FERTILITY CONTROL AND SOCIAL CHANGE IN INDIA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP83-00423R001201170006-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: November 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 19, 1999
• Sequence Number: 6
• Content Type: REPORT

Approved For Release 1999/09/10 :CIA-RDP83-004238001201170006-3
Not for Publication
Preliminar~Abstract
FERTILITY CONTROL AND SOCIAL CHANGE IN INDIA
The attempt to lower Indians fertility by deliberate policy resembles
other attempts to speed up the course of social change, In every such attempt
there is the assumption that without interventions the change will occur (if
it occurs at all) as part of a normal and virtually automatic pattern of develop-
ment which has been observed in the past. With respect to populations the, pat-
tern of change is known as the demographic transition; and the problem is whether
ar not the gap between mortality and fertility which ordinarj.ly occurs in this
transition can be deliberately minimized.
E~am3.natian of the demographic transition shows that it is clearer as
an abstraction than as a description of actual fact. It is a rough empirical
generalization which does not fit any set of historical data perfectly and shows
considerable variation from one country to another, As such it is a dangerous
instrument when used for purposes of prediction,
The normal lag of fertility decline behind mortality decline raises
two questions: Firsts does this lag have to occur? Second.' if it does occur,
how long does it have to last and haw severe must it becomes Tn the case of
India the question is idles because the lag is already visible -- notably since
1918, The second question is highly pertinent but it cannot safely be answered
on the basis of past experience, For one things the time required for the demo-
graphic gap to recede after reaching the point currently exhibited in India can-
not be determined accurately for Western countries partly because the elements
constituting the current position are different, Departing from the rate of
Approved For Release 1999/09/10 :CIA-RDP83-004238001201170006-3
 Approved For Release 1999/09/10 :CIA-RDP83-004238001201170006-3
natural increase alone (12,5 per 1000 per year in India during 1941-51)~ we
find the time required for completion of the cycle after this point in Britain
was roughly 30 years, But while-this rate of natural incrF.s.se is comparable to
that in Britain in 1901-1911 nothing else is comparable. In terms of the In-
dian birth rates the time required to complete the cycles by analogy with
Britain would be 55 to 60 years; and on the basis of the death rate it would
be approximately 135 years, Thus analogical reasoning in terms of the demo-
graphic transition is of Little value except to demonstrate its ambiguity,
If attention is given to other patterns of change -- such as the in-
dustrial revolution -- it will be found that not all of the stages are repeated
in each new country experiencing the change, Underdeveloped countries today
are taking over the .latest developments without going through all the inter-
mediate stages which led to these developments. If this variability is true
of the process of economic modernizatian~ it must also be possible with rdspect
to demographic modernization. In facts a noteworthy difference in the cycle as
it is emerging today is the tendency of mortality to decline much faster than
it did previously at a similar stage of economic development in Western coun-
tries. This is one of the new features which is putting great pressure on fam-
flies to reduce their fertility, Other new elements having the same tendency
(also noticeable in India) are the following: (1} The ever tighter governmental
control over agricultural production and marketing; (~) the availability of new
means of communication far mass education and propaganda; (3) the wide currency
of humanitarian a.nd egalitarian doctrines affecting the role of. women and atti-
tudes toward children; (b) the common realization that social change is not
only possible but inevitable. Such elements as theses together with the rapid
fall in the death rate and the consequent increase in rural densities and the
Approved For Release 1999/09/10 :CIA-RDP83-004238001201170006-3
 Approved For Release 1999/09/10 :CIA-RDP83-004238001201170006-3
_~_
cost of 1and~ make a rapid spread of fertility control even among an Asian
peasant population seem possible. The old social structure supporting high
fertility is crumbling fast. Field studies indicate that already Indian fam-
ilies wish to limit the number of children, The Indian governraent~s program
for fertility control is therefore not a hopeless effort, If the program is
strengthened and expanded it may give an extra push to a tendency already
incipienty and thus may reduce the duration of size of the demographic gap,
Kingsley Davis
Columbia University
Approved For Release 1999/09/10 :CIA-RDP83-004238001201170006-3