Why Study Global Cities? CW8-merged-merged PDF

Why Study Global Cities? So far, much of the analysis of globalization in the previous lessons has looked at how ideas of internationalism shaped modern world politics. We also examined movements like K-pop,...

Why Study Global Cities? So far, much of the analysis of globalization in the previous lessons has looked at how ideas of internationalism shaped modern world politics. We also examined movements like K-pop, cultural and how they spread through media like the internet. What this lesson willemphasize,however, is that globalization isspatial. This statement means two things. First, globalization is spatial because it occurs in physical spaces.You can see it when foreign investments and capital move through a city, and when companies build skyscrapers. People who are working in these businesses--or Filipinos working abroad start to purchase or rent high-rise condominium units and better homes. As allthese events happen, more poor people are driven out ofcity centers to make way for the new developments. Second, globalization is spatial because what makes itmove is the fact that it is based in places. Los Angeles, the home of Hollywood, is where movies are made for global consumption. The main headquarters of Sony is in Tokyo, and from there, the company coordinates the sale of its varivus electronics goods to branches across the world. In other words, cities act on globalization and globalization acts on cities. They are the sites as well as the mediums of globalization. Just as the internet enables and shapesglobal forces, so too do cities. In the years to come,more and more people will experience globalization through cities. In 1950, only 30 percent of the world lived in urban areas. By 2014, that number increased to 54 percent. And by 2050, it is expected to reach 66 percent. This lesson studies globalization through the living environment of a rapidly increasing number of people. Defining the Global City Sociologist Saskia Sassen popularized the term "global city" in the 1990s. Her criteria for what constitutes a global city 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 Stock Exchange (FTSE),and Tokyo has the Nikkei. The amount of money traded in these markets is staggering. The value of shares traded in the NYSE, for example, is S19,300 billion, while that of the shares in the Philippine Stock Exchange is only $231.3 billion. eNew York Stock ExChange represents the nghest (onrenttation of cap tal in the wortd Limiting the discuion 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 uf the economic power of cities today nust take note of the latest developments. Recent commentators have expanded the criteria that Sassen used to determine what Lonstitutes 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 1990, 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 pruportion of capital. However, Melbourne as Sydney's is described rival "global city" because many magazines and lists have nov referred to it as the world's "mostlivable 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 ofsolving this dilemma istogo 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 towhat extent are theyglobal? Indicators for Globality 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 2013.7  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 the San Francisco Bay Area to become some of the key figures in Silicon Valley'stechnology 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, 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 livability." It also houses the regional offices of many major global corporations. are also centers of authority. Washington D.C. Global cities may not be as wealthy as New York, but it is the seat of American state power. People around theworld know its major landmarks: the White House, the Capitol Supreme Building (Congress), the 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 to 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 which is not just the capital of Indonesia, Jakarta, but also the location of the main headquarters of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Powerful political hubs tinfluence on their own countries as well as on international alfairs. The European Central Bank, which oversees the Euro (the European Union's currency), is based in Frankfurt. A decision made in that city can, therefore, affect the political economyof an entire continent and beyond.  Singabore. with its yleamg buldings is often vieedas a synbo of Asian mndernty power of global cities that tiesthem to the Itis the cultural imagination. Think about how many songs have been written about New York (Jay and Alicia Keys's "Empire State of Mind," Z. 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, globalcities become culturally diverse. In a global city, one can try cuisines from different parts of the world. Because of their large Turkish populations, for example, Berlin and Tokyo ofter 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%.101  Finally, global cities are centers of higher learning and culture. A city's intellectual influence is seen through the influence of its publishing industry. Many of the books that people read are published inplaces like New York, London, or Paris. The New York Times carries the name of New York City, but it is far from being a local newspaper. People read itnot just across America, but also all over the world. One of the reasons for the many tourists visiting Boston because they want to see Harvard University-the is world's top university. Many Asian teenagers are moving to cities in Australia 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 made as much as it 19.2 billion Australian dollars (roughly 14 billion US dollars) from education alone.0 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, Copenhagen, the capital of is 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 is now considered one of the culinary capitals of the world, with its top restaurants incommensurate with its size. As the birthplaceof "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 drcary, industrial But many prominent post-punk and New Wave city. 