GROUP 1

OVERVIEW OF THE MODULE:

This chapter includes Media, Culture, and Globalization, Media and Its Functions, The
Global Village and Cultural Imperialism, Critiques of Cultural Imperialism, and Social
Media and the Creation of Cyber Ghettoes

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

At the end of the session students are able to:

 Recall Media and Its Functions
 Recognize The Global Village and Cultural Imperialism and Critiques of Cultural
Imperialism, Social Media and the Creation of Cyber Ghettoes

MEDIA, CULTURE, AND GLOBALIZATION

Lobo, Joliver et.al. (2019) The Contemproary World, BOOKS ATBP, 707 Tiaga cor
Kasipagan Streets Barangka Drive, Mandaluyong City
Media have a significant impact in cultural globalization in two mutually interdependent
ways: First, the media provides extensive transnational transmission of cultural
products; Second, it contributes to the formation of communicative networks and social
structures. The rapidly increasing supply of media products from an international media
culture poses a challenge to local and national cultures that exist. The sheer volume of
supply, as well as the vast technological infrastructure and financial capital that pushes
forward this supply have a significant impact on local patterns of cultural consumption
and opportunities to sustain independent cultural production.

Global Media cultures create a continuous cultural exchange in which critical aspects
such as identity, nationality, religion, behavioral norms and lifestyle are constantly
challenged and questioned. These cultural encounters often involve meeting cultures
with a different socio-economic basis, typically on one side a national, publicly regulated
cultural industry.

Global Media are promoting a restructuring of cultural and social communities because
of their very structure. Just as media like the press and later radio and television were
very important institutions for the formation of national communities, global media are
supporting the creation of new communities. For example, the Internet not only
facilitates worldwide communication but also supports the formation of new social
communities where members can interact with each other. And Satellite television and
radio make it possible for immigrants to be in close contact with the language an culture
of their homeland while gradually adapting to a new cultural environment. The common
starting point for the research program and its projects is to assume that a series of
international media is in itself a global cultural supply and serves as an independent
cultural and social globalization agency in which cultural communities are continually
restructured and redefined.
Media has assumed more and more functions for people – they live in dense media
communication networks, the postal network, the telephone network, the mobile phone
network, the internet, and so on.

Furthermore, interactive media have become important in all areas of life and as a
result, the construction of world knowledge and its meaning is changing. The same
applies to people’s identities and social relations, as well as the way they conduct
themselves, institutions, and organizations, and culture and society as a whole.

MEDIA AND ITS FUNCTIONS

Lisandro, Claudio E., and Abinales, Patricio N. (2018) The Contemporary World, C & E
Publishing Inc., 839 EDSA, South Triangle, Quezon City, Philippines

Lule describes media as ‘a means of conveying something, such as a channel of

communication.’ Technically,

Speaking, a person’s voice is a medium. However, when commentators refer to “media”

(the plural of medium), they mean the technologies of mass communication. Print media
include books, magazines, and newspapers. Broadcast media involve radio, film, and
television. Finally, digital media cover the internet and mobile mass communication.
Within the category of internet media, there are the email, internet sites, social media,
and internet based video and audio.

Different media simultaneously extend and amputate human sense. New media may
expand the reach of communication, but they also dull the users’ communicative
capacities. Think about the medium of writing. Before people wrote things down on
parchment, exchanging stories was mainly done orally. To be able to pass stories
verbally from one person to another, storytellers had to have retentive memories.
However, papyrus started becoming more common in Egypt after the fourth century
BCE, which increasingly meant that more people ould write down their stories. As a
result, storytellers no longer had to rely completely on their memories. This
development, according to some philosophers at the time, dulled the people’s capacity
to remember.

Something similar can be laid about cellphones. On one hand, they expand people’s
senses because they provide the capability to talk to more people instantaneously and
simultaneously. On the other hand, they also limit the senses because they make users
easily distractible and more prone to multitasking. This is not necessarily a bad thing, it
is merely change with a tradeoff. The question of what new media enhance and what
they amputate was not a moral or ethical one. New media are neither inherently good
nor bad.

THE GLOBAL VILLAGE AND CULTURAL IMPERIALISM

Lobo, Joliver et.al. (2019) The Contemproary World, BOOKS ATBP, 707 Tiaga cor
Kasipagan Streets Barangka Drive, Mandaluyong City

Media Imperialism occurs when one society media dominates another country’s culture.
The medium of cable television is a prime example to illustrate the effect of media
imperialism. Cable television and Satellite transmissions, for better or worse, has made
the world a global village. It is our television viewing that shapes our understanding of
the world and ourselves. However, it is saturated with foreign influence and media
imperialism. How much has world television through satellite and cable television
affected our culture and identity is yet to be explored?

