Oris, Michel

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Warren C. Robinson (ed.): Land, Labourand Population Growth: Theory, Policyand Case-Studies. Collected Papers from 4 DecadesAuthor House, Bloomington, Indiana, 2009, 320 pp.,ISBN 978-1-4389-4788-4.Michel OrisPublished online: 13 September 2012 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2012Warren C. Robinson is a professor emeritus of economics at Pennsylvania StateUniversity and was director of the Population Research Institute there. He hasworked in the academic field but also for the World Bank, the UN, and USAID. Thisvolume is a collection of 15 papers among the more than 100 published by theauthor between 1964 and 2005. They are organised into three parts: ‘‘Surpluslabour’’ in traditional societies and how policy converts it to a ‘‘developmentsurplus’’; Policy and other factors affecting population growth; and Why the‘‘transition theory’’ still proves useful.Over a professional career spanning more than 40 years, Warren Robinsongradually became a student of Notestein himself, discovering a world deeplydivided between a wealthy aging North and a South where economic under-development, resource scarcity and rapid population growth seemed to form aninextricable and terrible Malthusian trap. However, from 1945 to 1973, the peasantsfrom the Third World addressed with some success the most impressivedemographic challenge ever met in history, since food production indeed grewslightly faster than population. In the development economics of the 1960s, stilldeeply influenced by Keynesian theory, ‘‘surplus’’ was a key issue. Indeed, savingswere seen as the means to generate investments, which could push technologicalchange and consequently economic growth. However, poor countries wereobviously lacking any savings surplus and, instead, had a dramatic ‘‘surplus oflabour’’, particularly in the field of agriculture. Here, Robinson builds on Boserup’sfamous book about ‘‘The conditions of agricultural growth’’. Ester Boserupdeveloped the concept of creative difficulties, showing that demographic growthconstrained the peasants to innovation, and that when the conditions for endogenousdevelopment were met—i.e. a multi-sectorial economy and a positive social andM. Oris (&)University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerlande-mail: miche.oris@unige.ch123Eur J Population (2012) 28:383–384DOI 10.1007/s10680-012-9270-5political sanction of innovation—they indeed were more efficient than the policy-makers who promoted a reduction of population growth.Warren Robinson was one of the first influential economists and demographers toadhere to Boserup’s revision of the Malthusian dogma. He particularly contributedto extending and deepening the criticism of neo-Malthusian policies. Indeed, giventhat the basic components of population growth, mortality and fertility are directlyand indirectly related to the economic and social components of development,policies that directly target demographic behaviours without considering the widevariety of direct and indirect linkages are bound to fail. In several papers, somegrouped in part 2 of his book, Robinson studies some of those links, like educationand human capital, the cost of children within the domestic economy, femaleautonomy, etc.In part 3, Robinson defends and illustrates the idea that an efficient demographicpolicy must have robust theoretical foundations. He believes that the demographictransition theory, associated with John Bongaarts’ proximate determinants model,remains ‘‘the most useful general approach for understanding the past and also thefuture of population change in relation to environment’’ (p. 3). This belief isillustrated by the short provocative comment on the so-called ‘‘clash of civiliza-tions’’ in the last chapter, where Robinson argues ‘‘that most of the present hostilityand conflict stems from relatively familiar and powerful demographic and economicforces. The East (and South) are growing demographically but lag behind the West(and North) in technology and income per capita. Migration from one region to theother is a natural equilibration process, even if it is unsettling for all concerned. But,demographic growth rates are converging around the world and globalization andtechnology transfers are raising income standards in the LDCs. So the presentimbalances should gradually disappear, the migration streams should dry up and soshould the conflicts that have arisen’’ (pp. 314–315).I do not fully share this optimism since the future is by no means written, noteven by the demographic structures and the demographic transition process. Thisconclusion is, however, typical of someone who, over four decades, thought throughdemography. Robinson’s collection of essays illuminates a part of an intellectualhistory of which we are the heirs, and it can help us to think about our own way ofpositioning population issues in the still lively development debate. This is the mainadded value of bringing together these papers that are published in good journalsand therefore already widely available to researchers in economics and demogra-phy: they gain from being read together as an intellectual journey in the world ofideas.384 M. Oris123

Warren C. Robinson (ed.): Land, Labour and Population Growth: Theory, Policy and Case-Studies. Collected Papers from 4 Decades: Author House, Bloomington, Indiana, 2009, 320 pp., ISBN 978-1-4389-4788-4

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Warren C. Robinson (ed.): Land, Labour and Population Growth: Theory, Policy and Case-Studies. Collected Papers from 4 Decades: Author House, Bloomington, Indiana, 2009, 320 pp., ISBN 978-1-4389-4788-4

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