modes of explanation in anthropological theorical model

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Modes of Explanation in Anthropological Population Theory: Biological

Determinism vs. Self-Regulation in Studies of Population Growth in Third WorldCountries

Bonnie Anna Nardi

American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 83, No. 1. (Mar., 1981), pp. 28-56.

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Modes of Explanation in Anthropological Population Theory:Biological Determinism vs. Self-Regulation in Studies ofPopulation Growth in Third World Countries

BONNIE NNANARDIDuke University

Anthropological theones of population growth in underdeveloped countries are con-sidered and it is argued that most studies have concentrated e x c l ~ ~ ~ ~ v e l yn either deter -ministic or sel f-re gu lato y factors in population growth without regard to their probableinterac tion. A research strategy is proposed in which self -re gu lato y actors, especially thedecision-making activities of individual parents, provide a p r im a y focus of study but withcareful attention to deterministic factors which constrain and influence the decision pro-cess. [population, underdevelopment, biology and self-regulation in population theory]

INTRODUCTION

THEVAST MAJORITY OF THE WORLD'S POPULATION lives today in countries which have Cometo be known as underdeveloped. Although these countries have strong economic ties tothe richer nations, their own economies have been unable to generate and distributewealth to large segments of their populations. Many of these countries share a colonialpast; others became underdeveloped by virtue of a system of foreign investment whichreturns profits to investor countries but does not seem to advance the economy of thehome country to an appreciable degree.

Underdevelopment has produced colossal changes in the human condition and pros-pect for tens of millions of people. Most underdeveloped countries began to experiencerapid population growth when they were European colonies, often following a period ofextreme depopulation (see Wagley 1940, 1951 Hunt, Kidder, and Schneider 1954; Lessa1955; Polunin and Saunders 1958; Dobyns 1963; Polgar 1974, 1975). Rapid growth con-tinued into the postcolonial period as societies which were once characterized by self-sufficient subsistence economies were transformed into underdeveloped societies via thetransition to a cash economy and dependence on a world market. Other countries werenot colonized but experienced the same transformation from independent subsistenceproduction to dependence on world markets, and the same rapid population growth.

BONNIE A. NARD1 receiveda Ph.D. in anthropology from the UniversityofCalifornia atl ~ n en 1977. She is currently a postdoctoral fellow of Duke University conducting a studyof fertility decision making in WesternSamoa.Among her recent papers ia "Use of Com-puter Simulation for Predicting Sociocultural Change" (in Predicting SociocultumlChange, Swan Abbot and John Van Willigcn, cds..Athens: University of Georgiab).

Copyright @ 1981 by the American Anthropological Association0002-7294/81/010028-29$3.40/128


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29ardi] FACTORS IN POPULA TION G RO WT HThis growth is unprecedented. If we compare the modem increase with the other ma-

jor population expansion-that of the agricuitural revolution-the difference is easilyappreciated. The population increase associated with the agricultural revolution actuallyproduced a sharper inflection in the population curve than the present increase (seeDeevey 1960; Polgar 1972). But in 8000 B.C. there were only approximately 5.5 millionpeople on earth (Deevey 1960:195)so that were the population to double, it would meanan increase to just 11 million. Today a doubling of the world population implies an in-crease to about 8 billion people, and the doubling time at current rates is approximatelyforty years.. .This level of population growth has been cause for considerable concern; the anxiouscommentary of the news media and the fastidiously documented predictions of disasterand collapse from the scientific community have been more than enough to fuel the im-age of the "population crisis" in the popular imagination. There has been, of course,much sober and reflective discussion of the causes and consequences of the currentpopulation increase; however extreme opinions abound and it is noteworthy that theprophets of doom, the eugenicists and the proponents of "triage"' come from the mostrespected universities, foundations, government agencies, and international organiza-tions in the world (see Polgar 1975).

Concern with prodigious-growth in the human population is not new. Whether we lookto the Reverend Thomas R . Malthus's Essay on the Principle of Population (1958) inwhich he cast the famous arithmetic/geometric growth ~ a r a d i g r n , ~r to the Tikopianchiefs who periodically sent forth canoes full of young men on "voyages of exploration"from which they were not expected to return (Firth 1970), we find serious theoretical andmethodological approaches-to problems of population growth. But only in the at-mosphere of the current debate is it possible to find an article on human population con-trol in a general volume on pest management: "Pest Management: Objectives and Pro-spects on a Global Scale" (Corbet 1971).

In spite of (or perhaps in response to) the metaphorical excesses of the current rhetoric(including bombs, booms, explosions, and pests), a great deal of careful scholarly work inmany disciplines has been devoted to study of the rise of the modem population. Much ofthis work is motivated by a concern with the formulation and/or evaluation of populationpolicies. Numerous population policies have been proffered for underdeveloped coun-tries by economists, demographers, political scientists, and anthropologists. Thesepolicies range from simple verbal and pictorial exhortationS in favor of small families tothe coercive policies backed by such phrases as "fitness for parenthood" (Hardin 1970)and "earthpest explosion" (Corbet 1971). Most policies assume a responsible stance in ad-vocating various types of social change which are expected to induce lower birth rates andthus slow population growth. In order to evaluate the probable success of these policies, itis necessary to have an understanding of the dynamics behind the spectacular increase inpopulation which continues unabated in many countries today.

Other investigators are motivated by more purely theoretical concerns. Is the currentlevel of growth primarily a result of changes in the biological environment of today'sworld-more medicine, improved nutrition, extensive disease control-or is it a productof human intention and rational action, the deliberate creation of large families? Does itshare some aspects of both, and if so, by what methods can we study the effective con-tribution of each biological or intentional factor which affects levels of populationgrowth? To what extent do "cultural" factors come into play and what is their relation-ship to biological process and rational action?This pape; will ieview anthropological theories of population growth. Studies outsidethe discipline which have had a significant impact on anthropological thinking will also


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SO A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [SS, 1981literature review in which the major biological and intentional factors of current interestin anthropological population research are examined.

D E T E R M I NA N T S O F P O P U L A T I O N G R O W T H : D ETERMIN ISTIC FA CTO RS V S. SELF-REG U LA TIO N

Population studies are typically concerned with three principal processes: fertility,'mortality, and migration. For purposes of studying globai population growth the first twoare primary since individuals can be added to and subtracted from the population viabirth and death only. Migration may be critical at regional or national levels, and since itmay affect both fertility and mortality, its influence upon those processes must be con-sidered when appropriate.Anthropological studies of population growth in underdeveloped countries are sharplydivided into two groups. The first group relies on explanations in which "deterministic"factors are used to explain rates of population growth. These factors involve no elementof personal choice or purposeful behavior; demographic outcomes are determined for in-dividuals by external factors over which they have no control. Deterministic factors im-pinge upon individuals in such a way that they make no deliberate decision as to theiroperation or outcome. They are primarily biological or environmental in nature, andthey affect both fertility and mortality. Involuntary sterility, diet, age, disease, andbreast-feeding influence fertility. Diet, age, disease, sanitation, exposure to high risk oc-cupations, and activities such as coal mining or automobile driving affect mortality.I have labeled these variables "deterministic"; whether they are truly deterministic in adeeper philosophical sense is another question. I would like to emphasize that it is an

open question a t this point. For example, most investigators would agree that the agingprocess may be regarded as strictly deterministic when it is considered as a factor influ-encing fertility. It is something over which the individual has no control. However, it canbe argued that there are in fact limited special situations in which even aging can be de-liberately modified to affect fertility in a desired way, such as the administration of hor-mones to enhance fecundity. One cannot categorically state that for all individuals in allsituations the effects of aging upon fertility are beyond individual control. It follows thatit is incumbent upon the investigator to specify the extent to which a given variable con-strains individual choice in a particular situation-with completely constrained choice ofcourse being one option.The example of aging is an extreme case; the notion of determinacy becomes muchmore problematic when considering variables relating to "social control" such as age atmarriage, social pressure from close relatives, or sterilization of a retarded person. Are anindividual's actions determined for him in these cases or not? The answer will dependupon the investigator's notion of freedom of choice, and ideas regarding the extent towhich culture dictates, determines, prescribes, or merely suggests.The second group of studies is concerned with self-regulation in population con-trol- the way in which individual parents deliberately manage their reproductive lives.These studies view demographic process as the outcome of human intention and rationalaction. Population regulation may include increasing or decreasing family size at the in-dividual level, or community size at the group level.Anthropological studies of population growth which consider self-regulation have con-centrated on the regulation of fertility. Ultimately the study of fertility regulation reducesto the study of the practice of fertility-regulating behavior- the use of birth control,abortion, infanticide, sterilization, abstinence. However, it is the reasons for the use of


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Nardi ] F A C TO R S I N PO P U L A T IO N G R O W T H 31self-regulation consider social, cultural, political, and economic factors to which peoplerespond in controlling their fertility.

