MEC: Technophysio Evolution and Demographic Transition

Two "L" shaped graphs highlight the extraordinary changes in human prosperity over the last twelve thousand years. After millennia of infant mortality rates of 200-300 per 1,000 and life expectancy at birth of 20-30 years, most people today live in nations where infant mortality rates are dropping below 50, on their way to the single-digit levels of the West. Global life expectancy is pushing 70 years. These "L" shaped developments contribute to another "L" curve. Look at this chart of the world population:

We can get a better sense of population growth if we break the chart into two segments:

From 10,000 B.C.E. to 5000 B.C.E., the global population increased from about 4 million to 5 million. The plow was invented in the fifth millennium, irrigation began, and cities emerged. An upturn in population began during the middle of the first millennium B.C.E., the Greco-Roman era. Much slower growth followed in the third through eighth centuries C.E. Population fluctuated until the major European plague in the mid-1300s, after which population resumed an upward trajectory, particularly accelerating in the seventeenth century.

Many have attributed the population explosion of recent centuries to the Industrial Revolution, but clearly, its impetus predated the Industrial Revolution by one or two centuries. Economist Robert Fogel attributes this population growth to the Second Agricultural Revolution beginning in the seventeenth century (the First Agricultural Revolution beginning around 9000 B.C.E. with the discovery of farming techniques.) The Second Agricultural Revolution, starting in Europe, involved a combination of improved crop rotation methods, better planting and cultivation techniques, new technology, and improved storage and distribution methods. Beginning in the early nineteenth century (c. 1820), the Industrial Revolution was built upon the gains from agricultural advancements.

Robert Fogel calls the phenomenon we have experienced in recent centuries "technophysio evolution." Technology improved agriculture so that many people could eat beyond mere subsistence levels and live healthier and more productive lives. Better agriculture production also required fewer workers freeing up labor for other pursuits. These other pursuits included the pursuit of new technologies that both bettered people's lives and further improved agricultural production. Thus, a cycle of technophysio evolution was set in motion.

To understand technophysio evolution's impact on the global population, we can look at what demographers call the Demographic Transition Model (D.T.M.). The D.T.M. is a model reflecting the experience of Western Europe, extrapolated to interpret anticipated global demographic trends. There are four phases to the D.T.M.:

Stage 1: Death rates (deaths per 1,000 population) and birth rates (births per 1,000 population) vary but tend to balance each other out. Prior to the eighteenth century, this was the near universal story for humanity (although as we have seen, very slow steady growth had been the norm for many centuries before.)

Stage 2: Death rates begin to decline significantly. Birth rates stay constant for a while and then began to drop in a pattern similar to death rates. Though both are declining, the birth rate stays significantly above the death rate for decades (see the dashed line in the chart.) This leads to a significant increase in the population.

Stage 3: Death rate decline begins to slow and level out. Meanwhile fertility rates continue to decline leveling out at a later date. The population continues to experience growth but at an ever slowing rate.

Stage 4: Death rates and birth rates stabilize at or below replacement levels.

Wikipedia provides a chart for 250 years of Sweden's history that illustrates this. Notice the parallel death and birth rates until the beginning of the 1800s. The stages are demarcated for you at the top of the chart.

Stage 2 emerged in Europe because of technophysio evolution. Increased agricultural productivity led to a surplus of food and an improved diet. Improved health and vigor meant more productive people. It reduced the death rate as people lived longer and more productive lives. (Fogel notes that, in England, agriculture improved caloric intake, but the rapid urbanization created health problems that tended to retard advances in life expectancy until the late nineteenth century.) With improved health, and enough resources to meet basic subsistence needs, people began to address environmental problems like waste elimination and personal hygiene. This lessened the amount of disease and allowed more people to live longer and more vigorous lives.

Stage 3 was when the infant mortality rate (children dying before their first birthday) was noticeably lower. Whereas only four or five children out of eight might have lived to adulthood in the past, now seven or eight children might reach maturity. Fewer children were needed to perpetuate the family, and birth rates declined. Increased industrialization also meant urbanization and a departure from traditional values about family size and the role of women. Women no longer gained as much status from family. They become more educated and literate, often entering the workforce. This led to greater affluence and greater sophistication in creating a better quality of life. People became more empowered, and greater demands were made for environmental improvements, safety, and health care.

Stage 4 has seen a stabilization of death and birth rates. Concerns about quality-of-life issues, including environment and health, have risen in importance.

Some believe there may be a stage 5. Eventually, our ability to extend life expectancy will hit a wall, and the death rate will rise a little before stabilizing. With affluence, death rates may begin to increase because of decreased physical activity and increasingly unhealthy lifestyles like overeating. How birth rates will respond isn't known. Whether this is true and to what degree is a subject of debate.

We can extrapolate the D.T.M. to represent global changes with one significant change. The distinguishing feature of the global model is that instead of a relatively smooth transition into declining death rates over decades, death rates plummet quickly. Most developing nations experienced their population explosions in the years after World War II when enormous amounts of aid, vaccines, and technological knowledge were made available. Traditions and customs about family size can't adapt as quickly. Therefore, the gap between birth and death rates (see the dashed line in the graph below) is considerably larger than with the D.T.M. for Western nations. This leads to very rapid population growth.

Here is a chart showing the global birth and death rate from 1950 with projections until 2050:

Another distinguishing feature of the global D.T.M. is the linkage between increases in per capita income and improvements in living conditions. In the Western D.T.M., per capita growth in income seemed to draw living conditions to higher levels. The global experience has been more a matter of improved living conditions and health, drawing per capita income to higher levels. Aid and technology transfers from the West have shortened the learning curve for other nations following the West through the demographic transition.

It is important to note that the D.T.M. is not without controversy. Looking nation by nation, there is considerable variation in how demographic transitions occur. Still, the D.T.M. is a good standard that helps us frame questions about specific nations and regions. It does seem to keep capturing a sense of the overall global trend.

How can we model this technophysio phenomenon we live in? Brian McLaren offers a model of his societal suicide machine in Everything Must Change. Next, we will look at the economic growth machine that made rapid population growth possible while expanding prosperity.

(For a scholarly presentation of technophysiological evolution, see The Escape from Hunger and Premature Death, 1700-2100: Europe, America, and the Third World. Wikipedia has a pretty good article on the Demographic Transition Model.)

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Comments

[RonMcK]

Michael
These statistics you are presenting are very compelling, but they sort of beg the question. You are proving that "everything is changing" for the better. The more important question is "Are things changing enough, or fast enough?"(especially given the fact that statistical averages often hide real personal tragedies). "Should a nation where a majority of citizens claim to be Christian be doing more to change everything?"

I am more interested in these more normative" questions than the "postive" response you have made so far.

Despite your statistics, I still have to agree with McLaren that everything must change. What I am more like to disagree on is how things much change.

[RonMcK]

Correction.
What I am more likely to disagree with him on is how things must change.

[Michael W. Kruse]

Fair enough. I think I will begin to get to your questions in two or three more posts.

My objective to this point has been to counter the notion that our present experience is a "suicide machine," or at least not one in the sense McLaren is framing it. That so much good is happening does not, in itself, legitmate what is happening. On the other hand, I have a sense that diehard devotees of McLaren's perspective are not willing to even begin a normative discussion when they already "know" the present situtaion is so suicidal.