The human ecological approach to the study of population dynamics

Human ecology is a specialization of ecology, tailored to suit the characteristic features of human populations. This essay focuses upon human ecology as set forth by Hawley and Duncan, although other conceptualizations are referred to. The bio-ecological framework is described together with an introduction of the distinction between population ecology and community ecology. Bio-ecology is an important subdiscipline of biology, but its subject has never been as complex as that of human ecology. Human ecologists developed their own theoretical framework distinct from that of bio-ecology. The author briefly outlines the history of human ecology, emphasizing the initial phase of the Chicago School, which focused upon spatial patterns of human phenomena, and the succeeding one, in which a reorientation focused upon the organizational aspects of population dynamics. The author then reviews some of the basic features of human ecology, discusses population ecology and its applications, with reference to the study of populations of households, and outlines the use of graph theory, input-output frameworks, and multilevel modeling to improve the formal and methodological aspects of human ecology. The spatial concern of human ecology is considered and situated in a broader context.     

Social organization of the voleClethrionomys rufocanus and its demographic and genetic consequences: A review

Recent findings on the relationship between social interaction and demographic process in the gray-sided voleClethrionomys rufocanus are reviewed with reference to the findings in other microtine rodents. Social behavior was particularly focused on spacing and dispersal, and their effects on population dynamics are discussed. Female territoriality can limit a population abundance as a density-dependent factor, although its regulatory effect is controversial. Female philopatry and male-biased dispersal should bring about the clumped distribution of female relatives and genetically random distribution of males during the breeding season. The sexual difference in dispersal patterns can contribute to the mating behavior of the vole; promiscuous mating and low frequency of incestuous mating. However, effects of social structure, including kinship, on reproduction and survival of individuals still remains to be clarified. Molecular markers may help to solve these issues and provide new field of population ecology in microtine rodents.     

天山北坡经济带人与自然生态协调发展的实证分析

作为可持续发展的重要组成部分,人与自然生态的协调发展意义重大。作为新疆经济最发达的地区之一,天山北坡经济带中人与自然生态的发展状况处于何种阶段,不协调的因素有哪些,是否能适应可持续发展的要求,近来成为经济学家探讨的热门话题。本文从人口、资源、环境三个系统间的协调程度入手,借助历史数据,运用协调系数法和主成分分析法对天山北坡经济带人与自然生态的协调发展进行实证分析。     

The population,agriculture, and environment nexus in Latin America: country-level evidence from the latter half of the twentieth century

Unprecedented population growth and migration accompanied equally unprecedented land use and land cover change in Latin America during the latter decades of the twentieth century. Country-level data are examined with bivariate statistics to determine relationships between changes in population patterns and land use (agriculture and forest cover) from 1961 to 2001. In South America, large forest areas were eliminated during the period, while exceptionally high rates of forest clearing were ubiquitous in the Central America/Caribbean region. These environmental changes accompanied dissimilar initial population densities and different effects of population change on agriculture. While interacting with a host of political, socio-economic, and geographic processes, it appears that both Malthusian and Boserupian demographic processes were important drivers of deforestation. Given continued, though slowing, population growth, increased urban consumption, and future land use constraints, policy makers face myriad challenges in advancing sustainable agriculture-population dynamics in Latin America.     

Several problems concerning population investment]

Population investment is a major topic in the studies of population and economic relations. In this particular area, numerous theoretical and practical problems are still in need of solution. Concerning the problem of population concept, there are three different approaches: (1) to determine the definition of population investment from the relationship between the population growth and the capital from national income used for investment, including investment in the newly increased population and investment in the entire population; (2) to explain population investment from the economic viewpoint that people are producers; and (3) to explain population investment from the expense needed to change a simple labor force to a skillful labor force. The expenses include educational costs, maintanance spending, wages needed to compensate workers in labor, costs for workers to master and learn modern scientific techniques to be used for production, and the costs of keeping a young labor force in the next generation.     