Although one can divide the determinants of population growth into "deterministic"and "self-regulating" categories, the problem lies in ascertaining how various determi-nants operate in a given situation. The complexity of population problems shows up bothin terms of the number of variables which may be pertinent to the problem at hand andthe relative importance of each individual variable (see Hawthorn 1968; Olusanya 1971).Dealing with these problems is a major challenge of population research. It is also themajor shortcoming of most population studies to date. Thus far, most studies have con-centrated exclusively on one set of factors or the other, without regard to their probableinteraction.

As the following review will show, a large portion of the literature on populationgrowth in underdeveloped countries is devoted to examination of deterministic variablesonly. Human intention and the deliberate use of fertility-regulating practices are dis-regarded. Some investigators assume that conscious birth planning is unimportant ornonexistent, others that it is not amenable to analysis. Many approaches take the stancethat underdeveloped peoples do not consciously regulate their numbers, although pre-colonial (or preindustrial) and industrialized peoples do. A variant of this idea is that on-ly those Third World individuals who are in close contact with modem institutions suchas hospitals regulate family size. These explanations do not focus on the availability ofmodern methods of birth control as might be expected, but on attitudinal changes asso-ciated with development.

In certain contexts the strictly deterministic approach is useful and may providevaluable insights into the particular problem which the investigator has posed. This istrue primarily in two cases. The first case is comparative studies in which two regions ortime periods are being compared, and many factors can be carefully controlled. Here it isappropriate to focus on a deterministic factor without reference to individual motivation,provided there are no significant social changes or regional differences which could affectmotivation (e.g., Riley 1976). The second case is restricted to instances of low fertilitywhere a biological or environmental event has significantly decreased or destroyed fecun-dity, such as an epidemic of untreated syphilis. In this instance people do not have theoption of producing large numbers of children, whatever their desires might be.

These cases account for only a small number of studies. Most deterministic studies areextremely problematic because they rule out a pr ior i human intention and deliberate ac-tion regarding formation of the family. But these factors cannot be ruled out for severalreasons.

First, we know that people in all cultures and epochs have regulated fertility. In fact,there are many data to suggest that fertility regulation is a virtually universalphenomenon (Carr-Saunders 1922; Devereux 1967; Himes 1963; Polgar 1971, 1972,1975). Himes (1963) detailed the vast array of contraceptive, abortifacient, and steril-izing goods and services available in preindustrial societies in Africa, North America,South America, and "Australasia." Devereux (1967) examined abortion in 550"primitive, ancient and preindustrial societies." Langer (1974) cataloged the practice ofinfanticide in the West including Hellenistic Greece, medieval Europe, and 19th-centuryEngland (see also Kellum 1974). And it must be remembered that people can resort toabstinence and coitus interruptus to control fertility. Despite their obvious difficulties,these practices can lower fertility levels, if not offer the individual perfect control.(Demographers attribute the dramatic fertility decline of Europe after industrialization


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32 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981Investigators who focus on deterministic explanations of population growth must be

prepared to assert that the married individuals (and possibly others) in the populationsthey study are reproducing up o their biological limit, and that growth rates are essen-tially unaffected by the deliberate use of fertility-regulating techniques. This is anassumption underlying many studies which goes unstated but which is theoretically im-portant in attempting to delineate the determinants of population growth.

Investigations of population process which do not incorporate conscious control areproblematic for yet another reason. It is often extremely difficult to ascertain the in-cidence of infanticide, abortion, coitus interruptus, or abstinence. One can appreciate thedifficulty of eliciting information on such delicate topics. In no other situation are theage, sex, and marital status of the anthropologist likely to be so important . Special careand attention must be devoted to this topic if results are to be forthcoming.

Because anthropologists and others have demonstrated that the practice of fertilityregulation is a cross-cultural universal, varying in method and intensity of use, but neverabsent, studies confined to analysis of deterministic variables only must be regarded asseriously limited in aim and scope as they effectively cut us off from the possibility of in-vestigating how people plan and manage the creation of the family unit. It is more usefulto begin with the knowledge that our cultural heritage includes means of fertility andmortality control, and to attempt to explain motivations for family size and compositionin varying sociocultural contexts.

A number of anthropologists studying population self-regulation in underdevelopedcountries have begun to attempt such explanations. Although new, this research hasalready taken a very definite direction. Anthropologists studying population self-regulation in Third World countries have singled out socioeconomic conditions as theprincipal determinant of motivation at the individual level. People devise and executestrategies for family formation in response to their perceptions and understandings of thesocial and economic context in which they find themselves. Although there are manyother factors which could motivate people to desire a given family size (e.g. , religious fac-tors), current investigation has indicated that socioeconomic conditions are critical indetermining strategies of family formation.

Although these studies show promise of shedding new light on population dynamics inthe Third World, they can be criticized on the grounds that they utterly disregard thedeterministic factors, although infant mortality levels, maternal health, breast-feedingpatterns, etc, undoubtedly affect levels of population growth. Perhaps these factors havebeen set aside to provoke an appreciation of the self-regulatory process which is long over-due in Third World population research. But these deterministic factors should not bealtogether ignored; they can be considered as aspects of the environment to which peoplerespond in regulating their numbers. They do not have to be treated as first causes butcan be analyzed as important parts of the total environment affecting the individual inaddition to self-regulatory variables.

This paper will argue that both sets of factors affect demographic process and that tofocus on one set of factors to the exclusion of the other guarantees an incomplete ex-planation of levels of growth. However, a model in which all factors are thrown together,each to explain its "part of the variance," is to be avoided. A preferable approach is onewhich takes the self-regulatory process to be primary, but which incorporates determinis-tic factors that affect people who are attempting consciously to control their family (orcommunity) size.

I now turn to a critical examination of the anthropological population literature itselfwith an eye to what can be learned from existing work and where future research might


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Nardi] FACTORS IN POPULATION GROWTHDETERMINISTIC EXPLANATIONS OF POPULATION GROWTH

Demographic Transition TheoryThe most influential theory which attempts to explain population growth in the under-developed world is the theory of the demographic transition. It is not anthropological inorigin. Nevertheless, it is widely accepted in anthropology (see for example Benedict

1959; Geertz 1963; Elahi 1975; Frisancho, Klayrnan, and Matos 1976; Kaplan 1976;Page, Friedlaender, and Moellering 1977), and in most other disciplines as well,although, as Teitelbaum (1975) has pointed out, recent evaluations of demographic tran-sition theory have been very critical. This theory is discussed first because it is so taken forgranted in much of the literature as to be axiomatic.

Demographic transition theory posits three stages of demographic development. (SeeThompson 1928, Notestein 1953, and Teitelbaum 1975 for exposition of the theory.) Thefirst or "preindustrial" stage is characterized by high mortality rates deriving from theabsence of modem medicine, sanitation, and transportation (of food during famines). Inthis situation high fertility is necessary for the maintenance of society, and fertility levelsare close to or at the biological maximum of the population. Birth and death rates are inbalance.

