10/28/14
Bixby Center for Population, Health and Sustainability
School of Public Health
University of California, Berkeley
PH181 POVERTY AND POPULATION
Fall Semester 2014
CNN 75673
3 units
Lecture:
Monday, 4-6 pm
245 Li Ka Shing Auditorium
Discussion Sections:
101 Wednesday, 10-11, 141 Giannini
102 Wednesday, 5-6, 105 Latimer
103 Wednesday, 4-5, 105 Latimer
104 Wednesday, 11-12, 182 Dwinelle
105 Wednesday, 10-11, 122 Wheeler
106 Wednesday, 11-12, 123 Wheeler
Instructors:
Malcolm Potts
Ndola Prata
Graduate Student Instructors:
Madeline Blodgett, Lisa DeMaria, Abigail Gutmann-Gonzalez, Lauren Harris, Anna Summer
Course Overview:
This course seeks to provide a rigorous understanding of the relationship between population growth,
poverty, women’s autonomy and health. It explores the political “fashions” underlying changing
paradigms among demographers, economists and development specialists.
You will have the opportunity of not only learning about poverty and population from lectures and
readings, but you will be able to follow policy debates as they unfold. The faculty have firsthand
experience of the suffering of women struggling to control family size and they are, or have been, directly
involved in policy development in the field (e.g. Ethiopia, Angola, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Thailand) and
at a global level.
Worldwide, there are one million more births than deaths every 112 hours and well over 90% of this
growth is in the world’s poorest countries. Only anomalous, oil-rich countries have escaped from poverty
with family sizes that have remained above six or seven children. Between 1960 and 1980 considerable
attention was focused on rapid population growth. After 1994, attention faded, investment in international
family planning evaporated, and the number of unintended pregnancies in some groups of poor and
vulnerable women increased. Recent UN population projections confirm continued rapid population
growth in the least developed countries for the rest of this century. Whether the world has 6 billion or 16
billion (the UN upper and lower projections of population), it will affect not only levels of poverty and
inequity, but the life of everyone on the planet.
The focus is beginning to return to population and family. In July 2012, Melinda Gates and the UK
Minister of Overseas Development held the London Summit on Family Planning. However, there is still a
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long way to go. UC Berkeley is organizing an international initiative, The OASIS Initiative: Organizing to
Advance Solutions in the Sahel and some of the teaching for this course will be built on this effort.
Course Learning Objectives:
 Understand of the relationship between population growth and poverty alleviation.
 Learn about the unmet need for family planning and giving women more autonomy.
 Explore various ways of making family planning choices universally accessible.
 Discuss the impact of access to fertility regulation on maternal and infant health, education,
employment, and social stability.
 Analyze the contrasting perspectives and changing paradigms among demographers, economists
and development specialists.
 Learn why family planning remains controversial and how national and international policies are
developed.
Grading:
20% Short essay (4 pages, double-spaced) that relates to the readings for the lecture and discussion
sessions.
20% Midterm
25% Class participation in discussion sessions
35% Term paper (6-8 pages, double-spaced) using acquired knowledge to analyze a self-chosen
problem related to international development and proposed solutions. Your intervention idea can
be either a policy or a program. You may focus on domestic issues as they pertain to population
and poverty.
More information on the short essay and term paper will be provided in discussion sections.
Short essays turned in during class on 10/13. Outline of term paper listing at least six academic sources is
due in discussion sections on 11/05. Midterm given in discussion sections on 11/12. Term papers are due
the last day of class on 12/01.
Attendance
iClickers will be used in the lectures and also to validate attendance. Your final grade will be reduced
by 5% if you are absent from lecture; and 5% will be taken off your discussion session grade if you are
absent. If you need to miss a class for a valid reason you must inform your GSI ahead of time to be
excused.
iClickers
You can buy your iClicker remote at the Cal Bookstore. Please use iClicker or iClicker+; not iClicker
GO or any mobile devices. You MUST register your iClicker online prior to use for the Fall 2014
semester at: http://www.bspace.com under the PH181 Fall14 tab and iClicker section on the left. Each
student must have his or her own iClicker. Sharing is not allowed. It is imperative that you do not give
your iClicker to anyone if you will be absent or do not accept someone else’s iClicker.
Cheating and Plagiarism
Cheating and plagiarism are the ultimate insult to your fellow students and the University. University
policies on academic integrity will be enforced in this course. The Campus Code of Student Conduct can
be found at http://students.berkeley.edu/uga/conduct.asp
Class Rule
Laptops are to be used in class only for taking notes. GSIs will make random checks during the semester.
On selected occasions the faculty may suggest that students use social media to share ideas discussed in
the class with friends outside the class.
