In The News

The Failure of Free Migration

Robert Skidelsky July 20, 2016
One immigrant’s brutal crime – using a truck to kill 84 people and injure hundreds during Bastille Day festivities in Nice, France – heightens mistrust for all immigrants and boosts support for a swift crackdown. “Throughout the Western world, a toxic mix of physical, economic, and cultural insecurity has been fueling anti-immigration sentiment and politics precisely at the moment when the...

Global Migration? Actually, The World Is Staying Home

Guido Mingels May 24, 2016
Despite news about waves of refugees fleeing conflict and poverty, the number of people on the move has held fairly steady for the past five decades. Less than 1 percent of the world’s population of 7.3 billion has migrated for any reason during the last five years. The Wittgenstein Center for Demography in Vienna delves into United Nations statistics and offers surprising findings. For example,...

Africa Faces Worst Drought in Half a Century

Bartholomäus Grill May 13, 2016
Drought is devastating some of Africa’s poorest countries, threatening water supplies, power generation and agriculture. Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Swaziland have declared states of emergency. But some nations, like Ethiopia, are in denial about the impact of the abnormal sea and air patterns known as El Niño and the continent’s inability to handle population growth. Ethiopia’s...

How the One-Child Policy Changed China

Aileen Clarke November 30, 2015
Before China imposed its one-child policy, Mao Zedong banned contraception and encouraged reproduction. “China’s food supply was strained and the government reversed the campaign against contraceptives,” writes Aileen Clarke for National Geographic. “From 1959 to 1961, the Great Chinese Famine killed an estimated 15 to 30 million people.” The country backtracked. The one-child policy eventually...

China’s New Economic Plan Tackles the Rebalancing Puzzle

Stephen S. Roach November 10, 2015
Early reports on China’s Five-Year Plan outlining the government’s strategic priorities for 2016 to 2020 indicate preparations for slowed yet more sustainable economic growth. The plan involves ongoing transition toward an economy that promotes service industries, private consumption, innovation and entrepreneurship. The plan endorses a diversified economy, emphasizing quality rather than...

China Abandons One-Child Policy

October 29, 2015
Human rights advocates have long blasted China for its strict one-child policy. Confronting an aging population and slowing growth, China’s Communist Party is scrapping a policy crafted to ease poverty and allowing two children per family. “China is trying and complete its transition from a[n] investment-and-export-dependent developing nation to a ‘moderately prosperous society’ with an economy...

Live Longer, Consume Less: Recipe for Slow Growth

Joergen Oerstroem Moeller October 20, 2015
Global growth no longer keeps the pace of just a decade ago. Researcher Joergen Oerstroem Moeller points to behaviors that contribute to reduced consumption: Life expectancy has risen, but ages for collecting pensions have remained steady at around age 60, thus stretching out the retirement stage of life. Fearing poverty, combined with increased uncertainty over government regulations and social...