In the next stage of demographic development preindustrial peoples adopt the afore-mentioned modem practices which lead to a dramatic decline in mortality. High fertili-ty, however, is maintained out of respect for the traditions of the "extended familyM5which evolved when children were an important source of agricultural labor (Teitelbaum1975). It is at this stage that the "population explosion" occurs; birth and death rates areout of balance. In the final phase the balance is restored. The transition to low fertilityoccurs because urban, industrial life lowers the economic value of children, specificallyby widespread or compulsory education which removes children from the labor force.

On the face of it, demographic transition theory appears to offer an explanation ofpopulation growth which involves a motivational factor, i.e., the economic value ofchildren. However, it implies that during the second stage of demographic developmentindividuals maintain high fertility essentially out of habit. It is not until people are in-dustrialized that they can rationally assess the costs and benefits of children, at whichpoint they realize that children are of low or negative economic value. During stage twochildren merely appear to be economically valuable, because of outdated ideologies.Thus population growth in underdeveloped countries is explained by the widespreadmortality control afforded by modem techniques and by adherence to a tradition of highfertility. Rational self-regulation of population size occurs only after industrialization.

Frequency of CoitusFrequency of coitus is a variable which is implicit in the social structural explanations

which seek to explain levels of population growth via several factors: age at marriage,family form, and presence or absence of migratory spouses. It is assumed that these socialstructural variables predict the probability of a person engaging in coitus according toproximity or presence of spouse. As currently formulated, age at marriage, family form,and presence of spouse are not seen as variables influencing the individual's desired fami-ly size (and thus factors in self-regulation). Frequency of coitus is sometimes termed "ex-posure to pregnancy"; often it is assumed to be perfectly obvious and left unstated.

Nag has done several studies which evaluate the degree to which frequency of coitus af-


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34 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981high Indian fertility could be attributed to the prevalence of joint families (Nag 1967).He found that fertility in joint families was actually lower than in simple families so thatthe joint family system could not account for the high rate of 1ndian fertility. Nag ex-plained the difference in fertility rates between joint and simple families by frequency ofcoitus which varied according to privacy and adherence to taboos on sexual intercourseduring menstruation. Simple families enjoyed more privacy and adhered to taboos lessoften (Nag does not explain why) and thus had higher fertility.In a study of fertility in Barbados, Nag (1971) found that low fertility there (in com-parison to other "non-industrial" societies) could be explained partially by unstable con-jugal relationships which are characterized by a "considerable period of time betweensuccessive unions when women are not exposed to the risk of pregnancy at all"(1971:109). This was a partial explanation, however, and Nag incorporated othervariables which will be discussed later.In another study Nag's data on frequency of intercourse show that this variable by itselfcannot explain fertility (Nag 1972). In order to counter the notion held by the Indianelite that sex is an "indoor sport" for the poor, Nag compared rates of coital frequency forIndian women and American white women of corresponding age groups. He found thatAmerican rates of coitus were higher than Indian rates, while Indian fertility was higher;therefore other factors were operative in determining fertility rates (1972:237).Montgomery (1976) studied the relationship between family form and fertility insouthern India. He compared fertility rates in four types of families: lineal extended, col-lateral extended, lineal-collateral extended, and nonextended (1976:51). His datashowed a "limited degree of interrelationship" between family form and fertility forsouthern Indians. As family form was a poor predictor of fertility level, Montgomery ad-vocated that research efforts focus on social, economic, and environmental factors to ex-plain variation in growth rates (1976:56).Gulick and Gulick (1975) found that early marriage of women in the Iranian city ofIsfahan contributed to population growth because of exposure to pregnancy (1975:252).Although they observed other factors to be at work in determining fertility levels, theyreported that parents did not regulate family size to any appreciable extent. Thoughmost wives wanted to limit the number of children they had, they were hampered by lackof culturally appropriate contraception and by influential mothers and mothers-in-lawwho encouraged pregnancy and early marriage.Nash and Nash (1963) studied population growth in Upper Burma. They chose thisregion because its growth rate was low for an underdeveloped area. They examined manypossible causal factors and concluded that the "population retarding factors" were: lateage at marriage, high percentage of unmarried adults, low rate of remarriage, high in-fant mortality, and abortion (p. 253).Riley (1976) evaluated Nash and Nash's (1963) analysis by comparing growth rates inThailand and Burma. He maintained that the two countries have comparable culture,society, and economy so that the social structural factors cited by Nash and Nash (1963)as influencing growth could be evaluated through a comparison of the two countries. Hefound that the Thai rate of growth was greater than the Burmese primarily because of ahigher rate of infant mortality in Burma and not because of the frequency of coitusvariable associated with late age at marriage, high percentage of unmarried adults, andlow rate of remarriage. He found in fact that frequency of coitus accounted for onlyabout 5 percent of the difference in fertility rates between the two countries (Riley1976:47).Roberts (1975) compared population growth rates for Fijians and Indian emigrants inFiji from 1921 to 1956. Indians had consistently higher rates of increase. Roberts at-


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35ardi] F A C T OR S I N P O P U L A T I O N G R O W T Hpercentage of unmarried Fijian women, and a lower Indian mortality rate. On the otherhand, he noted that in 1956 Fijian women had more "paid occupations" than Indianwomen and that this factor may also explain differential fertility between the two groups.A more detailed analysis, of the relative contribution of each factor such as Riley's (1976)analysis, might shed further light on the Fijian case.These studies show that the factor of frequency of coitus by itself does not go very fartoward explaining population growth levels. This variable is important because age atmarriage is so consistently employed as an explanation of fertility levels, especially bydemographers. By assuming that it is merely the frequency of coitus in marriage which isthe critical factor in fertility levels, it is easy to overlook the possibility that families areformed upon marriage deliberately and consciously, and do not simply result as a by-product of the marriage bed. A clearer understanding of the relationship between crea-tion of the family unit, frequency of coitus, and marriage requires attention to factors in-fluencing individual desires for family size and composition.Breast -feeding

Lactational amenorrhea associated with breast-feeding is a variable used by some in-vestigators to explain variation in fertility rates in the underdeveloped world. Althoughthere is currently a controversy as to the actual degree of contraceptive protection af-forded by breast-feeding and as to the physiological processes which are at work (seeFrisch and Revelle 1970; Frisch and McArthur 1974; Knodel 1977; Simpson-Htbert1977; Van Ginneken 1977; Winikoff 1978), anthropologists have begun to incorporatethis variable into their analyses of population growth in underdeveloped countries wherethe impact of European modes of production and ideologies has decreased the incidenceand duration of breast-feeding. Since the practice of breast-feeding may continue todecline in underdeveloped nations due to the efforts of multinational corporations to pro-mote infant formula, an understanding of its contraceptive effects is particularly impor-tant.Although it is not known how breast-feeding prolongs postpartum amenorrhea, thereare two major hypotheses. The first is that of Frisch and her colleagues (Frisch andRevelle 1970; Frisch and McArthur 1974; Frisch 1978) who believe that undernourishedwomen or women with little body fat do not have enough body fat or energy in caloriesfor menstruation to return after pregnancy. They believe that high levels of lactation"drain" the body of the energy required for ovulation.