The population problems in the countryside of China from the viewpoint of ecological economy]

There is a very close relationship between the population and the economy. The economy is the foundation for the existence and development of the population. Different socioeconomic patterns will determine population rules and population development, they have a strong influence on the social economy and the development of the entire society, and they may control the pace of social and economic development. In the last 30 years, excessive population growth has caused a great many difficulties for Socialist construction, overburdened agriculture, and created an imbalance in agricultural ecology. In order to understand the relationship between the development of the agricultural population and agricultural production, we have to understand to dominant position held by people in an agricultural ecology system. People have to control their own reproduction and match it with the productivity of the agricultural ecology system. Unrestrained population growth in the countryside is the main reason for an imbalance in China's agricultural ecology. Urgent action is needed to control the population growth in the rural areas, to fully utilized the available labor force, to promote the level of agricultural productivity, and to provide more employment opportunities. The final goal is to match China's huge agricultural human resources with its rich resources. investment should be encouraged to increase the wisdom and quality of the agricultural population. Both the quality and quantity of the agricultural labor force should also match development of agricultural productivity. In this way, a normal condition of agricultural ecology may be maintained.     

Baby booms,busts, and population ageing in the developed world

The key challenge facing contemporary society is a process of population ageing rooted mainly in past fertility cycles. The goals of the study reported in this paper were (i) to analyse jointly the post-1930s baby boom and the baby bust that followed, (ii) to consider the specific ways this particular combination influenced the process of ageing in different societies, and (iii) to evaluate some possible implications for policy of different historical experiences. Demographic time series for 27 nations in the developed world were used. The main results confirm the importance of the boom and bust fertility cycle of the second half of the twentieth century for population ageing. Some countries will experience ageing processes driven mainly by the growth of elderly populations while others will age largely as a result of declines in working-age populations. These differences underscore the need to tailor policy priorities for specific patterns of ageing.     

Choosing the best population development goal]

Optimizing goals for controlled population growth and development through mathematical modeling has a practical value and is of important theoretical significance. An integrated model for optimizing multiple interactive targets for population development is proposed. A wide array of user-prioritized (weighted) economic indices or factors may be incorporated into this n-tuple m-dimensional model, by which complex linear and vector space computations are solved and interpreted through conventional mathematics. Although this numerical approach toward problem solving is imperfect, when properly used, the mathematical model presented in this paper is a practical and efficient means for solving multidimensional problems.     

Incorporating physiology into parasitoid behavioral ecology: the allocation of nutritional resources

A critical problem faced by most theoretical studies of parasitoid behavior and population dynamics has been the paucity of empirically obtained information about the pattern of resource allocation to egg production and metabolic maintenance in relation to adult diet in female parasitoids. This review calls for a shift from traditional manipulative feeding studies to studies that quantify the energetic budget of parasitoids and which take into account the dynamic nature of metabolic processes. As guidelines, we highlight the advances made along these lines with other insect groups and some of the simplest tools already available today for fulfilling this goal. Received: December 22, 1998 / Accepted: January 12, 1999     

Was ist neu am Neo-Institutionalismus?

This paper discusses the specific characteristic of the new institutionalism in comparison with other dominant approaches within US organization studies. The argument is led by the theses that within contingency theory, resource dependency theory, and population ecology the economic environment is of utmost importance and that the economy is regarded as the major sphere of reference, either implicitly or explicitly. A multi-contextual embeddedness between organizations and society is hardly to be found within these theoretical approaches. The new institutionalism departs from this line of thinking, because it considers a variety of different environmental realms and sees organizations as always being embedded within a societal context. I regard this as the central new and distinguishing feature of the new institutionalism. The aim of the paper is to show this distinguishing difference between the new institutionalism and the three approaches.     

On population of urbanization]

Unlike cities in capitalistic societies our socialistic cities are publically owned, and the relationship between rural and urban areas is mutually supportive and beneficial. 2 types of calculations are required for successful urbanization: an estimate of the total labor required in the city and an estimate of total agricultural products required to support the cities. Disregard for these 2 factors and overpopulated cities will result in unemployment, decreased agricultural production, inflation, and a decreased living standard. A balance between cities and country is important, and therefore population urbanization should be well planned. Capitalistic urbanization of population is based on the principle of private ownership and competition--from unplanned concentration of population in big cities to malignant expansion to the final decline of inner cities. Their governments are forced to redistribute the urban population. The same problem of overpopulated cities in underdeveloped countries results from stagnant agricultural production. We should learn from their mistakes in developing our cities. There are 2 types of socialistic urbanization. Russia has lopsidedly emphasized urban development and ignored agricultural production. Romania, on the other hand, emphasized both labor force distribution and agricultural production. Their numerous small cities near rural areas decrease the difference between big cities and the country. In the past we failed to follow our direction of urbanization--control the size of big cities, reasonably develop mid-sized cities, and actively develop small cities--because of the great difference in living standards between urban and rural areas and the lack of urbanization plans. The concept of industrialization must be accompanied by the concept of population urbanization.     