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Readings
Students are required to read the assigned articles posted on the class bSpace and available as a reader at
Krishna Copy, 2111 University Ave. Some lectures may have handouts.
Background Resources on bSpace
1) Online Sites and Resources
2) Population Pyramid
3) Population Reference Bureau’s POPULATION HANDBOOK
4) Selected lecture slides
Instructors
Malcolm Potts MD, PhD
207G University Hall, tel. 642-4327
potts@berkeley.edu
Ndola Prata MD, Msc
229 University Hall, tel. 643-4284
ndolal@berkeley.edu
GSIs
Madeline Blodgett, madelineblodgett@berkeley
Lisa DeMaria MPH, lisademaria@berkeley
Abigail Gutmann-Gonzalez, agutmann@berkeley
Lauren Harris MPH, lakharris@gmail.com
Anna Summer MPH, annasummer1@gmail.com
Course Coordinator
Claire Norris MPA
227 University Hall, tel. 642-6915
cnorris@berkeley.edu
COURSE OUTLINE
9/01
Labor Day Holiday
1. 9/08 The Rest of the 21st Century: Population Momentum, Poverty and Growing Economic
Inequity (Potts, Prata, Campbell)
Course “Road Map.” A sense of scale. Population momentum. Socio-economic differences in
family size: why do they exist, can the by overcome. Basic demographic methods and measures
for population growth. Poverty and population growth. Comprehending exponential growth.
Reading:
 Haub, Carl. "Understanding Population Projections." Population Bulletin, Vol. 42(4).
1987
 Engleman, Robert. MORE: Population, Nature, and What Women Want, Island Press,
2008. Introduction, pp. 1-10
 Slovic, Paul. Numbed by Numbers. Foreign Policy March 2007
 Summary Statement from The World in 2050: A Scientific Investigation of the Impact of
Global Population Changes on a Divided Planet, January 23-24, 2009
 Real-Time Map of Births and Deaths:
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/10/a-real-time-map-of-births-anddeaths/280609/
Discussion Section: Population pyramids, population effect mind map, other demographic
lingo.
2. 9/15
Poverty, Population and Sustainability (Alain de Janvry)
Interactive discussion on the underlying causal links between poverty and health in
developing counties, the state of affairs and recent trends in world poverty, and measuring
poverty and progress.
Reading:
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


De Janvry and Sadoulet, Development Economics: Thinking and Practicing
Development. Chapter Five.“Poverty and Vulnerability Analysis” September 2013
Global Poverty: A Fall to Cheer, The Economist, March 3, 2012
Poverty: Not Always with Us, The Economist, June 1, 2013
Discussion Section: According to Oxfam, the total wealth of the richest 85 people equals that
of 3.6 billion people in the bottom half of the world’s economy, and half of the world’s
wealth is owned by just 1% of the population. State of the Future Report 2013-2014
3. 9/22
Barriers to Family Planning (Prata, Karen Weidert)
We will review the evidence on how difficult it is for poor women to get contraceptives.
In Ethiopia, for example, health care is financed out of people's own pockets, from
government taxes, and international and national donors. This class looks at the evidence on
how to make family planning easy to get. We will present evidence on how the Bixby Center
at UCB is trying to address some of the key distribution and financing mechanisms to
provide family planning in rural Africa.
Reading:
 Campbell M, Sahin-Hodoglugil NN, Potts M, Barriers to fertility regulation: a review
of the literature. Stud Fam Plann. 2006 June; 37(2):87-98
 Prata N, Gessessew A, Cartwright A, Fraser A. Provision of injectable contraceptives
in Ethiopia through community-based reproductive health agents. Bull World Health
Organ. 2011 Aug 1;89(8):556-64. Epub 2011 Apr 29
 Prata N, Weidert K, Frazer A, Gessessew, A, Meeting Rural Demand: A Case for
Combining Community-Based Distribution and Social Marketing of Injectable
Contraceptives in Tigray Ethiopia, PLOS ONE, July 2013, Vol. 8, Issue 7
 One Billion Fans, Op-ed, Cassandra Blazer, Bixby Center Doctoral Fellow, UC
Berkeley School of Public Health
Discussion Section: Select a country with low contraceptive prevalence and high fertility.
Discuss potential options for addressing barriers to family planning in that country. Identify
challenges and opportunities. Note: If the unmet need for family planning in Uganda could be
met the CPR would jump from 26% to 64%.
4. 9/29
Paradigms for Understanding Fertility Decline (Potts, Martha Campbell)
Demographers have worked for six decades trying to explain why birth rates fall or are stalled
at a high level. At Berkeley we have developed a new theoretical framework for understanding
this process, and it is just beginning to take hold. Our theoretical perspective also helps to
explain why a move to smaller families is achievable within a human rights framework.