Other investigators (Buchanan 1975; Knodel 1977; Simpson-Htbert 1977; Huffman,Chowdhury, and Mosley 1978) feel that suckling practices may be much more importantin determining the length of postpartum amenorrhea in lactating mothers than are dietand weight. They postulate a direct, positive relationship between the frequency andduration of breast-feeding, and lactational amenorrhea which operates via the hormoneprolactin. Production of prolactin is stimulated by suckling, especially during the firstthree months of breast-feeding (Buchanan 1975). This means that full breast-feeding willprolong lactational amenorrhea much more effectively than partial breast-feeding, andthat feeding on demand will be more effective than a few scheduled feedings. Huffman etal. (1978) studied lactational amenorrhea among 2,048 women in Bangladesh. Theyfound that lactational amenorrhea was only slightly related to nutritional status and thatmore significant factors were maternal age, socioeconomic status, and the supplementalfeeding of infants. Investigators engaged in breast-feeding research concur that muchmore study is needed before lactational amenorrhea is adequately understood (Simpson-Htbert 1977; May 1978).


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36 AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST [83, 1981population growth in underdeveloped countries. But this deterministic factor may proveimportant in explaining current high fertility rates in places where breast-feeding has de-clined, especially if future research supports those who claim a substantial contraceptiveeffect for breast-feeding.

However, this factor by itself is unlikely to account for population growth in under-developed nations for several reasons. First, prolonged breast-feeding is still universallypracticed in the rural areas of underdeveloped countries (Buchanan 1975; Knodel1977).These areas maintain high rates of growth and in many cases higher rates than neighbor-ing urban areas where breast-feeding is declining. This is true, for example, in areas ofIndia, Chile, Mexico, the Philippines, and Singapore (Berg 1973). If breast-feeding af-forded contraceptive protection to the point of lowering the birth rate, we would expectthe reverse to be true.

Next, it is possible to have an average completed family size of 11 children per womaneven while breast-feeding, as the Hutterites do (May 1978:494). This statement requiresqualification. The Hutterites are an extremely well nourished population, so if Frisch isright, then their short five-month period of lactational amenorrhea is not remarkable.Hutterite women schedule infant feedings because of their demanding work schedules,supplement other foods early in the infant's life, use pacifiers, and ciaim not to enjoybreast-feeding, so the suckling hypothesis could account equally well for the short dura-tion of amenorrhea. But the Hutterite case shows that it is possible to breast-feed andreproduce somewhere near the biological maximum at the same time.

Since women in rural areas of underdeveloped countries still breast-feed their infants,today's higher fertility rates cannot simply be the result of the disappearance of breast-feeding, as argued above. However, lactational amenorrhea could still be important ifthe contraceptive effect of breast-feeding has declined due to behavioral or physiologicalchanges associated with breast-feeding. Let us consider the current ideas on lactationalamenorrhea and changes in diet and/or suckling practices and how they might apply tounderdeveloped countries.Diet seems an unlikely explanation since it would be difficult to make a case that peo-ple in most underdeveloped countries are better nourished today than a few hundredyears ago. People have iess control over food production than formerly when agricul-turalists were relativelv self-sufficient, Land shortage, the switch from food crops to cashwcrops, and declining productivity due to soil depletion, erosion, and other problems ofoveruse contribute to food problems. Famine is not uncommon. (See Lapp6 and Collins1977 for a discussion of food shortage in the Third World.) Grain or tuber diets have longbeen the norm in these countries, so a dramatic shift from one type of food to another hasnot occurred.On the other hand, it is likely that suckling practices have changed; women in manycountries may have an increased workload due to participation in the cash economy.(Women themselves may participate in cash-earningactivities or they may take on addi-tional subsistence or household tasks as other family members shift their efforts to thecash sector-or both.) Nerlove (1974) has shown that women's workload and intensity ofbreast-feeding are inversely related, so current breast-feeding practices would yield lesscontraceptive effect. However, even now, periods of lactational amenorrhea averaging18-24 months have been reported from several countries (Huffman et al. 1978:1,155). Itis not known how much longer they might have been in the past. If we take the birth in-tervals of nomadic IKung as a baseline, we find that four-year birth intervals (May1978:493) imply a postpartum amenorrhea period of about 36 months-significantlyhigher than the 18-24 month average for underdeveloped countries today. We simply donot know whether this provides a baseline with which to compare precolonial popula-


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Nardi] F A C TO R S IN P O P U LA T I O N G R O W T H 37would be more comparable to the village IKung whose birth interval of less than threeyears (May 1978:493) implies a period of lactational amenorrhea of just about 18-24months, exactly as reported for some underdeveloped countries. Therefore if we are topostulate higher fertility for underdeveloped countries today than in their precolonialpast, it seems that the factor of changes in breast-feeding patterns alone is not likely toprovide adequate explanation.

There remains another significant factor in the problem: infant mortality. The resultsof several studies indicate that breast-fed infants have significantly higher chances of sur-viving to one year than those who are not breast-fed, although the extent of the differencevaries regionally (Knodel 1977:1,112). The net demographic effect of shorter periods oflactational amenorrhea and increased infant mortality due to decreased breast-feedingremains to be conclusively calculated. Knodel's research has suggested that most of theincrease in fertility to be expected from a shift from breast- to bottle-feeding would becounteracted by the reduced chances of survival associated with artificial means of infantfeeding (1977:1,114-1,115).

The following studies consider lactational amenorrhea and population growth inunderde~elo~edregions.omaniuk (1974) compared fertility levels of older and youngerJames Bay Indian women. He constructed complete reproductive histories for 427 ever-married women. He explained high fertility among young James Bay women as a func-tion of three deterministic variables: decreased breast-feeding, less pregnancy wastagedue to "medical progress," and less separation of spouses as ~ndians ave up nomadism.Romaniuk asserted that these variables fully explained increasing fertility in the modemcontext and stated that "relaxation of fertility restrictive customs" (abortion, infanticide,etc.) did not play a role in modernization (1974:350).

Bowers (1971) examined the demographic characteristics of populations in montaneNew Guinea which are undergoing "modernization." Her analysis-of increasing fertilitylevels in these societies is similar to Romaniuk's (1974). She pointed to shorter periods oflactation, increased access to medical facilities, i n d the adlabil ity of tinned hsh as theprimary determinants of increased fertility. Bowers did not hypothesize about themechanism by which tinned fish affects fertility; possibly the additional calories or pro-tein provided.by this food were thought to enhance fertility.

Hinshaw, Pyeatt, and Habicht (1972) studied population growth in HighlandGuatemala. They studied three communities, utilizing data from the past 35 years. Theyfound that both mortality and fertility rates declined. Mortality, especially child mortali-ty, declined more quickly than fertility, resulting in population growth. They explainedthe declining rate of fertility as a result of the decline in child mortality: lactationalamenorrhea was maintained longer since breast-feeding was not interrupted due to thedeath of a child.The authors also postulated a "culturally prescribed family size" (Hinshaw et al.1972:220) which people attempted to achieve. They concluded that "differences in birthand natural increase rates result as much from physiological and cultural factors not con-sciously controlled as from the efforts of the people to influence population increase"(1972:216). However, the authors stated that one community achieved longer birth inter-vals, and hence smaller families, because of "a heightened sense of responsibility forkeeping children alive." This sense of responsibility was due to a nearby health clinic, arising standard of living, and higher expectations for children (1972:228). Formerly,parents in the same village believed more in "predestination and fate" and thus felt less"personal guilt" regarding matters of child care (1972:228).The authors suggest that when the traditional cultural beliefs about "fate" and "paren-tal responsibility" of Highland Guatemalans are affected by such modern institutions as


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38 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981their children than they did before their contact with agents of modernization. Tradi-tional peasants appear in their familiar guise as fatalistic; they are depicted as acceptinglarge families which result, paradoxically, from their putative neglect of existingchildren. Modernizing peasants, on the other hand, gain control of their reproductivelives by adopting new attitudes about predestination and child care. Fertility levelsamong traditional peasants are seen to be determined by the strictly deterministic factorof breast-feeding, whereas fertility among modernizing peasants is modulated by con-scious control.

