A brief history of demographic transition and population thought

Abstract

”Demographic transition” is one of the most important concepts in understanding the modern history of population and health. The modernization of nations progressed as a drastic demographic shift occurred from a regime of high fertility and high mortality to that of low fertility and low mortality. Considering the long-term demographic changes, the paper presents a brief history of population thought from Malthusian theory at the end of the 18th century to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the early 21st century. Malthus’ theory of population implied that living things have a prolific nature, although this idea was considered dangerous and not clearly stated at the time. It promoted the emergence of birth control movements and enabled Darwin to complete and publish his theory of evolution. Malthus, who pioneered the modern era, emphasized the contrast between population growth and food shortage. We, standing at the demise of the modern era, face new challenges, such as global resource constraints and environmental concerns, population aging to an unprecedented degree, coexistence of populations with still high and very low fertility, and new tides of international migration. The SDGs do not explicitly mention population trends, but the majority of the goals are substantially related to population and health.