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! The Challenges of GlobalCities 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 ofthe Chicago Council on Global Affairs, o: Citiescan 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."i 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 footprint in the United States, o In Asia, dense global cities like Singapore and Tokyo also have relatively low per capita carbon footprints. Not allcities, 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 like 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 of the world's energy. Cities only cover 2 percent of the world's landmass, but they consume78 precent of global energy."s Therefore, if carbon must be cut to prevent global emissions warming, this massive energy consumption in cities must be curbed. This action will require a lot of creativity. For example, many food prcducts travel many miles before they get to major city centers. Shipp.ng this food through trains,buses, and even planes increases carbon emissions. Will it be grow more food possible to cities instead? Solutions like so-called "vertical farms" built in abandoned buildings (as is increasingly being done in New York) may lead the way more environmentally sustainable cities. towards If more food can be grown with less water in denser spaces, cities willbegin 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 9/1l attacks Center in that brought down the twin towers of the World Trade New York, and the November 2015 coordinated attacks in Paris by zealots of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). Now that real estate magnate Donald Trump is the president of the United States, security experts believe that properties around the world that carry his name may be targets of terror attacks. T'here Trump Towers, for example, in places like Istanbul and Manila. The GlobalCity and the Poor We have consistently noted that economic globalization has inequality. This phenomenon is thus paved the way for massive 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 countries, are sites of contradiction. In those in the developing places like Mumbai, Jakarta, and Manila, it is common to find gleaming buildings alongside massive shantytowns. This duality may even be seen in rich, urban cities. AMumba slum  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. Asa 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 ofdriving out the poor in favor 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 city centers that more jobs, more government services, and better offer transportation due to gentrification. In France, poor Muslim migrants are forced out of Paris and have clustered around ethnic enclaves known as banlieue. Inmost of the world's global cities, the middle class is also thinning 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 attend to their increasing needs. will Meanwhile, many middle-income jobs in manufacturing and business process outsourcing (callcenters, for example) are moving toother 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 bea paradise for some,but a purgatory fuor others. 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 fusionsof culture and ideas. They are also places that generate tremendous wealth. However, they remain sites of great inequality, whereglobalservants 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.  Global Demograph f)Learning Outcomes At the end of this lesson, you should be atble to 1 dscuss the relationship bet ween popuiation and economicwelfare: 2 ident.fy the effects of agng and overpopulation, and 3 differentiate between contrasting postiorns over reproductive health. 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 willhave a successor generation that will continue its name. The kinship is preserved, and the family'sstory continues. A few, however, worry how much strain a child can bring to the houselold 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 assetor a burden to the family? Rural communities often welcome an extra hand to help in crop cultivat ion,particularly during the planting and harvesting scasons. 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 can be hawking their wares on the streets. Hence, the more children, the better it will be for the for the farm or the small by-the-street corner enterprises.  Global ernogtapty I 97 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 et aside significant parts of their incomes tortheir retirement, health care, and the future education of their child/children. Rural families view multiple children and large kinship networks as critical investments. Children, for example, can take over the agricultural work. Their houses can also become the retirement homes" of their parents, who will then proceed totake care of their grandchildren. Urban families. however, may not have thesame kinship network anymore because couples live on their own,or because they move out of the farmlands. Thus, it is usually the basic family unit that is left todeal 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 "lesdeveloped 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 growth states that "[t]hese arcas contained 85 percent of the world 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 ofthetotal world population, compared to the statistics in 1980 in which rural and urban population percentages were more or less the same. The blog site "Nourishing the Planet," however, noted that even as "the agricultural population shrunk as a share of total population between 1980and 201, it grew numerically from 2.2 billion to2.6 billion people during this period."u? Urban populations have grown, but not necessarily because families are having more children. It is rather the combination 98 | Movement and Sustainability of the naturaloutcome of significant migration to the cities by people secking work in the "more modern" sectors of society. ement of people is especially manifest in the developing countries where industries and businesses in the cities are attracting people from the rural areas."n This trend has been noticeable since the 1950s, with the pace accelerating in the next half-a-century. By the start of the 21st century, the world had become "44 percent urban, while the corresponding figures for developed countries are 52 percent tu 75 percent." International migration also plays a part. Today. 