CharacterIn a large study of the fertility of women in villages in Kenya, Mexico, and the Philip-pines, Reining and her associates (1977) studied "motivation to limit fertility" withineach village. They determined that "character" was one of the key variables in explainingfamily size (p. 98).Character was defined as an intrinsic personal trait determined by historical and socio-economic conditions. Once formed it was not subject to self-regulation or to changes insocioeconomic status. As the authors saw it, poor women failed to regulate fertilitybecause of character traits associated with poverty. More prosperous women did regulatefertility because of character traits associated with prosperity. "The poorer women, morepassive and unconsciously despairing, were continuing to have the traditional largefamilies" (Reining 1977:98). Women "without hope" (a character trait) exhibited "ac.quiescence to large family size" (1977:7). The authors predicted that

. . . th e most characterologically productive women of the cas h-lab orin g gro up will be the firstto limit their families significantly. Such women understand clearly that in the newly emergingcash economy they can only support so many children and that limiting their families is impor-tant for economic survival [1977:97].Reining's study involved a large number of investigators, a large sample, and a cross-cultural format, and is of recent vintage, and yet fertility is explained by a rather un-adorned version of culture-of-poverty heory. Poor people are tradition-bound and fail toregulate family size because they do not clearly perceive their socioeconomic situation.Their more prosperous counterparts have greater insights into their actual situation andchoose to limit offspring, behaving in a rational manner. Like many investigators (e.g.,demographic transition theorists, Hinshaw et al. [1972]) Reining links large families,tradition, poverty, and irrationality. This approach has been severely criticized as un-inspired and ethnocentric by other investigators who find the stereotype of the fatalisticpeasant of little use in understanding demographic process. The work of these in-vestigators is discussed below.

Venereal DiseaseIn a large statistical cross-cultural study of fertility in "non-industrial" societies, Nag(1968) found significant associations for only three variables: postpartum abstinence,sterility, and venereal disease. These three variables were of course associated with low

fertility, and, as Nag pointed out, sterility and venereal disease are causally related. Heconcluded that venereal disease leading to sterility is the most important cause of low fer-tility in nonindustrial societies (1968:146). Nag's paper is to be commended for under-scoring the importance of a variable which is often overlooked but which can have


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Nardi ] F A C TO R S I N P O PU L A T I O N G R O W T HChief ly C ontrol

Anthropologists working primarily with Oceanic societies have proposed thatprecolonial populations successfully limited their populations via control exerted at thecommunity level by chiefs or community leaders. In precontact times these leaders werecareful to promote population regulation because they were aware of the ecological limitsof their environments. They may have been motivated by a desire to foster the well-beingof their subjects, to avoid channeling land and labor into food crops, or to maintainpolitical buffer zones between rival groups (by reserving land which might be inhabitedor cultivated otherwise) (Nardi 1974). Population control ceased when chiefly authoritywas undercut by European penetration. ~ a t an support of this hypothesis come primari-ly from Oceania, but Polgar (1971, 1972) suggested that it might be of general ap-plicability.

Firth (1970) reported that Tikopian population growth was regulated by bachelorhoodof the young male members of a family and by "sea-voyaging" (one-way tickets for youngmen selected by chiefs). Decisions regarding marriage and sea-voyaging were madeaccording to assessment of food resources by chiefs and family heads. Firth also notedthat coitus interruptus, abortion, and infanticide were practiced so it is not clear whetheror not individual self-regulation was also important. However, it is clear that after mis-sionaries established themselves in Tikopia they discouraged abortion, infanticide, sea--voyaging, and bachelorhood.

Borrie, Firth, and Spillius did a restudy of the Tikopian population in 1952 (Borrie,Firth, and Spillius 1957). The use of abortion and infanticide were apparent. The periodof study coincided with a famine which the authors suggested may have motivated the useof these fertility-regulating echniques. Borrie et al. maintained that mortality, not birthcontrol, limited the rate of growth to 1.4 percent per annum during the period from 1929to 1952. However, infanticide and abortion were practiced and mortality figures includ-ed infanticides so that a purely deterministic explanation based on mortality rates re-quires re-examination.

Bayliss-Smith (1975a) examined the demographic history of several central Polynesianoutlier populations. He observed three demographic stages: decline, stability, and rapidincrease. He attributed the r a ~ i dncrease to missionaries who forbade the once-commonpractices of abortion and infanticide. On the island of Sikiana the government issued aprohibition on infanticide and abortion which was followed by a "sudden spurt of popu-lation growth . . . unexplained by mortality" (1975a:334). Bayliss-Smith suggested thatthe prohibition was "reinforced by the decay of traditional authority . . . and the conver-sion of the population to Christianity in 1930" (1975a:334).

Carroll (1975) provided a slightly different perspective on the loss of population regu-lation at the community level. He studied Nukuoro, a Polynesian outlier. He hypothe-sized that in the contemporary colonial situation, community members "are rapidly los-ing their sense of how the ecosystem fits together" (1975:393). Because of a high rate ofout-migration Nukuoroites do not really know how many of their number really exist.Carroll conjectured that if for some reason they all had to return to Nukuoro there wouldbe a population crisis. It is quite possible that with changing labor and immigration lawsin the Pacific, a large number of Nukuoroites might be forced to return home, soCarroll's concern is not unwarranted. However, for now, out-migration is an effectiveform of population regulation in Nukuoro.

Bayliss-Smith (1975b) argued in a similar way for the island of Ontong-Java. He sug-gested that the initial increase in population in Ontong-Java was a response to depopu-


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40 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 981of postpartum abstinence, improved health of women, reduction in fetal loss and infantdeaths, improved female longevity, and less widowhood. However, he concluded:

The responsibility for the decision-making that controls, or fails to control, the demographicsystem is . . . being transferred from the village level to the national level, . . . this change inspatial scale . . . seems to be accompanied by a loss in the efficiency of a population's response tostress signals from its environment [1975b:472].

Bayliss-Smith maintained that when Ontong-Javanese society was "small-scale" it wascharacterized by "the conscious use of fertility checks" (1975b:473). However, sinceOntong-Javanese now migrate to the Solomon Islands to ezrn cash, they have attained a"national" perspective which does not recognize the need for fertility limitation. AsBayliss-Smith sees it , the current population increase is a result of the outcome of biolog-ical process, i.e. , improved health of women and the other factors cited, whereas before,growth was controlled in response to stress signals in the e n~i ronment .~

The loss-of-chiefly-control hypothesis incorporates some aspects of both the deter-ministic and self-regulatory approaches. However, it is ambiguous with regard to the ac-tual mechanism triggering growth. Did people consciously choose to have large familiesout of respect for Christian belief, gladly abandoning abortion and infanticide? Or whenthese methods were banned by missionaries were people simply stuck without the triedand true methods they had come to rely upon, momentarily lacking in suitable tech-nology?

Some of the same investigators who suggested that missionary influence affected fertili-ty have also proposed that postcontact population growth was a response to the extremedepopulation caused by the spread of European diseases (Polgar 1971; Bayliss-Smith1975b). Since the recovery of the population was concurrent with mission efforts andoverall European penetration, it is difficult to separate out possible motivational factorsfor a desire to repopulate on the one hand and adherence to religious teachings orgovernment edicts on the other hand. In any case, growth rates have continued to be highin Oceanic (and other) populations in spite of the availability of family planning servicesand government programs to encourage their use.

