES
demographic rates are typically: occurrence/exposure rates
occurence
RATE= the risk of occurrence /exposure ¿
person− years of exposure ¿
occurrence: numbers of events (e.g. number of
births)
exposure: events (e.g. who is at risk, who is exposed
to the event)
 the frequency of occurrences = higher in larger populations



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