Media globalization is seen as a modern form of imperialism, and more believe that this
globalization will destroy individual cultures and diversity. Culture domination refers to
the process in which national cultures are overwhelmed by the importing news and
entertainment from other countries like South Korea, China, Taiwan, and Latin America
such as Mexico. A resident of many countries are concerned that their national and
local heritage will be replaced by one global culture dominated by other country’s
values. They point out that dominating country’s music, books, television shows, and
films are popular around the world. Many countries like Canada, Spain, and France
have placed quotas in the amount of foreign material that can be carried in their
broadcasting system. The culture domination also spills over into the news area.

For almost 15 years, after the success of “Lovers in Paris” and “Jewel in the Palace,”
the Philippines is being invaded by K-Pop (South Korean) entertainment cultures or the
Hallyu wave. Many Filipinos especially the edgers and millenials are avid fanatics of K-
Drama and K-Pop music. K-Pop stars make the Filipino fanatics jive into foreign
entertainment sounds and music in a very unfamiliar and unfathomable language.

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE CREATION OF CYBER GHETTOES

Lisandro, Claudio E., and Abinales, Patricio N. (2018) The Contemporary World, C & E
Publishing Inc., 839 EDSA, South Triangle, Quezon City, Philippines
By now, very few media scholars argue that the world is becoming culturally
homogenous. Apart from the nature of diverse audiences and regional trends in cultural
production, the internet and social media are proving that the globalization of culture
and ideas can move in different directions. While Western culture remains powerful and
media production is still controlled by a handful of powerful Western corporations, the
internet, particularly social media, is challenging previous ideas about media and
globalization.

As with all new media, social media have both beneficial and negative effects. On on
hand, these forms of communication have democratized access. Anyone with an
internet connection or smart phone can use Facebook and Twitter for free. These media
have enabled users to be consumers and producers of information simultaneously. The
democratic potential of social media was most evident in 2011 during the wave of
uprisings known as the Arab Spring. Without access to traditional broadcast media like
T.V., activists opposing authoritarian regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya used Twitter
to organize and disseminate information. Their efforts toppled their respective
governments. More recently, the “women’s march” against newly installed US President
Donald Trump began with a tweet from a Hawaii lawyer and became national, even a
global movement.
However, social media also have their dark side. In the early 2000s, commentators
began referring to the emergence of a “splinternet” and the phenomenon of
“cyberbalkanization” to refer to the various bubbles people place themselves in when
they are online. In the United States, voters of the Democratic Party largely read liberal
websites, and voters of the Republican Party largely read conservative websites. This
segmentation, notes an article in the journal Science, has been exacerbated by the
nature of social media feeds, which leades users to read articles, memes, and videos
shared by like-minded friends. As such, being on Facebook can resemble living in an
echo chamber, which reinforces one’s existing beliefs and opinions. This echo chamber
precludes users from listening to or reading opinions and information that challenge
their viewpoints, thus, making them more partisan and closed-minded.

This segmentation has been used by people in power who are aware that the social
media bubbles can produce an herd mentality. It can be exploited by politicians with
less than democratic intentions and demagogues wanting to whip up popular anger.
The same inexpensiveness that allows social media to be a democratic force likewise
makes it a cheap tool of government propaganda. Russian dictator Vladimir Putin has
hired armies of social media "trolls“ (paid users who harass political opponents) to
manipulate public opinion through intimidation and the spreading of fake news. Most
recently, American intelligence agencies established that Putin used trolls and online
misinformation to help Donald Trump win the presidency- a tactic the Russian autocrat
is likely to repeat in European elections he seeks to influence.

In places across the world, Putin imitators replicate his strategy of online trolling and
disinformation to clamp down on dissent and delegitimize critical media. Critics of the
increasingly dictatorial regime of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are
threatened by online mobs and pro-government trolls, who hack accounts and threaten
violence. Some of their responses have included threats of sexual violence. Some of
their responses have included threats of sexual violence against women.
As the preceding cases show, fake information can spread easily on social media since
they have few content filters. Unlike newspapers, Facebook does not have a team of
editors who are trained to sift through and filter information. If a news article, even a
fake one, gets a lot of shares, it will reach many people with Facebook accounts.

The dark side of social media shows that even a seemingly open and democratic media
may be co-opted towards undemocratic means. Global online propaganda will be the
biggest threat to face as the globalization of media deepens. Internet media have made
the world so interconnected that a Russian dictator can, for example, influence
American elections on the cheap.