191 million people live in than their own, and the United countries other Nations projects that over 2.2 million will move from the developing world to the First World countries (more on this in Lesson 11). ""Countris welcome immigrants as they offset the debilitating effects of an aging population, but they are also perceived as threats to the job market because they conpete 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.!"i 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 discussivon brings back ideas of British scholar Thomas Malthus who warned in his 1798 "An Essay on the Principle of Population" that population growth will inevitably exhaust world food supply by the middle of the 19th century.'"" Malthus' prediction was off base, but it was revived in the late 1960s when American biologist Paul R. Ehrlich and his wite, Anne, wrote The Population Bomb, which argued that overpopulation in the 1970s and the 1980s will bring about global environmental disastersthat would, in turn, lead to food shortage and mass starvation." They proposed that countries like the Lnited States take the lead in the promotion ofglobal population control in order to reduce the growth rate to zero.'i4 Their recommendations ranged from the bizarre hemical castration) to the policy-orientedan additional (taxing hld and luxury taxes on child-related products) to monetary IIentives (paying off men who would agree to be sterilized after twochildren) to institution-building (a powerful Department of Population and Environment)," Ay overpopulated: e. 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 by World War II.The growth rate rose from L8 percent per year from 1935 to 1975, peaking at 2.06 percent annualgrowth rate between 1965 and 1970." By limiting the population, vitalresources could be used for cconomic and not be "diverted" and "wasted" to feeding progress more mouths.!"" This argument became the basis for governent "population control programs worldwide. In th Download )l Movement andSustainability 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 puverty, mass hunger, and political instability. l"" As early as 1958, the American policyjournal,Foreign Affairs, had already advocated "contraception and sterilization" as the practical solutions to global economic, social,and political problems.'19While there have been criticismsthat challenged this argument (see the next section), it persists even to this very day. InMay 2009, a group of American billionaires warned of how a "nightmarish" explosion of people was "a potentiallydisastrous environmental, social, and industrialthreat" to the world.!20 This worryis likewise at the core of the economist argument for the promotion of reproductive health. Advocates of population control contend tor 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 "poorcountry" into a "modern nation."22 determine these "birth control" programs. Finally. politics Developed countries justifytheir 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.!2"From 1920onwards, the Indian government "marked lower castes, working poor, and Muslims as hypersexual and hyper-fecund and hence a drain on national resources."124 These policy formulations lead to extreme policies like the forced sterilization of twenty million "violators"of the Chinese government's one-child policy. Vietnam and Mexico also conducted coercive mass sterilization.!25  Global Derrnogtaphy I 101 It's the Economy, Not the Babies! The use of population control to prevent economic crisis has its critics. Hartmann disagrees with the For example, Betsy advocates of nco-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."" Others pointed out that the population did grow fast in many countries in the 1960s, and this growth "aided economic development by spurring technological and institutional innovation and increasing the supply of human ingenuity."1" They acknowledged the shift in population from the rural to the urban areas (52 percent to 75 percent in the developing world since the 1950s). They likewise noted that while these "megacities" clustersin which income disparities along with "transportation, housing, air pollution and, waste management" are major problems, they also have become. and continue to be, "centers 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: "Asa country's baby-boom generation gets older, for a time it constitutes a large cohort group of 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 population means that, potentially, there are more workers per dependent than previously. Production can therefore increase relativeto consumption, and GDP capita can receive a boost."30 The productive capacities of this generation are especially high in regions like East Asia as "Asia's remarkable growth in the 2|Movement and Sustainability past half century coincided closely with demographic change in the region.As infant mortality fell from 18I to 34 per 1,000 births between 1950 and 2000, fertility fell from six to two children per woman. The lag bet ween 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 (awelcome demographic dividend),"! Population growth has, in fact, spurred "technological and institutional innovation" and increased "the supply of human ingenuity."i" Advances in agricultural production have shown that the Malthusian nightmare can be prevented. The "Green Revolution"created high-yieldingvarieties 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 and 1984, globalgrain production increased by over 250 percent,allowing agriculture to keep pace with population