Lambert (1975) provided an example of the failure of government programs of popu-lation control to limit population growth in a study of Makin Islanders in the Gilberts. Hesuggested that Europeans were responsible for the cessation of infanticide, abortion,observance of the custom of postpartum abstinence, and the practice of periodically"sending large groups of people into exile," all of which served to regulate populationgrowth. In addition, Lambert observed that population increase occurred after "thenatives began to obtain access to Western medicines" (1975:26&).As a means of dealing with their rising population Makin Islanders have developedvoluntary associations for improving agricultural production and for increasing income.Although the government has instituted a family planning program because it is con-cerned about overpopulation, the program has not been effective in limiting fertility.Lambert noted that Makinese oppose contraception on religious grounds but also thatchildren are valued because they perform household tasks and generate cash by workingaway from Makin and remitting to relatives who have not left the island. Further study isrequired to untangle the effects of European medicine, religious belief, and the economicvalue of children on Makin.Summay

Most of these studies have focused rather narrowly on deterministic factors in explain-


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Nardi] F A C T OR S IN P O PU L A T I O N G R O W T H 4 1(1972) and Montgomery (1976) have concluded that this approach permits limitedunderstanding of the demographic process in underdeveloped nations, while others haveseen fi t to explain population growth purely in terms of a few deterministic variables. Atthe worst these studies leave us with the conclusion that the societies studied practice nobirth control, increase up to their biological limit, and are qualitatively different frompreindustrial and "modem" societies where birth control is practiced in a rational man-ner. At best they bring to our attention important deterministic factors which can behandled in future analyses in more complex ways. Instead of continued attempts to ex-plain population growth in the underdeveloped world in simplistic deterministic fashion,perhaps we can look forward to more sophisticated models which incorporate thesevariables but which stress self-regulation by individuals.

SELF-REGULATION

Value of ChildrenAnthropologists interested in self-regulatory variables in population growth in under-

developed countries have devoted their attention primarily to the factor of labor de-mand. Children are produced for the purpose of their potential labor power. Thoughthere are many different versions of demand-for-labor theory in anthropological popula-tion analysis, they are united by the premise that family size can be predicted from thelabor demands of the productive system.

Some anthropological applications of demand-for-labor theory derive from Marxisttheory and consider "social forces" rather than self-regulation by individuals. Howeverthey are included here as theories of self-regulation since they imply it (rather than anydeterministic factors).

Adam Smith (1776) provided an early formulation of demand-for-labor theory. Hebelieved that "the demand for men . . . necessarily regulates the production of men."Coontz (1961), an economist, attributed his elaboration of demand-for-labor theory toSmith. Since Coontz has influenced recent anthropological work in population, histheory will be reviewed here.

The basis of Coontz's theory is that demand for labor regulates the supply of labor, orfertility: "Population is the dependent variable reflecting both long-and-short-runchanges in demand for labor" (1961:2). Coontz considered that a reduction in the qualityof labor with a concomitant increase in the quantity needed, is the situation mostfavorable to population growth (1961 172).Coontz's theory is a direct challenge to demographic transition theory. Where demo-graphic transition theory attributes population increase in underdeveloped countries toone change only-that of mortality decline-Coontz attributed it both to a change inmortality and a n important change in the economic system, increased demand for labor.

It is generally held that the increase in population in colonial areas is due entirely to the mortalitydecline. . . . Certainly . . . mortality [is reduced]. However, unless in the long-run thereare . . . changes in demand for labor, a continued increase in population is inconceivable[1961:192].

An increase in family size must be accounted for by some phenomenon which Coontz sawas demand for labor, stimulated by the imposition of the colonial economy in which laboris needed to exploit the agricultural and extractive capacities of the colonies.

Marx's version of demand-for-labor theory appeared in Capital (1887). He noted thatlaborers produce a "relative surplus population" which forms a disposable industrial


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42 A M E R IC A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981tion tha t a portion of the laboring population is unemployed or underemployed- a massof human material always ready for exploitation.Marx's conceptualization of demand for labor is problematic in its sketchiness. Under-lying his hypothesis is one of two propositions. Either (1) individual parents are in a situa-tion of severe underemployment but in which the extreme poverty of the family cannevertheless be alleviated by children's economic contributions, or (2) the "needs ofcapitalism" dictate a mass of human material always ready for exploitation. The latterinterpretation has been utilized in recent Marxist analyses (e. g. , Yengoyan 1974; Faris1975) although it is unsatisfactory in its simplistic functionalism. It is to be hoped thatfuture Marxist analyses consider the question not from the point of view of abstractcapitalist forces but from that of the unemployed and underemployed proletariat.Faris (1975) hypothesized that in situations where there is "producer control" there willbe lower birth rates. This is because capitalism requires increasing population growth asit requires expanding production. With the emergence of class structures "producers nolonger really control decisions about population planning, but reproduce in terms of thedemands of the production system, now controlled by the ruling classes" (1975:265). Insupport of this point Faris cited Mamdani's (1974) work (discussed more fully below)which details the economic advantages to the individual peasant of large family size.Faris suggested that when producer control is implemented birth rates will fall, in fact"reproduction planning will . . . come into being with no trouble" (1975:265). Why thisshould happen is not intuitively obvious. Faris cited contemporary China as an exampleof this move to reproduction planning. However, Side1 (1972) and Banister (1977)reported that massive educational campaigns including the employment of local healthworkers to disseminate information, widespread distribution of contraceptive methods,and successful government efforts to transform the creation of a small family into ameaningful political act have in fact caused Chinese birth rates to decline. In addition,an increase in the age of marriage and celibacy before marriage have been enjoined to agreat extent. This does not square with Faris's notion of trouble-free reproduction plan-ning, and his Chinese example is unconvincing.

Yengoyan (1974) analyzed fertility in different sectors of the rural Philippine economy.He compared fertility levels among fishpond owners, fishpond laborers, deep-sea fishers,and tenant farmers. These occupations have different labor requirements and Yengoyanmaintained that birth rates and "indices of fertility are . . . responses to differentiallevels of labor inputs" (1974:58). His analysis showed that fishpond owners had thesmallest families (2-5 children) and tenant farmers the largest (7-8). Deep-sea fishers andfishpond laborers were intermediate (exact family sizes for these groups were not given).Yengoyan is not entirely consistent in his analysis of fertility and labor requirements,sometimes arguing at the level of the individual, and other times at that of the group. Heexplained that the fishpond owners have lower fertility because their operations requirelittle labor and much capital. They do not seek family labor and have a "perceivableideology" that many children are a burden. Fishpond laborers and deep-sea fishers dohave "large" families. The "excess" labor of these families migrates to seek employmentin sugar and rice cultivation. At this point Yengoyan's explanation is more Marxian as heasserts.Exceu labor moves from fishponds and deep-sea fishing economies to rice and sugar cultivation,both of which have the ability to absorb labor for increasing specialization of agricultural tasks.Furthermore, high labor inputs are causally interrelated with the maintenance of increasingsugar and rice production. . . . The fertility of local populations which are involved in rice andsugar cultivation is high due to this continuous process of labor absorption [1974:64] .


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43ardi] F A C T O R S I N P O P U L A T I O N G R O W T Hductive system, but he did not enumerate the factors influencing the decisions of the in-dividual laborer as he did for the fishpond owners. Rather he maintained that high fer-tility is a necessary feature of the agricultural mode of production and therefore exists:"With the existence of a sugar industry based on labor intensity and the absence of mech-anization, the internal popGlation must respond to labor demands in maintaining and in-creasing levels of production" (1974:67, emphasis added).

Yengoyan's explanation of the fertility of fishpond owners took into account both themode of production and individual decision-making processes. Since Yengoyan couldpredict fertility level from the mode of production a n d explain how individuals fit intothe economy of which they are a part , this approach seems more fruitful than stopping atthe more abstract level. Prediction of fertility rates will be enhanced by careful analysesof individual decision makers to ascertain exactly which aspects of the mode of produc-tion bear upon their decisions. Yengoyan hinted that further analysis of his Philippinedata might lead in this direction, noting that the sisal economy in Brazil (which is similarto the Philippine economy) "forc[ed] more family members into the labor market inorder to maintain household incomes at existence levels" (1974:70).Other recent Marxist analyses suggest that the "creation of a labor force," i. e. , highrates of fertility, in underdeveloped countries is the result of economic pressures on theindividual. In a study of rice-prbducing peasants in West Sumatra , ~ a h n1975) foundthat fertility was responsive to a demand for cash generated by taxation and fluctuationsin the price of rice. "The periodic depressions in the rice-producing areas, combined withthe need for a cash income in order to pay the tax, served to create a labor force"(1975: 149).

