Topic: South Asia & Southeast Asia

Bangladesh & Pakistan: Demographic Twins Grow Apart

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UN figures indicate that Bangladesh, a state once identified with natural catastrophes and rock-concert relief, is on the cusp of its demographic window (reflected in its age structure, shown in Figure 1, below)—a period of favorable age structures that researchers associate with an increased pace of development and a more stable political future. Bangladesh is already a solid member of the World Bank’s lower middle-income class. According to a set of statistical models that we have developed, by 2030 Bangladesh appears to have an even chance of reaching the Bank’s upper middle-income class (roughly US$4,000 to $12,000 per capita annually). For a country that Henry Kissinger famously dubbed “a basket case” at independence in 1971, that prospect is impressive.

Comparison of age structures, 1970 & 2015, following Bangladesh’s secession in 1971: East Pakistan Provincial Wing becomes Bangladesh; West Pakistan Provincial Wing becomes Pakistan.

 

 

This remarkable turnaround is not a big surprise to international health specialists. In 1975, the government in Dhaka began collaborating with the International Centre for Diarrheal Disease Research, Bangladesh (ICDDR/B) to initiate a program of community-based contraceptive distribution in Matlab subdistrict, a long-term health and demographic surveillance site.

 

Click here to read the rest of … “Bangladesh & Pakistan: Demographic Twins Grow Apart” on the New Security Beat, or download the .pdf here.

Myanmar’s Inability to Ascend to Liberal Democracy

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See the New Security Beat essay by Rachel Blomquist and Richard Cincotta on Myanmar’s long-term inability to integrate minorities and to ascend to liberal democracy (FREE in Freedom House’s annual assessment).

According to political demographers, who study the relationship between population dynamics and politics, two characteristics when observed together provide a rather good indication that a state is about to shed its authoritarian regime, rise to a high level of democracy, and stay there. Myanmar has both.

So why, despite an impressive succession of social reforms and political reversals, including the recent victory of the National League for Democracy led by Aung San Suu Kyi and the first elected civilian president, U Htin Kyaw, should analysts remain somewhat skeptical of Myanmar’s ability to make the leap to liberal democracy? The answer can be found in Myanmar’s dismal record of managing inter-ethnic politics, particularly the systematically disenfranchised Muslim Rohingya minority.
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Pakistan’s Health and Demography

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View the post, Pakistan’s Health and Demography, originally published on Arms Control Wonk. Another version of this review and commentary is published on The New Security Beat, entitled Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey Shows Slow Progress.

How well did Islamabad measure up in its latest Demographic and Health Survey? Not well, at all. The PDHS results are a disappointment for Pakistan’s public health professionals and women’s health advocates, and they warn of increasingly difficult conditions for rural service delivery. To some health program analysts, the results reflect the low priority given to public health and family planning for decades by Pakistan’s central government.

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Can Demography Save Afghanistan?

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Read “Can Demography Save Afghanistan?” by Richard Cincotta, published by Foreign Policy, Nov. 16, 2009.

Picture Afghanistan two decades from now. Difficult? Not really — if you’re a demographer.
The two agencies that independently publish population estimates — the U.N. Population
Division and the U.S. Census Bureau’s International Programs Center — routinely project an
array of demographic statistics for the world’s nearly 200 countries on a time-frame of
decades. Until now, the U.S. and U.N. agencies closely matched one another’s projections
for an Afghanistan-to-be. Not anymore. The U.N. believes Afghanistan’s population (around
28 million today) will pass the 50 million mark by 2030, whereas the Census Bureau foresees
a 2030 population under 43 million.

Download “Can Demography Save Afghanistan?” here …