growth, thereby keeping global famine under control. Lately, a middleground emerged between these two extremes. Scholars and policymakers agree with the neo-Malthusians but suggest that if governments pursue population control programs, they must include "more inclusive growth" and "greener economic growth." is 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  Globel Demoquthy llo have their progenies, if any. By giving women this power, they will be able to pursue their vocationsbe they economic, social,or politicaland contribute to economic growth. This serial correlation between fertility, family,and fortune has motivated countries with growing econonmies to introduce or strengthen their reproductive health laws, including abortion." High-income First World nations and fast-developingcountries 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 mot her'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 theirchildren.! Most countries implement reproductive health laws because they worry about the health of the mother. In 1960, Bolivia's the average total fertility rate (TFR) was 6.7 children. In 1978, 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 reproductive health laws out of the same concern as declined that of the Bolivian government. As a result. "fertility examples steeply...andcontinued to decline (after] 1994."0 Such draw the attention of other countries. Thus, in 2014. seemed to the United Nations report noted that the proportion of count ries allowing abortion o preserve the physical health of a wonan increased from 63 percent 67 percent, and those to preserve to the mental health of a woman increased from 52 percent to 64 percent.4 but a false Opponents regard reproductive rights as nothing of preventing front for abortion. They contend that this method mother and must be banned. conception endangers the life of the The religious wing of the anti-reproductive rights fank goes 1l Movement and Sustainability further and describes abortion as a debauchery that sullies the name of God; it will send the mother to hell and 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 the 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 allows atbortion when the mother's life is threatened." The Philippines, witha 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.* Acountry being industrialized and developed, however, does not automatically assure pro-women reproductive regulations. In the United States, the women's movement of the 1960s 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 restrictionon women's access to abortion. While pro-choice advocatesargue that abortion is necessary to protect the health of the mother, their conservative rivals shiftthe 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 the political arenas in the United States. The Feminist Perspective Feminists approach the issue of reproductive rights from 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  Glotoal ltrtnt., l0) wrong. These factors ignore other equally important causes ike the unequal distribution of wealth. the lack of public safety nets like universal health care,education, and gender cquality programs. Feminists also point out that there is evidence very little that point to overpopulation as the culprit behind poverty and ccological devastation.4 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 representat ives to that conference agreed that women should receive family planning counseling on abortion, the dangers of sexually transmitted diseases, the nature of human sexuality, and the main elements of responsible parenthood." However, the conference also left it to the individual countries to determine how theserecommendations can be turned into programs. Hence. globally. women's and 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. tlua. The feminist afitDàch to repcltive ssus i pine't', ghts-based 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 2100,4 The median age of this population is 30.1, with the male median age at 29.4 years and female, 30.9 years. 106 | Movement and Sustanability Nincty-five percent of this population growth will happen in the developing countries, with denmographers predicting that by the middle of this 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 cont rol. Demographers predict that the world population will stablize by 2050to9 billion, alt hough they warn that feeding this population willbe an immense challenge. The decline in fertility and the existenceofa young productive population, however, may not be enough to offset this concern over food security. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)warns that in order tor countries to mitigate the impact of population growth, food production must increase by 70 percent; annual cerealproduction must rise to 3 billion tons from the current 2.Ibillion; and yearly meat production must go up to 200 million tons to reach 470 million. The problem here is that the global rateof growth of cereals had declined considerably -from 3.2 percent in 1960tojust 1.5 percent in 2000.0 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 suggsts that countries develop a comprehensive social service program that includes food assistance,consistent deliveryof 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 topush 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.  Globa lemo«aqty | 07 Conclusion Demography is a complex discipline that requires the Integration of various social scientific data. As you have een,demographic changes and policies have impacts on the environment, poltics, resources, and others. Yet, a: its core, temography accounts for the growth and decline of the human pecies. It may be about large numbers and massive effects, but it ultimately about people. Thus, no interdscplinary account of gkbalization is complete without an accounting of people. The next lesson will continue on this theme of examining people, and willfocus particularly on their global movement. CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner CamScanner