Some studies have focused on demand for labor in the individual household. Childrenare seen as valuable because they contribute to household production and/or earn cashthrough participation in the market economy. They may migrate to areas where wagework can be found and remit money to parents on a regular basis. They are also a form ofold-age security, caring and providing for parents who are aged or disabled.

Many anthropologists have noted that parents regard children as economic assets.Richards and Reining (1958) compared urban and rural Baganda households. Theyreported that in rural households children were valued because they provided householdhelp, increased wealth, and enhanced household status. Costs of children were low. Intown the costs of children increased dramatically because of school fees and higher urbanprices, and they were therefore of less economic value.

Swartz (1969) studied the way in which beliefs about children affect the number andsex of children desired, and actual family size and composition. He compared three EastAfrican societies- the rural Bena and Hehe of Tanzania and the urban Luo of Kenya.He found that in all three groups having children was an important aspect of being ingood moral standing in the community. All spoke of their children as wealth and dis-cussed the material benefits and old-age security to be gained through children.

Gulick and Gulick (1975) reported that the Iranian city dwellers they studied did notassess the costs and benefits of children. But thev noted that Iranians sav that " 'childrenare poor people's only fortune,' " and that parents hope "for vicarious achievementthrough the worldly success of their children" (1975:290). Children also provide old-agesupport to Iranian parents.

Some anthropologists have tried to pinpoint more specifically than these studies theconditions under which children's labor is of value to parental households. These in-vestigators concur that in a situation characterized by poverty, a demand for cash, andopportunities for productive labor for children, children are likely to be viewed byparents as economically valuable.


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44 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981observed that the overall demand for labor in underdeveloped countries was paralleledby demand for labor in the peasant household as peasants strove to meet the demands ofoverlords, tax farmers, and money lenders. Polgar maintained that, up to a point, thecost of children in peasant households was offset by their work contribution duringseasonal peaks of high labor demand (1972:207-208). He (1971) hypothesized that insituations of declining agricultural yields per acre which characterize many under-developed economies, large numbers of children are especially valuable to increase cropyields through labor intensification. Where external authorities impose productionquotas for foods that will be consumed outside the peasant family, a situation equivalentto declining yields is created and labor again becomes extremely valuable.Mamdani (1974) provided useful insights into how children's labor affects the fertilitydecisions of Indian peasants. He studied a village in which a large well-funded familyplanning program (the Harvard Khanna study) had failed in its objective of lowering fer-tility. In this study the villagers accepted the birth control pills offered by the programadministrators, but threw them away (or, in one case, constructed a modernisticsculpture of them).Mamdani interviewed people of different castes to find out how children figured intheir economic strategies. He found that for farmers the cheap labor provided by sonswas their most valuable asset. Not only could sons work the family land, but some sonscould be sent away to work as wage laborers, accumulating savings which could then beused to purchase more land. Having many sons allowed a farmer to diversify hiseconomic "portfolio."Mamdani argued that today's farmer cannot afford to be concerned about tomorrow'sfragmentation of land- that is the next generation's problem. Labor is the current prob-lem. He also argued that although Indian farm wage laborers may be seasonally un-employed, with a large family more can be earned and saved during the busy season.An interesting case in Mamdani's study was that of the blacksmiths. Blacksmiths in In-dian villages now have very little work. It would seem that large families would beburdensome since the sons of a blacksmith cannot be put to work as can those of thefarmer. However, the blacksmiths explained to Mamdani that sons are economicallyvaluable because they can be sent out to do wage labor and save a portion of their earn-ings. With these savings one son can learn the skills required to work on the new machinescoming to the village as some farmers mechanize. Eventually the wages of this son can beused to pay school fees to educate another son who may then get a well-paying job. Theearnings of the educated son then go to help sons down the line.Mamdani reported that the villagers did not believe that the Harvard study was really astudy because it is obvious that children are a necessity (1974:27). They were furtherpuzzled because the study cost so much-clearly such an expensive project must have animportant purpose, although the villagers could never figure out what it was.

Marshall (1972) also studied the economic value of children in an Indian village. Hisfindings were similar to Mamdani's. In addition, he reported that a man could borrowmoney more easily if the creditor knew that he had several sons who would share theobligation to pay a debt; so sons were an important form of collateral. Kinship ties estab-lished between families at the time of a marriage of a son or daughter implied financialhelp which could be counted upon in the future. Children engendered few costs, in-cluding opportunity costs. Neither husbands nor wives produced children at the expenseof any other economic activity.White (1973) studied population growth in colonial Java. He drew on Coontz's (1961)demand-for-labor theory but placed the focus of study on demand for labor within thefamily (White 1973:230). He reasoned that in Java, a "western-induced drop in mortali-


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45ardi] F A C T O R S IN P O P U L A T I O N G R O W T Hticide, abortion, and possibly systematic undernourishment of children) had there beennothing to encourage the maintenance of high levels of fertility (1973:224). However,high fertility was encouraged by the execution of the colonial policies of the Dutch whodemanded taxes and rent of the Javanese peasants, requiring the peasants to increaseproduction to fulfill their obligations to the government. The only way for peasants to in-crease production was to increase labor, which they produced themselves in the form ofchildren. White hypothesized that (1) children probably became net producers at veryyoung ages, (2)Javanese peasants endeavored to maintain standards of living and leisure,and (3) at certain times of the year adult labor was maximally utilized to performseasonal agricultural tasks at which times children's labor was extremely valuable.

White's theory suggests that the imposition of a colonial economy which calls upon theindividual household to increase production will lead to an increase in population if thehousehold has little or no capital to invest. This situation can continue into the post-colonial country in which the society and economy are conceived of as "underdeveloped"and agriculturalists still have only the production of labor power with which to produceincome.White also noted that though many underdeveloped countries appear to have wide-spread unemployment, in fact people are not idle but are employed in "increasinglyunderproductive activities, that is, activities demanding increasingly long hours of laborto insure a minimal level of subsistence" (1973:219).

White has conducted field studies of children's economic contributions to thehousehold in contemporary Java (White 1975; Nag, White, and Peet 1978). This workmakes a quantitative assessment of children's actual contributions to the householdeconomy. Data from this research show that "the children in large families tend to worknot less but more than those in small families" so that large families are actually moreproductive, probably because children in large families "are encouraged to begin work atan earlier age" and because "older children of large families are freer to engage in 'direct-ly productive' activities because their younger siblings do the household chores" (Nag etal. 1978:299, emphasis added). Boulier (1976), Cain (1977), and Peet (Nag et al. 1978)have also conducted studies of children's labor in the Philippines, Bangladesh, and Nepalrespectively. Their data indicate that children are economically valuable to their parentsat young ages.

Children's labor may also be economically valuable to parents if children migrate awayfrom rural areas to towns or cities where wage labor work can be obtained. In many caseschildren remit cash to parents, even after they have grown. This cash may be a large por-tion of the parents' income. A study by Caldwell (1974, 1977) showed that in NigeriaYoruba children who migrate to an urban area remit money to parents and also provideother benefits associated with urban life. They contribute money to village projects,ceremonies, and festivals which brings honor to their parents. They may use their in-fluence in town to secure teachers, roads, electricity, or a water supply for their village.Parents can enjoy a visit to town, meet their children's important friends, or arrange forthe education of another child (1974:19-20).Caldwell maintained that the high fertility of Yoruba villagers is explained bychildren's contribution to household labor and their potential as members of the urbanelite. Villagers "maximize the chance of success" through

a kind of lucky dip principle, or the backing of many horses; with a large number of childrenthere is a good chance that at least one will do well, and one elite salary will outweigh the earningsof a string of children working in traditional or poor urban occupations and will make up for ex-penditure on several educations. [In addition ;here is] the value of sibling chain of assistance[1974:40].