The debate on population and the environment: Australia in the global context

This paper reviews the debate on population and the environment. The Australian debate is emphasized, but set within a global context, in recognition of the important interdependencies between countries of the North and South. The population-environment debate is long standing and highly controversial. It has been waged primarily as a war of ‘facts’ concerning capacity to support people at global, national and/ or regional levels. This has been inconclusive for it has failed to give due recognition to the inherent uncertainties in our knowledge, the paradigms which influence our judgements of key parameters, and the political ideology which has permeated the debate from the time of Malthus. Recent attempts to put the debate on a more analytical footing are considered. A framework which recognizes the inherent uncertainty in our knowledge of population-environment linkages is critical and decisions should be guided by the precautionary principle. Significantly the debate has been marginalized in mainstream discussion of each of population and the environment, both internationally and within Australia. It is suggested that this is a major barrier to progress towards sustainability. A population policy for Australia requiring development of institutions and decision-making processes which give a centrally important place to population-environment linkages in the day-to-day affairs of government, and which engage the community in debate about ‘desirable futures’ at national, regional and local levels, is endorsed. Importantly, the policy should require consideration of these issues within the context of Australia’s responsibilities both globally and to future generations.     

Emergent and effective properties in ecology and evolution

Emergent properties are often discussed in arguments concerning relationships among different levels. However, the different definitions of emergent properties sometimes confuse the arguments about macro-level phenomena, since some authors regard emergent properties not only as observable global patterns but as properties that affect and cause change in ecological and evolutionary processes. Thus it is important to distinguish higher-level or larger-scale properties that can influence particular ecological and evolutionary processes from those that cannot. I call the former properties effective properties. I gave examples that show why the distinctions between effective and non-effective properties are important.     

Values: their place in population education

In an attempt to resolve the crucial issues relating to dealing with the value dilemmas of students, population educators in the Philippines convened a series of conferences. The Philippine population education teachers, trainers, and administrators participating in the conferences agreed that a fusion of the affective and cognitive processes was necessary and that there should be more student involvement and self-made decisions on the part of students. An issue still unresolved is whether schools should inculcate values in the students or let them resolve or discover values by themselves; the strategies suggested range from open-ended or value processing to close-ended value teaching. Teachers and supervisors stressed that all strategies should be undertaken since they complement each other, but the choice and availability of materials to support and reinforce the strategy continues to be a problem for many participants. Preliminary studies conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of a value clarification strategy support the contention that value clarification processes do make a difference in certain patterns of student behavior, attitudes, and knowledge. Research also shows that the value clarification strategy is ineffective with teachers who are highly authoritarian, closed-minded, and dogmatic. The Population Education Program has responded to recommendations of the conference participants and taken some definite action, such as the implementation of value clarification strategies as part of the teacher training program and development of a list of Filipino values to serve as guides in teaching value-laden population issues.     

The coevolution of population and environment: The ecology and ideology of feedback relations in Pakistan

A new approach to the study of population and environment is proposed, based on Norgaard's theory of co-evolution. This theory is applied to two developments currently underway in Pakistan: the transfer of tree cover from public forests to private farms, and the partial replacement of woodfuel by dungfuel in household hearths. Both developments are characterized by feedback from the ecosystem to the sociosystem, which consists of a shift of regulatory mechanisms and complexity from the former to the latter. The efficacy of this feedback depends on an accurate perception of the process by the participating population. These perceptions are more accurate in the case of the forest-farm transition than the woodfuel-dungfuel transition, and this explains why the latter appears less sustainable than the former. Accuracy of perception also varies systematically between government officials and local peoples, primarily due to openness to explanations of behavior based on population/resource pressure. It is concluded that external development agencies have a potentially important role to play in demystifying perception of feedback processes between ecosystem and sociosystem.     