Reading:
 Campbell M. Potts M. 2012. Do economists have frequent sex? Population Press. Fall
2012. 4-7
 Campbell, MM, Prata, N, Potts, M. Impact of Freedom on Fertility Transition: Revisiting
the Theoretical Framework, Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care,
2013: 39:44-50
 Potts, M. Getting family planning back on track, Global Health: Science and Policy
2014, Volume 2, Number 2
Discussion Section: Debate on supply side versus demand side.
5. 10/06 Demographic Dividend and Successful Family Planning Programs (Prata, Potts)
Where is the demographic dividend? Will Africa benefit from it? Why is the demographic
dividend important to alleviate current poverty levels in Africa? The class will also review
successful family planning programs, level of political commitment, and funding and
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leadership necessary to achieve success.
Reading:
 Eastwood R, Lipton M. Demographic transition in sub-Saharan Africa: how big will the
economic dividend be? Population Studies (Camb). 2011 Mar; 65(1): 9-35
 Judith Seltzer, The Origins and Evolution of Family Planning Programs in Developing
Countries, Rand Report
 Fertility and Economic Growth around the World, Population Reference Bureau, March
2013: http://www.prb.org/Multimedia/Video/2013/tfr-gni-engage-short.aspx
 The Dividend is Delayed:
http://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21598646-hopes-africasdramatic-population-bulge-may-create-prosperity-seem-have
Discussion Section: Dissecting the demographic dividend. Discuss examples from Asia and
make comparisons with Africa.
6. 10/13
Poverty and Subsistence Farming (Federico Castillo)
In most developing countries the agricultural sector employs the majority of the workforce.
The agricultural sector plays an important role in determining socio-economic outcomes
associated with nutrition, health, environmental quality, gender relations and others. In this
lecture we will explore the role that agriculture plays in the process of economic development and how agricultural productivity, agricultural markets and associated institutional
arrangements can increase the wellbeing of those living in rural areas. Emphasis will be
given to African countries while using examples from Latin America and Asia.
► Turn in short essay in class.
Readings:
 SOFA Team and Doss, Cheryl. “The Role of Women in Agriculture”. FAO Working
Paper No. 11-02. 43 pp. 2011
 Diao, Xinshen, Hazeill, Peter and Thurlow, James. “The Role of Agriculture in African
Development”. World Development Report. No. 38 pp. 1375-1383. 2010
Discussion Section: How can women help increase food production in Africa?
7. 10/20
The Special Case of Africa (Prata)
For many countries in Africa population growth appears to affect the quality of the
development process more than the rate of growth of average per capita income.
Reasons for population growth. Implications for economic development and poverty
alleviation. Effects of HIV/AIDS epidemic on population size, age structure of the
population, characteristics and impact on society and economic development. Attaining the
MDGs: how is Africa doing? Education, the foundation for development and empowerment
of women; the case of Northern Nigeria.
Reading:
 Ezeh AC, Bongaarts J, Mberu B.Global population trends and policy options. Lancet.
2012 Jul 14;380(9837):142-8. Epub 2012 Jul 10
 Jean-Christophe Fotso, Alex Chika Ezeh, Nyovani Janet Madise, James Ciera: Progress
towards the child mortality millennium development goal in urban sub-Saharan Africa:
the dynamics of population growth, immunization, and access to clean water. BMC
Public Health 2007, 7:218
 Thornton PK, Jones PG, Ericksen PJ, Challinor AJ. Agriculture and food systems in subSaharan Africa in a 4°C+ world. Philos Transact A Math Phys Eng Sci. 2011 Jan
13;369(1934):117-36
 D Perlman et al, Pathways to Choice: Delaying Age of Marriage through Girl-Child
Education in Northern Nigeria, from Women’s Health and Empowerment, University of
California Press (in press)
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
We Can End Poverty: Millennium Development Goals and Beyond, United Nations,
http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/
Discussion Section: If the absolute number of poor people goes up, but the fraction of people
in poverty comes down, has poverty gone up or gone down? Why is this important?
8. 10/27
Poverty in Extreme Conditions (Potts, Alisha Graves, Paige Passano)
Why have an OASIS meeting? How did it evolve? What will the next one be about? The role
of child marriage in population growth. Feed the future.
Reading:
 OASIS Initiative, A Project of the University of California, Berkeley and African Institute
for Development Policy
 Potts, M, Henderson, C, Campbell, M. The Sahel: A Malthusian Challenge, Spring
Science and Business Media Dordrecht 2013
 Potts M., Gidi V, Campbell, Zureick. Niger: Too Little, Too Late International
Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health 17: 95-101. 2011
 Cincotta R. P. 2008 March/April How democracies grow up: Countries with too many
young people may not have a fighting chance for freedom. Foreign Policy 165:80-82
Discussion Section: Can an OASIS Initiative in Berkeley help poor people in Burkina Faso?
