*[Enwl-eng] What does family planning look like in a warming world?

[enwl]

Друзья, день добрый!
Хороший обзор (не только про Америку) свежих данных о глобальной 
демографической ситуации.
Свет

В последние годы изменение климата повлияло на принятие сугубо личных 
решений о том, заводить ли детей и когда именно.
Исследование, проведенное в 2020 году, показало, что 78% представителей 
поколения Z в США не планируют заводить детей из-за изменения климата. 
Некоторые опасаются, что дети появятся в мире, который столкнется со все 
более серьезными последствиями глобального потепления, другие беспокоятся об 
углеродном следе нового человека, который, по некоторым оценкам, 
эквивалентен более чем пяти тысячам трансатлантических перелетов.
“В принципе, существует научный консенсус в отношении того, что жизнь детей 
будет очень трудной”, - заявила представитель организации Александрия 
Окасио-Кортес в 2019 году. “И это заставляет молодых людей задаваться 
законным вопросом: нормально ли по-прежнему иметь детей?”
Для других рождаемость представляется одной из наименьших проблем 
человечества, поскольку многолетние усилия по улучшению доступа к 
противозачаточным средствам и абортам, а также борьбе с детской смертностью 
приводят к положительным социально-экономическим и демографическим 
результатам. Во многих странах мира еще никогда не было лучшего времени для 
того, чтобы завести ребенка.
В условиях потепления на планете наше личное и коллективное будущее 
складывается неожиданным образом. Здесь мы рассмотрим некоторые из новейших 
идей, эмоций и данных.



От: Anthropocene Magazine <contact at anthropocenemagazine.org>
Date: пн, 29 апр. 2024 г. в 15:16
Subject: What does family planning look like in a warming world?

The answer will depend as much on climate anxiety as carbon emissions.
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                        What does family planning look like in a warming 
world?

                        The answer will depend as much on climate anxiety as 
carbon emissions.


                        By Mark Harris








                        In recent years, climate change has thrown a wrench 
into the intensely personal decision of whether or when to have children.

                        A 2020 survey found that 78% of Gen Zers in the US 
weren’t planning to have children because of climate change. Some fear 
bringing kids into a world that will see increasingly severe effects from 
global warming, others fret at the carbon footprint of a new human—by one 
estimate the equivalent of over five thousand trans-Atlantic flights.

                        “Basically, there’s a scientific consensus that the 
lives of children are going to be very difficult,” said Representative 
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in 2019. “And it does lead young people to have a 
legitimate question: Is it okay to still have children?”

                        For others, fertility seems to be one of the least 
of humanity’s problems, as decades-long efforts to improve access to 
contraceptives and abortion, and tackle child mortality, deliver positive 
socioeconomic and demographic outcomes. For much of the world, there has 
never been a better time to have a child.

                        On a warming planet, our personal and collective 
futures come together in some unexpected ways. Here we explore some of the 
latest thinking, emotions, and data.



                        • • •
                        The Anxiety Is Real


                        1. As temperatures rise, enthusiasm for families 
fall. Jade Sasser, an associate professor at the University of California 
Riverside, conducted a survey of 2,500 Millennials and Gen Zers for her book 
Climate Anxiety and the Kid Question, published this month. “Having and 
raising children symbolizes futures where we can feel good about parenting 
children, giving them a good life, and leaving some sort of legacy,” she 
writes. “For many people of reproductive age, that hope is being threatened 
by climate change.” A large meta-study of 13 studies with over 11,000 people 
(mostly from the global north) found that 12 of them had solid evidence 
linking greater climate concern with intentions to have fewer children or 
none at all.

                        2. More empty daycares. When the economy slows, 
fertility often dips as people postpone having children for a short time. 
But in the years following the 2008 Great Recession, births in the US never 
rebounded, found the Pew Charitable Trust. Western states have been most 
affected, with dropping school enrollment and looming tax shortfalls in 
decades to come. Many other developed nations like Canada, the UK, France, 
Germany, Australia, and even China are also seeing historically low birth 
rates.