As consumers of media, users must remain vigilant and learn how to distinguish fact
from falsehood in a global media landscape that allows politicians to peddle what
President Trump’s senior advisers now calls “alternative facts.” Though people must
remain critical of mainstream media and traditional journalism that may also operate
based on vested interest, we must also insist that some sources are more credible than
others. A newspaper story that is written by a professional journalist and vetted by
professional editors is still likely to be more credible than a viral video produced by
someone in his/her bedroom, even if both will have their biases. People must be able to
tell the difference.
GROUP 2

OVERVIEW OF THE MODULE:

This chapter includes The Global City, Defining the Global City, Indicators for
Globalization, Challenges for Global Cities, and The Global City and the Poor

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

At the end of the session students are able to:

 Recall the Definition of Global City
 Enumerate Indicators for Globalization and Challenges for Global Cities
 Examine The Global City and the Poor

PERIOD:
MIDTERM

WEEK:
11th WEEK

TIME ALLOTMENT:
3 hours /week

CONTENT DISCUSSION:

THE GLOBAL CITY

The Global City, Defining the Global City, Indicators for Globalization, Challenges for
Global Cities, and The Global City and the Poor
If you had the chance, would you move to New York? Tokyo? How about Sydney?
Chances are many of you would like to move to these major cities. And if not, you would
probably like to visit them anyway. Some of you might have already travelled to these
cities as tourists or temporary residents. Or maybe you have heard stories about them.
You may have relatives living there who have described buzzing metropolises, with
forests of skyscrapers and train lines that zigzag on top of each other. You may likewise
have an idea of what these cities look like based on what you have seen in movies or
TV. Do you remember when downtown Manhattan in New York was destroyed in a
confrontation between the Avengers (Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, the Hulk, etc.)
and aliens?

Not all people have been to global cities, but most know about them. Their influence
extends even to one’s imagination. What are these places? Why are they important?
And how are they relevant to you?

DEFINING THE GLOBAL CITY

Sociologist Saskia Sassen popularized the term “global city” in the 1990s. Her criteria
for what constitutes a global city were primarily economic. In her work, she initially
identified three global cities: New York, London, and Tokyo, all of which are hubs of
global finance and capitalism. They are the homes, for instance, of the world’s top stock
exchanges where investors buy and sell shares in major corporations. New York has
the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), London has the Financial Times (FTSE), and
Tokyo has Nikkei. The amount of money traded in these markets is staggering. The
value of shares traded in the NYSE, for example, is $19,300 billion, while that of the
shares in the Philippine Stock Exchange is only $231.3 billion.

Limiting the discussion of global cities to these three metropolises, however is proving
more and more restrictive. The global economy has changed significantly since Sassen
wrote her book, and any account of the economic power of cities today must take note
of the latest developments. Recent commentators have expanded the criteria that
Sassen used to determine what constitutes a global city. Though it is not as wealthy as
New York, movie-making mecca Los Angeles can now rival the Big Apple’s cultural
influence. San Francisco must now factor in as another global city because it is the
home of the most powerful internet companies—Facebook, Twitter, and Google. Finally,
the growth of the Chinese economy has turned cities like Shanghai, Beijing, and
Guangzhou into centers of trade and finance. The Chinese government reopened the
Shanghai Stock Exchange in late 1990s, and since then, it has grown to become the
fifth largest stock market in the world.

Others consider some cities “global” simply because they are great places to live in. In
Australia, Sydney commands the greatest proportion of capital. However, Melbourne is
described as Sydney’s rival “global city” because many magazines and lists have now
referred it as the world’s “most livable city” --- a place with good public transportation a
thriving cultural scene, and a relatively easy pace of life.

Defining a global city can thus be difficult. One way of solving this dilemma is to go
beyond the simple dichotomy of global and non-global. Instead of asking whether or not
one city is a global city (a yes or no question), it is better to ask: In what ways are cities
global and to what extent are they global?

INDICATORS OF GLOBALIZATION

So what are the multiple attributes of the global city? The foremost characteristic is
economic power. Sassen remains correct in saying that economic power largely
determines which cities are global. New York may have the largest stock market in the
world but Tokyo houses the most number of corporate headquarters (613 company
headquarters as against 217 in New York, its closest competitor). Shanghai may have a
smaller stock market compared to New York and Tokyo, but plays a critical role in the
global economic supply chain ever since China has become the manufacturing center of
the world. Shanghai has the world’s busiest container port, moving over 33 million
container units in 2013.
Economic opportunities in a global city make it attractive to talents from across the
world. Since the 1970s, many of the top IT programmers and engineers from Asia have
moved to San Francisco Bay Area to become some of the key figures in Silicon Valley’s
technology boom. London remains a preferred destination for many Filipinos with
nursing degrees.

To measure the economic competitiveness of a city. The Economist Intelligence Unit

has added other criteria like market size, and purchasing power of citizens, size of the
middle class, and potential for growth. Based on these criteria, “tiny” Singapore is
considered Asia’s most competitive city because of its strong market, efficient and
incorruptible government, and liveability. It also houses the regional offices of many
major global corporations.

