Preface ix
1 The Space and Strategy of Demographic Growth 1
1.1 Humans and Animals 1
1.2 Divide and Multiply 5
1.3 Jacopo Bichi and Domenica Del Buono, Jean Guyon, and Mathurine Robin 8
1.4 Reproduction and Survival 11
1.4.1 The Frequency of Births 12
1.4.2 The Fecund Period Used for Reproduction 13
1.5 The Space of Growth 20
1.6 Environmental Constraints 22
1.7 A Few Figures 28
Notes 32
Further Reading 37
2 Demographic Growth: Between Choice and Constraint 39
2.1 Constraint, Choice, Adaptation 39
2.2 From Hunters to Farmers: The Neolithic Demographic Transition 42
2.3 Black Death and Demographic Decline in Europe 50
2.4 The Tragedy of the American Indios: Old Microbes and New Populations 56
2.5 Africa, America, and the Slave Trade 63
2.6 The French Canadians: A Demographic Success Story 68
2.7 Ireland and Japan: Two Islands, Two Histories 73
2.8 On the Threshold of the Contemporary World: China and Europe 80
Notes 88
Further Reading 99
3 Land, Labor, and Population 101
3.1 Diminishing Returns and Demographic Growth 101
3.2 Historical Confirmations 106
3.3 Demographic Pressure and Economic Development 112
3.4 More on Demographic Pressure and Development: Examples from the Stone Age to the Present Day 116
3.5 Space, Land, and Development 120
3.5.1 The Occupation of Uninhabited or Sparsely Populated Regions 123
3.5.2 Transformation and Land Reclamation 124
3.5.3 External Expansion 125
3.6 Population Size and Prosperity 128
3.7 Increasing or Decreasing Returns? 132
Notes 134
Further Reading 139
4 Toward Order and Efficiency: The Demography of Europe and the Developed World 141
4.1 From Waste to Economy 141
4.2 From Disorder to Order: The Lengthening of Life 147
4.3 From High to Low Fertility 154
4.4 European Emigration: A Unique Phenomenon 161
4.5 A Summing Up: The Results of the Transition 167
4.6 Theoretical Considerations on the Relationship between Demographic and Economic Growth 170
4.6.1 Purely Demographic Factors 174
4.6.2 Factors of Scale and Dimensional Factors in General 174
4.6.3 The Stock of Knowledge and Technological Progress 175
4.7 More on the Relationship between Demographic and Economic Growth: Empirical Observations 176
Notes 185
Further Reading 192
5 The Populations of Poor Countries 195
5.1 An Extraordinary Phase 195
5.2 The Conditions of Survival 200
5.3 A Brief Geography of Fertility 208
5.4 The Conditions and Prospects for Fertility Decline and Demographic Policy 214
5.5 India and China 222
5.6 Fertilia and Sterilia 234
5.7 Explaining a Paradox 240
Notes 246
Further Reading 257
6 Microbes, Food, and Space, and Sustainability of Population Change 259
6.1 Moving Limits 259
6.2 Microbes, Virus, and Longevity: Biological Sustainability 264
6.2.1 Biological Sustainability 265
6.2.2 AIDS Epidemic: Sustainable for the Rich, Unsustainable for the Poor 266
6.2.3 COVID- 19: Unexpected Visitor 271
6.3 Microbes, Virus, Longevity 272
6.3.1 Political Sustainability 272
6.4 Microbes, Virus, and Longevity: Economic Sustainability 274
6.5 Food for All? 277
6.5.1 First Topic: Food, Nutrition, and Hunger 277
6.5.2 Second Topic: Productivity, Extension, and Intensification of Agricultural Systems 280
6.5.3 Third Topic: Production, Consumption, and Greenhouse Gases 283
6.6 Nonrenewable Resources and the Parable of Pauperia and Tycoonia 284
6.7 Space and Environment in a Smaller Planet 289
6.7.1 First Critical Issue: Deforestation and Intrusion in the Pluvial Forests 292
6.7.2 Second Critical Issue: Increasing Human Settlement in the Coastal Areas 295
6.7.3 Third Critical Issue: Megacities Energy Consumption and Pollution Champions 297
6.7.4 Population and Environment: Adaptation and Mitigation 298
Notes 300
Further Reading 305
7 The Future 307
7.1 Population and Self- Regulation 307
7.2 The Numbers of the Future 309
7.3 The North- South Divide and International Migration 315
7.3.1 Demographic Inequalities 321
7.3.2 Economic Inequalities 321
7.3.3 Migration Policies 322
7.3.4 Climate Change 323
7.3.5 Geography and Migratory Systems 324
7.4 Downward Fertility and the Role of Policies 326
7.5 Geodemography 328
7.6 A Different World 333
7.7 Calculations and Values 335
Notes 339
Further Reading 341
Index 343