Seasonal forcing on the dynamics ofClethrionomys rufocanus: Modeling geographic gradients in population dynamics

We interpret gradients in population dynamics of the gray-sided vole from the southwestern part of the island of Hokkaido to its northeastern part within the framework of a phenomenological model involving the relative length of summer and winter. In Hokkaido, as in other northern regions, both spring and fall is considered as short transition periods between the two main seasons — summer (the primary breeding season) and winter (the non-reproductive or secondary breeding season). We show that the geographic transition in dynamics may be understood as the combined consequence of different patterns of density-dependence during summer and winter, and geographically varying season lengths. Differences are shown to exist between summer and winter with respect to strength of density-dependence. Direct density-dependence, in particular, is stronger during winter than during summer. A model is presented to show how relative lengths of seasons can induce both stable and periodically fluctuating population dynamics. The results are compared and contrasted with what is otherwise known about the gradient in rodent dynamics in Fennoscandia.     

生命原理与人口控制

平衡原理、关联原理、生命伦理是以生存原则为前提的三大生命原理.生物种群、生物量与环境容量必须保持平衡的平衡原理及平衡原理贯彻的必然性和破坏性,提供了人口控制的必然性;生物数量、体形(质量)、寿命以环境容量空-时限定为背景的相互关联,和人类作为一个"生态学悖论"的存在,表现了人口控制的紧迫性;而生命伦理,则体现了人口控制对人类和生物的道德性.     

Segregation and Fragmentation: Extending Landscape Ecology and Pattern Metrics Analysis to Spatial Demography

Though demography’s roots involve a strong spatial component, recent attention to capitalizing on widely available spatially referenced demographic data has returned the focus to spatially enabled analyses. Landscape ecology offers a theoretical framework and concomitant methodology in pattern metric analysis well suited for extracting process through the examination of spatial patterns. Applied on the environmental side of population–environment interaction research, pattern metric analysis has not been brought to bear on population data per se. This research illustrates the utility of a pattern metric approach utilizing U.S. Census data from 1990 and 2000 to document changes in spatial configuration of race and class in South Carolina. The results corroborate similar findings elsewhere of exurban growth as well as an increasing income gap and spread of Hispanic population, both statistically and spatially. Further insight into the forces related to these processes is gained from explicit assessment of spatial configuration. The method is offered as a complementary tool to the richly evolving field of spatial demography.     

Study thoroughly the Marxist theory on population, develop population science in China]

The Third National Population Science Congress emphasized the production theory of Marxism, the basic difference between China's population control and the old and new Malthusianism, and possible social problems caused by the one child per couple policy. The meeting was well-organized, and the participants were actively involved; it included a keynote speech, group discussions, and seminars by specialists. Most people agreed that population production should be included in the social economy and that both material and population production should together decide the development of the society. Some people believed that Malthus' population theory is antirevolutionary and totally unacceptable. Others thought that there are some positive aspects such as the coordination of population with consumer goods and his population control measures. Many valuable suggestions were made in the meeting concerning population control. This Congress also established a Chinese Population Society, passed the bylaws, and elected members of the board of directors for the Society. Vice-Premier Chen gave an important closing speech about the importance of family planning and population control.     

A developing countries' perspective on population,environment, and development

The subject of this paper is the political behavior of developing states (the South) on issues of population, environment and development. It attempts to understand why the South is so weary of international population policy in the name of the environment. It argues that the South's response is shaped by five inter-related concerns about responsibility, efficiency, efficacy, additionality, and sovereignty. That is, the developing countries, (a) do not want their population growth to be held responsible for global environmental degradation, (b) argue that a more efficient solution to the environmental crisis is consumption control in the North, (c) believe that development remains a necessary condition for efficacious population control, (d) are weary of the population priorities of the North distracting international funds from other developmental goals of the South, and (e) are unprepared to accept any global population norms which challenge their fundamental political, cultural or religious sovereignty. It is maintained that these concerns have historically guided the positions of the South and remain valid and relevant today. Although, over the last two decades of North-South debate on the subject the nuances within these concerns have evolved, the concerns themselves remain valid and were apparent again at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development. Finally, it is proposed that although a grand North-South bargain around population-environment-development issues remains unlikely, both sides can gain much from trying to understand - even where they do not agree with - the other's concerns. The purpose of this study is not as much to defend the South's position, as to present it and the rationale behind it.