Global cities are also centres of authority. Washington D.C. may not be as wealthy as
New York, but it is the seat of American state power. People around the world know its
major landmarks: the White House, the Capitol Building (Congress), the Supreme
Court, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Washington Monument. Similarly, compared with
Sydney and Melbourne, Canberra is a sleepy town and thus is not as attractive as
tourists. But as Australia’s political capital, it is home to the country’s top politicians,
bureaucrats, and policy advisors.

The cities that house major international organizations may also be considered centers
of political influence. The headquarters of the United Nations is in New York, and that of
the European Union is in Brussels. An influential political city near the Philippines is
Jakarta, which is not just the capital of Indonesia, but also the location of the main
headquarters of the Association of the South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). Powerful
political hubs exert influence on their own countries as well as on onternational affairs.
The European Central Bank, which oversees the Euro (the European Union’s currency),
is based on Frankfurt. A decision made in that city can, therefore, affet the political
enemy of an entire continent and beyond.
Finally, global cities are centers of higher learning and culture. The city’s intellectual
influence is seen through the influence of its publishing industry. Many of the books that
people read are the established places like New York City, but it is far from being the
local newspaper. People read it not just across America, but also all over the world. One
of the reasons for the many tourists visiting Boston is because of the leading English-
language Universities there. Education is currently Australia’s third largest export, just
behind coal and iron ore, and significantly ahead of tourism. In 2015, the Australian
government reported that it made as much as 19.2 billion Australian dollars (roughly 14
billion US dollars) from education alone.

WE have already explained why Los Angeles, the center of the American Film Industry,
may be considered a global city. A less obvious example, however, is Copenhagen, the
capital of Denmark. It is so small that one can tour the entire city by bicycle in thirty
minutes. It is not the home of a major stock market, and its population is rather
homogenous. However, Copenhagen ois now considered one of the culinary capitals of
the world, with its top restaurants incommensurate with its size. As the birthplace of
“New Nordic” cuisine, Copenhagen has set into motion various culinary trends like
foraging the forests for local ingredients. Similarly, Manchester, England in the 1980s
was a dreary, industrial city. But many prominent post-punk and New Wave bands- Joy
Division, the Smiths, the Happy Mondays--- hailed from this city, making it a global
household name. In Southeast Asia, Singapore (again) is slowly becoming a cultural
hub for the region. It now houses some of the region’s top television stations and news
organizations (MTV Southeast Asia and Channel News Asia). Its various art galleries
and cinemas also show paintings from artists and filmmakers, respectively, from the
Philippines and Thailand. It is in fact, sometimes easier to watch the movie of a Filipino
Indie filmmaker in Singapore than it is in Manila!

It is the cultural power of global cities that ties them to the imagination. Think about how
many songs have been written about New York (Jay Z and Alicia Key’s “Empire State of
Mind,” Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York,” and numerous songs by Simon and
Garfunkel) and how these references conjure up images of a place where anything is
possible---“ a concrete jungle where dreams are made of,” according to Alicia Keys.

Today, global cities become culturally diverse. In a global city, one can try cuisines form
different parts of the world. Because of their large Turkish populations, for example,
Berlin and Tokyo offer some of the best Turkish food one can find outside of Turkey.
Manila is not very global because of the dearth of foreign residents (despite the massive
domestic migration), but Singapore is, because it has a foreign population of 38%.

CHALLENGES FOR GLOBAL CITIES

Global cities conjure up images of fast-paced, exciting, cosmopolitan lifestyles. But such
descriptions are lacking. Global cities also have their undersides. They can be sites of
great inequality and poverty as well as tremendous violence. Like the broader
processes of globalization, global cities create winners and losers.

In this section, we list some “pathologies” of the global city, based on the research of
the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.

Cities can be sustainable because of their density. As Richard Florida notes:

“Ecologists have found that by concentrating their populations in smaller areas, cities
and metros decrease human encroachment on natural habitats. Denser settlement
patterns yield energy savings; apartment buildings, for example, are more efficient to
heat and cool than detached suburban houses. Moreover, in cities with extensive public
transportation systems, people tend to drive less and thereby cut carbon emissions. It is
no surprise to learn that, largely because of the city’s extensive train system, New
Yorkers have the lowest per capita carbon footprints.”

Not all cities, however, are as dense as New York or Tokyo. Some cities like Los
Angeles are urban sprawls, with massive freeways that force residents to spend money
on cars and gas. And while cities in Manila, Bangkok, and Mumbai are dense, their lack
of public transportation and their governments’ inability to regulate their car industries
have made them extremely polluted.

