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An award-winning journalist and leading international social researcher make the provocative argument that the global population will soon begin to decline, dramatically reshaping the social, political, and economic landscape For half a century, statisticians, pundits, and politicians have warned that a burgeoning population will soon overwhelm the earth's resources. But a growing number of experts are sounding a different alarm. Rather than continuing to increase exponentially, they argue, the global population is headed for a steep decline—and in many countries, that decline has already begun. In Empty Planet, John Ibbitson and Darrell Bricker find that a smaller global population will bring with it many benefits: fewer workers will command higher wages; the environment will improve; the risk of famine will wane; and falling birthrates in the developing world will bring greater affluence and autonomy for women. But enormous disruption lies ahead, too. We can already see the effects in Europe and parts of Asia, as aging populations and worker shortages weaken the economy and impose crippling demands on healthcare and social security. The United States and Canada are well-positioned to successfully navigate these coming demographic shifts--that is, unless growing isolationism leads us to close ourselves off just as openness becomes more critical to our survival than ever. Rigorously researched and deeply compelling, Empty Planet offers a vision of a future that we can no longer prevent--but one that we can shape, if we choose.Praise for Empty Planet “An ambitious reimagining of our demographic future.”—The New York Times Book Review “The authors combine a mastery of social-science research with enough journalistic flair to convince fair-minded readers of a simple fact: Fertility is falling faster than most experts can readily explain, driven by persistent forces.”—The Wall Street Journal “The beauty of this book is that it links hard-to-grasp global trends to the easy to-understand individual choices being made all over the world today . . . a gripping narrative of a world on the cusp of profound change.”—The New Statesman“John Ibbitson and Darrell Bricker have written a sparkling and enlightening guide to the contemporary world of fertility as small family sizes and plunging rates of child-bearing go global.”–The Globe and Mail
Authors Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson give us a title “Empty Planet” that seems to be just another treatise on doomsday for the Earth. This should not dissuade the reader because the book is well-written, well-argued, and well-substantiated. Certainly not a cold, dry, contemporary look at population, the book is warm and ends positively. There is a liberal amount of “We think…” and “We feel…” The authors did their research through discussions with real people in countries from the poorest to the richest as well as assembling the latest statistics on population, fertility rates, and death rates. Added to that are an impressive assemblage of survey revelations and other relevant cultural signs.The first two chapters deal with the requisite history of human population growth and different societies’ responses to it. Then the authors present several chapters that analyze population trends and their significance in different countries or regions. With the downward trajectory of fertility rates everywhere, altogether they conclude that the world population will follow the United Nation’s “low variant” prediction of 8.5 million humans around 2050 and down to 7.0 billion by 2100. They disparage the UN’s high-variant and medium-variant predictions as badly out-of-step with the current declines in fertility rates, with few exceptions, across the globe. They also point to the normalization of “small family” thinking in most of the world’s cultures. This is a result of several factors like available birth control, women’s rights, urbanization, and weakening of religious constraints.So, what does our world look like with declining population? The subtitle “The Shock of Global Population Decline” seems ominous. Until the last chapter, the authors are not clear on whether a decline is overall positive or negative, while hastening to strongly point out many of the disadvantages of aging population profiles. In “What Lies Ahead”, the authors discuss “a world growing smaller in numbers by choice.” In completely unmasking their feelings, they say “We believe there will be much about that world to admire. It will be cleaner, safer, quieter.” On the important subject of peace, they say “…the world could enter a new era of peace: a geriatric peace.”The authors are mostly silent though on exactly how societies and nations must adapt to declining population. We now have social and political systems that are built around population increases, except for a few countries; we are only now confronting how to build the right structure into our systems to deal with declining populations. The authors would say it can be done — indeed, their last paragraph begins “ The future will make its own way…” Perhaps a second book from this brilliant duo will offer how?