                        Source: Kearney, MS et al. 2022, Journal of Economic 
Perspectives

                        3. No climate baby boom. A 2022 study by economists 
at the University of Maryland and Wellesley College concluded that even with 
a strong economy, there was no sign of the US fertility slump reversing. The 
researchers could only attribute it to “broad societal changes that are hard 
to measure or quantify.” In 2021, the New York Times carried a report about 
the growing “anti-natalism” movement arising from people’s fears and 
anxieties about climate change.




                        • • •
                        But Not Having Children Won’t Solve the Climate 
Crisis


                        1. The next generation (and its carbon footprint) is 
already shrinking. This excellent summary page at Our World in Data shows a 
continual decline in birthrates due to the growing empowerment of women, and 
declining rates of child mortality and child labor in developing nations. 
These are the same advances that slowly lowered fertility rates in countries 
like the US and UK in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but on a much 
faster timescale. In comparison, family planning and climate anxiety are 
barely a blip.






                        Source: Our World In Data


                        2. The carbon clock. The climate impact of 
individual fertility choices will play out over hundreds of years, but 
tackling climate change requires immediate action. The nonprofit Founders 
Pledge calculates that donating $1000 today to specific climate charities 
that are sequestering carbon is far more effective in terms of the climate 
than any lifestyle choice—including having one fewer child. This is because, 
the nonprofit says, many developed nations are legally obliged to reach net 
zero by 2050, so any child’s carbon footprint will end there. Even if that 
goal is missed by 30 years, donations today will have more of an effect than 
not procreating, they calculate. But that still assumes that the climate 
charities they pick out will actually deliver on their carbon removal 
promises—which is far from certain in the tricky business of climate tech.

                        3. Climate isn’t the first existential threat we’ve 
faced. Britt Wray’s thoughtful documentary for CBC points out that 
“marginalized communities, especially Indigenous and Black communities, have 
had to organize for centuries to change the systems in which they live for 
the protection of their children.” People have continued to raise families 
under the specter of nuclear war and genocide. “Rather than turn away from 
bringing babies into the world, many work to change the world so that their 
babies can more easily live within it,” she writes.




                        • • •
                        What To Keep An Eye On


                        1. When the personal meets the political. Activism 
on such an emotional topic doesn’t always play out as intended. This social 
history of the BirthStrike for Climate group, which launched in 2019 and 
disbanded in 2021, makes for fascinating, and at times quite moving, 
reading. Despite never advocating for population control, the group found 
its message misunderstood and misinterpreted. “Raising the alarm can be 
galvanizing for some, but paralyzing for others,” wrote two British 
sociologists who chronicled the movement’s rise and fall.

                        2. The world is growing up, and that’s not bad. In 
his book Decline and Prosper, Norwegian economist Vegard Skirbekk suggests 
we embrace a low birthrate world. “Low fertility and shrinking population 
size can reduce overcrowding and resource use, and make it more feasible to 
meet climate targets and reduce pollution,” he wrote in this insightful 
piece for Wired in 2022. Although many countries will have aging 
populations, seniors are healthier than ever, and there are plenty of 
youngsters from nations still growing rapidly to keep the engines of society 
ticking over.

                        3. Worrying returns to old ideas. Previous attempts 
to interfere with families’ fertility choices have been disastrous. 
Eugenicists and racists attempted to use birth control in the US for social 
engineering, while forced sterilizations plagued many countries. China’s 
one-child policy probably set back its progress by decades. Nor have 
attempts to stimulate fertility been any more impressive. When the French 
government thought its neighbor Germany was out-breeding it in the early 
20th century, it restricted abortion and contraception and gave medals to 
mothers of large families, Matt Reynolds wrote for Wired. Nothing shifted 
the birth rate until France’s post-war economic boom.


                        Top image ©Anthropocene Magazine





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                              Other Recent Fixing Carbon Posts


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