More importantly, because of the sheer size of city populations across the world, it is not
surprising that urban areas consume most of the world’s energy. Cities only cover 2
percent of the world’s land mass, but they consume 78 percent of global energy.
Therefore, if carbon emissions must be cut to prevent global warming, this massive
energy consumption in cities must be curbed. This action will require a lot of creativity.
For example, many food products travel many miles before they get to major city
centers. Shipping this food through trains, buses, and even planes increases carbon
emissions. Will it be possible to grow more food in cities instead? Solutions like so-
called “vertical farms” built in abandoned buildings (as is increasingly being done in New
York) may lead the way towards more environmentally sustainable cities. If more food
can be grown with less water in denser spaces, cities will begin to be greener.

The major terror attacks of recent years have also targeted cities. Cities, especially
those with global influence, are obvious targets for terrorists due to their high
populations and their role as symbols of globalization that many terrorists despise. The
same attributes that make them attractive to workers and migrants make them sites of
potential terrorist violence. Only by looking from this perspective will we be able to
understand the 9/11 attacks that brought down the twin towers of the World Trade
Center in New York and the November 2015 coordinated attacks in Paris by zealots of
the Islamic States, security experts believe that properties around the world that carry
his name may be targets ot terror attacks. There are Trump Towers, for example, in
places like Istanbul and Manila.

THE GLOBAL CITY AND THE POOR

We have consistently noted that economic globalization has paved the way for massive
inequality. This phenomenon is thus very pronounced in cities. Some large cities,
particularly those in Scandinavia, have found ways to mitigate inequality through state-
led social redistribution programs. Yet many cities, particularly those in the developing
countries, are sites of contradiction. In places like Mumbai, Jakarta, and Manila, it is
common to find gleaming buildings alongside massive shanty towns. This duality may
even be seen in rich urban cities.

In the outskirts of New York and San Francisco are poor urban enclaves occupied by
African Americans and immigrant families who are often denied opportunities at a better
life. Slowly, they are being forced to move farther away from the economic centers of
their cities. As a city attracts more capital and richer residents, real estate prices go up
and poor residents are forced to relocate to far away but cheaper areas. This
phenomenon of driving out the poor in favour of newer, wealthier residents is called
GENTRIFICATION.

In Australian cities, poor aboriginal Australians have been most acutely affected by this
process. Once living in public urban housing, they were forced to move farther away
from the city centers that offer more jobs, more government services, and betters
transportation due to gentrification. In France, poor Muslim migrants are forced out of
Paris and have clustered around ethnic enclaves known as BANLIEUE.

In most of the world’s global cities, the middle class is also running out. Globalization
creates high income jobs that are concentrated in global cities. These high earners, in
turn, generate demand for an unskilled labor force (hotel cleaners, nannies, maids,
waitresses, etc.) that will attend to their increasing needs. Meanwhile, many middle
income jobs in the manufacturing and business process outsourcing (call centers, for
example) are moving to other countries. This hollowing out of the middle class in global
cities has heightened the inequality within them. In places like New York, there are high-
rolling American investment bankers whose children are raised by Filipina maids. A
large global city may thus be a paradise for some, but a purgatory for others.

In conclusion, Global Cities, as noted in this lesson are sites and mediums of
globalization. They are, therefore material representations of the phenomenon. Through
them, we see the best of globalization; they are places that create exciting fusions of
culture and ideas. They are also places that generate tremendous wealth. However,
they remain sites of great inequality, where global servants serve global entrepreneurs.
The question of how globalization can be made more just is partly a question of how
people make their cities more just.

GROUP 3

OVERVIEW OF THE MODULE:

This chapter includes Global Demography, The “Perils” of Overpopulation, It’s the
Economy, Not the Babies, Women and Reproductive Rights, The Feminist Perspective,
Population Growth and Food Security

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

At the end of the session students are able to:

 Describe Women and Reproductive Rights
 Interpret The Perils of Overpopulation, It’s the Economy, Not the Babies, and The
Feminist Perspective, Population and Food Security

PERIOD:
FINALS

WEEK:
13th WEEK

TIME ALLOTMENT:
3 hours /week
CONTENT DISCUSSION:

GLOBAL DEMOGRAPHY

When couples are asked why they have children, their answers are almost always
about their feelings. For most, having a child is the symbol of a successful union. It also
ensures that the family will have a successful generation that will continue its name. The
kinship is preserved, and the family’s story continues. A few, however, worry how much
strain a child can bring to the household as he/she “competes” for the parents’ attention
and in reverse, how much energy the family needs to shower its love to an additional
member. Viewed from above, however, having or not having children is mainly driven by
economics. Behind the laughter or the tears lies the question: Will the child be an
economic asset or a burden to the family?

Rural communities often welcome an extra hand to help in crop cultivation, particularly
during the planning and harvesting seasons. The poorer districts of urban centers also
tend to have families with more children because the success of their “small family
business” depends on how many of their members cn be hawking their wares on the
streets. Hence, the more children, the better it will be for the farm or the small by the
street corner enterprises.