9. 11/03 Population and A Sustainable World (Potts)
It has been said that this is the first generation to face the possibility that human activity will
irreversibly damage the biosphere – and it is the last generation that can prevent this
happening. Other than large scale nuclear war, this is the overarching threat of the 21st
century. Rapid population growth and climate change are key variables in dealing with this
existential threat. “The impossible hamster.”
► Turn in outline of term paper in discussion sections.
Reading:
 House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, The UK’s response to extremism and
instability in North and West Africa, March, 2014, pgs. 7-12; 20-24
 Harte, J. “Human population as a dynamic factor in environmental degradation.” Energy
and Resources Group and ESPM, University of California, Berkeley, published online 11
May, 2007
 Potts M, Hayden T. Sex and War, pp. 320-331
 People and the Planet. The Royal Society London, 2012. Conclusions and
Recommendations, pp. 101 to 106
Discussion Section: In 2100 the world could have 6 billion people or 16 billion – will that
make a difference to the world your children inherit?
10. 11/10 History, Culture and Religious Perspectives (Potts, David Cao)
Influence of various world religions in understanding the issues of reproduction and
overpopulation. The Church and contraception and abortion. Differing perspectives –
Roman Catholicism and Islam. The Judeo-Christian tradition. The rise of clinics, Margaret
Sanger, Marie Stopes, Comstock, sexual and reproductive health rights movement, 1994
United Nations International Conference on Population and Development. The UN in denial.
► Midterm in discussion sections.
Reading:
 Potts and Campbell, History of Contraception, Gynecology and Obstetrics, 2002
 Roudi-Fahimi, F., Islam and family Planning, Population Reference Bureau, Mena
Policy Brief
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
Potts and Campbell, The origins and future of patriarchy: the biological background of
gender politics, Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care, 2008, 34(3):
171-174
Discussion Section: Midterm
11. 11/17 The Special Case of China, of India, and of Iran (Potts)
China and Iran have undergone similar fertility declines over similar time spans, but the social
and religious perspectives underpinning national policies have been profoundly different. Is
there an underlying common theme or not?
Reading:
 Potts M. China's one child policy. BMJ. 2006 Aug 19;333(7564):361-2
 Ding QJ, Hesketh Family size, fertility preferences, and sex ratio in China in the era of
the one child family policy: results from national family planning and reproductive health
survey.BMJ. 2006 Aug 19:333(7564):371-3
 Roudi, F. Iran’s family planning program: responding to a nation’s needs. MENA Policy
Brief, 2002
 Iran reverses course on family planning, Philly.com articles, Nasser Karimi, Associated
Press, July 30, 2012
 Diamond-Smith N, Potts M, Are the population policies of India and China responsible
for the fertility decline? International Journal of Environmental Studies, 67: 291-301.
2010
Discussion Section: Why is it that once reproductive freedoms have been won they are often
taken away later? What is likely to happen to the TFR in Iran?
12. 11/24 Franchising and the Private Sector (Dominic Montagu)
The majority of healthcare provision in developing countries comes from private providers.
And yet private practitioners are excluded from most healthcare planning, and nearly all
healthcare regulation. This lecture will provide an introduction to the issues of private
healthcare delivery in developing countries and the interventions which are being increasingly
used to make use of this large potential resource in order to advance public good.
Reading:
 Public stewardship of Mixed Health Systems, Lancet, published online August 12, 2009
 Social Franchising: Reaching the Underserved, Marie Stopes International
Discussion Section: Thanksgiving Holiday
13. 12/01 Public Health in Emergency Settings (Jesse Berns)
This lecture will cover a description of humanitarian actors and their roles; summary of field
epidemiology in areas of conflict and disaster, including rapid health assessments, health
access studies, and surveillance establishment; typical reproductive health and family
planning interventions in emergency settings, and current issues in the realm of humanitarian
emergencies and public health.
► Term papers due. Course evaluations.
Reading:
 UN Cluster Approach: https://www.humanitarianresponse.info/clusters/space/page/whatcluster-approach
 ‘Typical’ Emergency Health Needs Assessment/Study:
http://data.unhcr.org/syrianrefugees/partner.php?OrgId=57
 WHO Rapid Health Needs Assessment Protocol:
http://www.wpro.who.int/vietnam/publications/rapid_health_assessment_protocols.pdf
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Discussion Section: The pregnancy rate among refugee women living in refugee camps is
higher than among refugees living outside the camps in local communities. Why is this? What
are the implications of this difference?
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