Urbanisation and Inequalities in a Post-Malthusian Context: Challenges for the Sustainable Development Agenda

132 Pages·2016·2.64 MB·English

by  Sylvia Szabo (auth.)

SPRINGER BRIEFS IN POPULATION STUDIES
Sylvia Szabo
Urbanisation and
Inequalities in a
Post-Malthusian
Context
Challenges for
the Sustainable
Development Agenda
123
SpringerBriefs in Population Studies
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/10047
Sylvia Szabo
Urbanisation and Inequalities
in a Post-Malthusian Context
Challenges for the Sustainable Development
Agenda
123
Sylvia Szabo
University of Southampton
Southampton
UK
ISSN 2211-3215 ISSN 2211-3223 (electronic)
SpringerBriefs inPopulation Studies
ISBN978-3-319-26569-8 ISBN978-3-319-26571-1 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-26571-1
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2015955391
SpringerChamHeidelbergNewYorkDordrechtLondon
©TheAuthor(s)2016
Thisworkissubjecttocopyright.AllrightsarereservedbythePublisher,whetherthewholeorpart
of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations,
recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission
or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or
dissimilarmethodologynowknownorhereafterdeveloped.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt
fromtherelevantprotectivelawsandregulationsandthereforefreeforgeneraluse.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this
book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the
authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained
hereinorforanyerrorsoromissionsthatmayhavebeenmade.
Printedonacid-freepaper
SpringerInternationalPublishingAGSwitzerlandispartofSpringerScience+BusinessMedia
(www.springer.com)
Preface
Urbanisationandinequalitieshaveemergedaskeycontemporarychallengesdespite
the fact that population growth is projected to stabilise and overall poverty levels
have been declining. The present book analyses these issues through a dual lens:
that of a traditional Malthusian framework and the global development agenda.
Whilethebookisconcernedwiththeanalysisofbothurbanisationandinequalities,
the speed of urban growth and its impacts on human development remain the
primary focus of investigation.
The book is the result of a marriage of academic training, practitioner’s per-
spective and philosophical reflection. The motivation for the subject developed
gradually.First,itwaspromptedbytheauthor’sprofessionalexperienceworkingin
international development and direct exposure to the shaping of the sustainable
development agenda. Global development politics and policies remain largely
unknown outside of the specialist area, despite the fact that both often have a
tangibleeffectonpeople’slives.Second,theinspirationforthebookarosefromthe
richMalthusianscholarship,whichremainsmostnotoriousforMalthus’claimthat
population growth would impact disastrously on food supplies, or resources more
broadly. Combining these two aspects—the practical human development chal-
lenges and the need to revisit the traditional Malthusian framework—provided an
opportunity for extended research, resulting in this book.
While the present volume has been written in an academic context and its
contentisevidence-based,itistheauthor’shopethatthechaptersofthisbookwill
appeal to different audiences, both in terms of professional interests and geo-
graphical location. Urbanisation is a key contemporary issue that crosses bound-
aries: thefastgrowth ofAsian citiesisoccurring atthesame timeasurbanitiesare
expandinginAfricaandasEuropefacesunprecedentedchallengesassociatedwith
living in urban areas. In addition, inequalities continue to rise despite positive
aggregate trends in most human development indices.
I wish to thank Professor Sabu Padmadas, Professor Jane Falkingham,
Professor André Junqueira Caetano, Dr Angela Baschieri, Dr Gloria Langat and
Professor Zoe Matthews for their comments on the early versions of this
v
vi Preface
manuscript and support at different stages of the writing process. I am grateful to
Ms Dee Rees and the Springer team for assistance with the editing of the text.
Finally, my gratitude goes to the anonymous reviewers and colleagues who pro-
videdtheirfeedbackonthepreviousdraftsofthisbook.Allviewsexpressedinthis
manuscript are my own, as are all unintended omissions.
Contents
1 Why This Book? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 Structure of the Book. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 The Original Malthusian Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.4 The Need for a New Framework. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2 The Urban Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.1 Urbanisation in the Age of Malthus. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.2 Geneses of Urbanisation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.3 Definition and Typology of Urbanisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.4 National Classifications of Urban Areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
3 Urbanisation and Evolving Food Security Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . 29
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
3.2 Conceptualising Contemporary Food Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
3.3 Urbanisation and the Four Aspects of Food Insecurity . . . . . . . . . 35
3.3.1 Food Availability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3.3.2 Food Access. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
3.3.3 Food Utilisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
3.3.4 Food Stability. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
3.4 Other Key Factors Affecting Food Security. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
3.5 Future Outlook and Implications for Sustainable
Development Agenda. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
4 Urbanisation, Human Capital and Safe Drinking Water . . . . . . . . . 57
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
4.2 Urbanisation and Water Challenges: Macro and Micro-level
Interlinkages. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
vii
viii Contents
4.3 Human Capital in the Context of the Traditional
Post-Malthusian Debate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.4 The Impact of Human Capital. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4.5 Quantifying Associations Between Urbanisation,
Human Capital and Water Access . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
4.5.1 DHS Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
4.6 Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
5 Urbanisation and Intra-urban Inequalities in Nutritional
Outcomes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
5.2 Historical Inequalities in Access to Food . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
5.3 The Nature of Inequalities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
5.4 Contemporary Urbanisation and Intra-Urban Inequalities. . . . . . . . 86
5.4.1 Urbanisation and Child Undernutrition in the Least
Developed Countries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
5.4.2 Prepositions Regarding Urbanisation and Nutritional
Inequalities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
5.5 Intra-Urban Inequalities in Most Rapidly and Less Rapidly
Urbanising LDCs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
5.6 Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
6 Linking Theory and Practice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
6.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
6.2 Revised Post-Malthusian Framework in the Context
of Global Urbanisation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
6.3 Rethinking the IPAT Equation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
6.4 Contribution to the Critique of Traditional Urban Theories . . . . . . 110
6.5 Linking Historical Urbanisation with Contemporary
Urban Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
6.6 Challenges for the Sustainable Development Agenda . . . . . . . . . . 113
6.6.1 Population Size and Population Growth. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
6.6.2 Urbanisation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
6.6.3 Food Security. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
6.6.4 Human Capital . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
6.6.5 Inequalities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
List of Figures
Figure 1.1 Malthusian conceptual framework
(adapted from Malthus 1798, 1826) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Figure 1.2 Trends in urban and rural population growth
(1950–2050) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Figure 2.1 GNP at factor cost—Great Britain 1801–1901
(in £ million). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Figure 2.2 Percentage of families working in agriculture, trade,
handicraft and manufactures and other occupations
in four English regions (1831 census). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Figure 2.3 Proportion of urban population in early industrialised
and later industrialised European countries
(1800–1910) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Figure 3.1 Conceptual framework of food security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Figure 3.2 Trends in urbanisation and agricultural productivity—
OECD countries and LDCs (1960–2010) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Figure 3.3 Trends in urbanisation and area harvested—global
and LDCs (1960–2010) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Figure 3.4 Trends in food prices—most and least developed
countries (2001–2010) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Figure 3.5 Relative risk ratios of female underweight
and overweight/obesity by place of residence
and region’s human development level. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Figure 3.6 Contemporary framework presenting associations
affecting food security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Figure 4.1 Global trends in mean years of schooling by level
of development (1980–2010). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Figure 4.2 Macro-level association between urban growth
and access to safe drinking water accounting
for education. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
ix