Urbanized, educated, and professional families with two incomes, however, desire just
one or two progenies. With each partner tied down, or committed to his/her respective
professions, neither has the time to devote to having a kid, much more to parenting.
These families also have their sights on long-term savings plans. They set aside
significant parts of their incomes for their retirement, health care, and the future
education of their child/ children.

Rural families view multiple children view multiple children and large kinship networks
as critical investment. Children, for example, can take over the agricultural work. Their
houses can also become the “retirement homes” of their parents, who will then proceed
to take care of their grandchildren. Urban families, however may not have the same
kinship network anymore because couples live on their own, or because they move out
of the farmlands. Thus, it usually the basic family unit that is left to deal with life’s
challenges on its own.

These differing versions of family life determine the economic and social policies that
countries craft regarding their respective populations. Countries in the “less developed
regions of the world” that rely on agriculture tend to maintain high levels of population
growth. The 1980 United Nations report on urban and rural population in 1975 and are
projected to contain 90 percent by the end of the 20th century.

Since then, global agricultural population has declined. In 2011, it accounted for over 37
percent of the total world population, compared to the statistics in 1980 in which rural
and urban population percentages were more or less the same. The blogsite
“Nourishing the Planet,” however, noted that even as “the agricultural population shrunk
as a share of total population between 1980 and 2011, it grew numerically from 2.2
billion to 2.6 billion people during this period.
Urban populations have grown, but not necessarily because families are having more
children. It is rather the combination of the natural outcome of significant migration to
the cities by people seeking work in the “more modern” sectors of society. This
movement of people is especially manifest in the developing countries where industries
and businesses in the cities are attracting people is especially manifest in the
developing countries where industries and businesses in the cities are attracting people
from the rural areas. This trend has been noticeable since the 1950”s, with the pace
accelerating in the next half-a-century. By the start of the 21 st century, the world had
become “44 percent urban, while the corresponding figures for developed countries are
52 percent to 75 percent.”

International migration also plays a part today. Today 191 million people live in
countries other than their own, and the United Nations projects that over 2.2 million will
move from the developing world to the First World countries. Countries welcome
immigrants as they offset the debilitating effects of an ageing population, but they are
also perceived as threats to the job market because they compete against citizens for
jobs and often have the edge because they are open to receiving lower wages. Voters’
pressure has often constrained their governments to institute stricter immigration
policies.

THE “PERILS” OF OVERPOPULATION

Development planners see urbanization and industrialization as indicators of a
developing society, but disagree on the role of population growth or decline in
modernization. This lengthy discussion brings back ideas of British scholar Thomas
Malthus who warned in his 1798, “An Essay on Principle of Population” that population
growth will inevitably exhaust world food supply by the middle of the 19 th century.
Malthus’ prediction was off base, but it was revived in the late 1960s when American
biologist Paul R. Ehrlich and his wife, Anne, wrote The Population Bomb, which argued
that overpopulation in the 1970s and the 1980s will bring about global environmental
disasters that would, in turn, lead to food shortage and mass starvation. They proposed
that countries like the United States take the lead in the promotion of global population
control in order to reduce the growth rate to zero. Their recommendations ranged from
the bizaare (chemical castration) to the policy-oriented (taxing an additional child and
luxury taxes on child-related products) to monetary incentives (paying off men who
would agree to sterilized after two children) to institution-building (a powerful
Department of Population and Environment).
There was some reason for this fear to persist. The rate of global population increase
was at its highest between 1955 and 1975 when nations were finally able to return to
normalcy after the devastations wrought World War II. The growth rate rose from 1.8
percent per year from 1955 to 1975, peaking at 2.06 percent annual growth rate
between 1965 and 1970.

By limiting the population, vital resources could be used for economic progress and not
be “diverted” and “wasted” to feeding more mouths. This argument became the basis for
government “population control” programs worldwide. In the mid-20 th century, the
Philippines, China, and India sought to lower birth rates on the belief that unless
controlled, the free expansion of family members would lead to a crisis in resources,
which in turn may result in widespread poverty, mass hunger, and political instability. As
early as 1958, the American policy journal. Foreign Affairs, has already advocated
“contraception and sterilization” as the practical solutions to global economic, social,
and political problems. While there have been criticisms that challenged this argument,
it persists even to this very day. In May 2009, a group of American billionaires warned of
how a “nightmarish” explosion of people was “a potentially disastrous environmental,
social, and industrial threat to the world.

This worry is likewise at the core of the economist argument for the promotion of
reproductive health. Advocates of population control contend for universal access to
reproductive technologies (such as condoms, the pill, abortion, and vasectomy) and,
more importantly, giving women the right to choose whether to have children or not.
They see these tools as crucial to their nation’s development. Thus, in Puerto Rico,
reproductive health supporters regard their work as the task of transforming their “poor
country” into a “modern nation.”

Finally, politics determine these “birth control” programs. Developed countries justify
their support for population control in developing countries by depicting the latter as
conservative societies. For instance, population experts blamed the “irresponsible
fecundity,” of Egyptians for that Nation’s run-on population growth, and the Iranian
peasant’s “natural” libidinal tendencies for the same rise in population. From 1920
onwards, the Indian government “marked lower castes, working poor, and Muslims as
hypersexual and hyper-fecund and hence drain on national resources. These policy
formulations lead to extreme policies like the forced “violators” of the Chinese
government’s one child policy. Vietnam and Mexico also conducted coercive mass
sterilization.

IT’S THE ECONOMY, NOT THE BABIES

The use of population control to prevent economic crisis has its critics. For example,
Betsy Hartmann disagrees with the advocates of neo-Malthusian theory and accused
governments of using population control as a “substitute for social justice and much
needed reforms- such land distribution, employment creation, provision of mass
education and health care, and emancipation. Other pointed out that the population did
grow fast in many countries in the 1960’s, and this growth aided economic development
by spurring technological and institutional innovation and increasing the supply of
human ingenuity. They acknowledged the shift in population from the rural to the urban
areas (52 percent to 75 percent in the developing world since the 1950’s). They likewise
noted that while these “megacities” are now clusters in which income disparities along
with “transportation, housing, air pollution, and waste management” are major problems,
they also have become, and continue to be, “center of economic growth and activity.”

The median of 29.4 years for females and 30.9 for males in the cities means a young
working population. With this median age, states are assured that they have a robust
military force. According to two population experts:

“As a country’s baby-boom generation gets older, for a time it constitutes a large cohort
group working age individuals and later a large cohort of elderly people… In all
circumstances, there are reasons to think that this very dynamic age structure will have
economic consequences. A historically high proportion of working age individuals in a
population means that potentially, there are more workers per dependent than
previously. Production can therefore increase relative to consumption, and GDP capita
can receive a boost.”

The productive capacities of this generation are especially high in regions like the East
Asia as “Asia’s remarkable growth in the past half century coincided closely with
demographic change in the region. As infant mortality fell from six to two children per
woman, The lag between falls in mortality and fertility created a baby-boom generation:
between 1965 and 1990, the region’s working age population grew nearly four times
faster than the dependent population. Several studies have estimated that this
demographic shift was responsible for one-third of East Asia’s economic growth during
the period (a welcome demographic dividend).

Population growth has, in fact, spurred “technological and institutional innovation” and
increase “the supply of human ingenuity.” Advances in agricultural production have
shown that the Malthusian nightmare can be prevented. The “Green Revolution” created
high-yielding varieties of rice and other cereals and along with the development of new
methods of cultivation, increased yields globally, but more particularly in the developing
world. The global famine that neo-Malthusians predicted did not happen. Instead,
between 1950-1984, global grain production increase by over 250 percent, allowing
agriculture to keep pace with population growth, thereby keeping global famine under
control.

Lately, a middle ground emerged between these two extremes. Scholars and policy
makers agree with the neo-Malthusians but suggest that if governments pursue
population control programs, they must include “more inclusive growth” and “greener
economic growth.”

WOMEN AND REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS

The character in the middle of these debates- women- is often the subject of these
population measures. Reproductive rights supporters argue that if population control
and economic development were to reach their goals, women must have control over
whether they will have children or not and when they will have their progenies, if any. By
giving women this power, they will be able to pursue their vocations--- be they
economic, social, or political- and contribute to the economic growth.
This serial correlation between fertility, family, and fortune has motivated countries with
growing economies to introduce or strengthen their reproductive health laws, including
abortion. High income First World nations and fast developing countries were able to
sustain growth in part because women were given the power of choice
And easy access to reproductive technologies. In North America and Europe, 73
percent of governments allow abortion upon a mother’s request. Moreover, the more
educated a woman is, the better are her prospects of improving her economic position.
Women can spend most of the time pursuing either their higher education or their
careers, instead of forcibly reducing this time to take care of their children.

Most countries implement reproductive health laws because they worry about the health
of the mother. In 1960, Bolivia’s average total fertility rate (TFR) was 6.7 children. In
1978, the Bolivian government put into effect a family planning program that included
the legalization of abortion (after noticing a spike in unsafe abortion and maternal
deaths). By 1985, the TFR rate went down to 5.13 and further declined to 3.46 in 2008.
A similar pattern occurred in Ghana after the government expanded the reproductive
health laws out of the same concern as that of the Bolivian government. As a result,
“fertility declined steeply…and continued to decline (after) 1994. Such examples
seemed to draw the attention of other countries. Thus, in 2014, the United nations
reported noted that the proportion of countries allowing abortion to preserve the physical
health of a woman increased from 63 percent to 67 percent, and those to preserve the
mental health of a woman increased from 52 percent to 64 percent.

Opponents regard reproductive rights as nothing but a false front for abortion. They
contend that this method of preventing conception endangers the life of the mother and
must be banned. The religious wing of the anti-reproductive rights flank goes further and
describes abortion as a debauchery that sullies the name of God; it will send the mother
to hell as it prevents a new soul, the baby to become human. This position was a
politically powerful one partly because various parts of the developing world remain very
conservative. Unfailing pressure by Christian groups compelled governments of Poland,
Croatia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, and even Russia to impose restrictive reproductive health
programs, including making access to condoms and other technologies difficult. Muslim
countries do not condone abortion and limit wives to domestic chores and delivering
babies. Senegal only allow abortion when the mother’s life is threatened. The
Philippines, with a Catholic majority, now has a reproductive health law in place, but
conservative politicians have enfeebled it through budget cuts and stalled its
implementation by filing a case against the law in the Supreme Court.

A country being industrialized and developed, however, does not automatically assure
pro-women reproductive regulations. In the United States, the women’s movement of
the 1960’s was responsible for the passage and judicial endorsement of a pro-choice
law, but conservatives controlling state legislatures have also slowly undermined this
law by imposing a restriction on women’s access to abortion. While pro-choice
advocates argue that abortion is necessary to protect the health of the mother, their
conservative rivals shift the focus on the death of the fetus in the mother’s womb as the
reason for reversing the law. This battle continues to be played out in all political arenas
in the United States.

THE FEMINIST PERSPECTIVE

Feminists approach the issue of reproductive rights from another angle. They are
foremost, against any form of population control because they are compulsory by
nature, resorting to a carrot- and – stick approach (punitive mechanisms co-exist
alongside benefits) that actually does not empower women. They believe that
government assumptions that poverty and environmental degradation are caused by
overpopulation are wrong. These factors ignore other equally important causes like the
unequal distribution of wealth, the lack of public safety nets like universal health care,
education, and gender equality programs. Feminists also point out that there is very little
evidence that point to overpopulation as the culprit behind poverty and ecological
devastation.
Governments have not directly responded to these criticisms, but one of the goals of
1994 United Nations International Conference on Population and Development
suggests recognition of this issue. Country representatives to that conference agreed
that women should receive family planning counselling on abortion, the dangers of
sexually transmitted diseases, the nature of humans sexuality, and the main elements
of responsible parenthood. However, the conference also left it to the individual
countries to determine how these recommendations can be turned into programs.
Hence, globally women’s feminist arguments on reproductive rights and overpopulation
are acknowledged, but the struggle to turn them into policy is still fought at the national
level. It is the dilemma that women and feminist movements face today.

POPULATION GROWTH AND FOOD SECURITY

Today’s global population has reached 7.4 billion, and it is estimated to increase to 9.5
billion in 2050, then 11.2 billion by 2100. The median age of this population is 30.1, with
the male median age at 29.4 years and female, 30.9 years. Ninety-five percent of this
population growth will happen in the developing countries, with demographers
predicting that by the middle of the century, several countries will have tripled their
population. The opposite is happening in the developed world where populations remain
steady in general, but declining in some of the most advanced countries (Japan and
Singapore). However, this scenario is not a run-off that could get out of control.
Demographers predict that world population will stabilize by 2050 to 9 billion, although
they warn that feeding this population will be an immense challenge.

The decline infertility and the existence of a young productive population, however may
not be enough to offset this concern over food security to mitigate the impact of
population growth, food production must increase by 70 percent; annual cereal
production must rise to 3 billion tons from the current 2.1 billion; and yearly meat
production must go up to 200 million tons to reach 470 million. The problem here is that
the global rate of growth of cereals had declined considerably – from 3.2 percent in
1960 to just 1.5 percent in 2000.

The FAO recommends that countries increase their investments in agriculture, craft long
term policies aimed at fighting poverty, and invest in research and development. The
UN body also suggests that countries develop a comprehensive social service program
that includes food assistance, consistent delivery of health services, and education
especially for the poor. IF domestic production is not enough, it becomes essential for
nations to import. The FAO, therefore, enjoins governments to keep their markets open,
and to eventually “move towards a global trading system that is fair and competitive,
and that contributes to a dependable market for food.”

The aforementioned are worthy recommendations but nation-states shall need the
political will to push through these sweeping changes in population growth and food
security. This will take some time to happen given that good governance is also a goal
that many nations, especially in the developing world, have yet to attain.