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46 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981their nonmigrant parents. Shankman's (1976) data showed that the remittances of Sa-moan overseas migrants totaled 50 percent of the cash income of Western Samoans in1974 (1976:38). Average completed family size was 7.6 children. Shankman reviewed theliterature on migrant remittances and found that this phenomenon is widespread, occur-ring in such places as Ghana, Nigeria, Upper Volta (Gugler 1968), Lesotho (Hance1970), India (Lelyveld 1970), and Mexico (Miracle and Berry 1970)- Although theauthors of these studies did not make the connection between migrant remittances andlarge family size as Caldwell did, further analysis to test the association seems warranted.

A good test of the hypothesis concerning the economic value of children will be provid-ed by studies done in underdeveloped countries with relatively low fertility. Unfortunate-ly there are few studies available which evaluate children's labor value. Nag's (1971)study of fertility in Barbados is suggestive. This study indicated that when economic op-portunities for utilizing children's labor are minimal, children are not of economic valueand fertility levels are lower. Low fertility in Barbados during the 1940s was partially afunction of increasing pressure on land, decreasing opportunities for emigration, andlack of prospects for rapid industrialization (1971:117). Family planning in Barbados hasbeen accepted because of "knowledge among most people that the island has a very highdensity and few opportunities for increasing the standard of living" (1971:121). Thisstudy suggested that children could not be profitably employed because of land shortage,barriers to emigration and income from remittances, and few job prospects in the in-dustrial sector. Children will be economically valuable only where opportunities exist forthem to engage in income-producing work, or to assume tasks which allow parents to seekincome-producing work.

None of these studies of the economic value of children considers the effects of patternsof breast-feeding, levels of infant mortality, maternal health, or any of the other deter-ministic factors on the growth rate of the society studied. Although they speak to the issueof "high fertility," a more precise approach to the problem which would focus on exactfamily size is impossible. Parents in one society, Society A, may have a demand for house-hold labor identical to that in Society B, and yet if women breast-feed for two years in theformer and one year in the latter, family sizes may differ, other things being equal. Thus,although studies of the economic value of children have provided considerable insight in-to parental motivation for large families in Third World nations, most have failed toanswer, or even to ask, Why are not these families even larger? If children are so valuableto parents, why aren't there even more of them? Family sizes rarely approach the averagecompleted family size of the Hutterite community of 11 children per woman.'

Nag et al. (1978) have suggested that very young children may impose a financialburden on families since they contribute little or nothing to their parents. Thus parentsbeginning their families attempt to avoid closely spaced births which would result in abrood of toddlers whose benefits do not yet exceed their costs. Spacing offspring of coursetends toward decreasing family size, so that if true, this hypothesis would help to explainwhy family sizes are not larger even where children are economically valuable.

Many other factors could also account for these less than maximum family sizes, in-cluding both deterministic and self-regulatory factors. Infant mortality, lactationalamenorrhea, and maternal mortality and morbidity are some deterministic factors whichshould be considered. Even where children are economically valuable, women may notbe willing to continue the physical burdens of pregnancy, childbearing, and breast-feed-ing after they have reached a certain family size, or to accept the consequences of shortintervals hetween births. Families of, say, six or seven children may be deemed sufficient


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48 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83 , 1981CONCLUSION

Cu rren t anthropological stud ies of d em ogr aph ic process which add ress the question ofindividual mo tivation have imputed motivation rath er th an having actually studied it perse. Cho ices for large o r sma ll families, boys or g irls, closely space d or widely spaced birthsare inferred from analysis of prevailing socioeconomic conditions. While this is a goodbeginning, our understanding of Third World population dynamics will be seriouslylimited if fu tur e investigation is confined to inference and attribu tion of motive. In con -gruities and ambiguities in current models of self-regulation have already arisen fromthese limitations. For exam ple, Nag et al. (1978) argu ed tha t children in Nepal a n d Javaare economically valuable and therefore provide an incentive to parents for largefamilies. They presented careful, detailed quantitative data to support this hypothesisand their data are entirely convincing on the matter that, from an "objective" stand-point, children are economically valuable. However, the authors are left in the positionof having to h edge on w hether this demo nstrated economic value is actually a motivationfor high fertility. They explicitly avoid coming to grips with this problem. In their con-clusion they s tate:

Without any assumptions as to the conscious strategies or decisions adopted by parents withregard to fertility, the pattern of actual reproductive behavior in the Javanese and Nepalesevillages (with births spaced at an average interval of more th an three years) may b e regarded as amechanism which enables the parents to achieve a relatively large number of surviving childrenwhile avoiding the extreme pr;ssures on the h ousehold econom y that would result from uncon-trolled fertility [19 78:30 0-301 , emphasis ad ded].It is unf ortun ate th at the auth ors dismissed the problem by reference to "a m echa nism ,"but the fact that they felt compelled to raise the issue in their concluding remarks sug-gests that they recognize that underlying their analysis is the assumption of some type ofreproductive strategy. The study of such strategies is the very next step in achieving afuller und erstan ding of reproductive behavior a nd de mo grap hic process. Th ere is a needfor the direct study of decisions, strategies, plan s, an d motivations to avoid the co ntinu alneed for theoretical hedges which are unnecessary and obscure important areas of in-quiry.Fu rth erm or e, it is interesting to n ote th at the work of Ma md ani (1974) is widely citedby anthropologists, demographers, economists, and others (whether or not they agreewith his conclusions). While M am dan i did no t develop a formal decision mo del, he vivid-ly depicted the economic pressures facing individual India n villagers and he po rtrayed indetail their perceptions a nd concerns.It is in this area that anthropologists can make a significant contribution to ThirdW orld p opulation studies. Demographers, economists, and others have concentrated ondeveloping large-scale surveys and working with mathematical models frequently besetwith unrealistic assumptions and para me ters which ar e very general estimates taken fromhighly aggregated da ta (see Nag 1976 on this p ~ i n t ) . ~hile these app roaches have merit,they cannot come to terms with the question of how individuals actually structure theircho ice-m akin g behavior in th e critical area of family form ation . Anthrop ologists, havinga w ell-developed sensitivity to th e local con text an d familiarity w ith studies which focuson the individual in society, can begin to move in this direction. The anthropologicalstudy of decision-making behavior has ad vanced g reatly in recent years (see Geoghegan1973; H . Gladwin 1975; C. Gladwin 1976, 1979; Barlett 1977; Qu inn 1975, 1976, 1978;Young 1978) an d the models an d methods w hich have emerged from these studies shouldbe utilized for the study of demographic behavior.That such work has not already been initiated may be related to a bias in recent


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49ardi] F A C T O R S IN P O P U L A T IO N G R O W T Hhas tended to "import models and techniques from the methodologically more advanceddiscipline of economics" (1978:206), a profession which stresses prediction from "objec-tive" quantitative data, not subjects' own reflections of their economic behavior. This hasled anthropologists "to discount verbal reports as legitimate data" (1978:222).

Exclusive reliance on this econometric approach is liable to steer anthropologists awayfrom important questions about self-regulation in the demographic process. Studies ofindividual choice which "introduc[e] people's own explanations of what they are doinginto models of economic behavior" (Quinn 1978:222) will enhance anthropologicalpopulation studies by centering on exactly how individuals perceive, manipulate, andrespond to the economic (and other) conditions which are thought to influence theirbehavior. By focusing on individual decisions we can discover how external factors im-pinge upon individual decisions, not how we imagine they impinge upon them. Withoutsuch a focus we are left at the level of inference characterized by the disciplines ofeconomics and demography, and, in addition to the fact that our inferences may simplybe wrong, we are bereft of the possibility of attaining a deeper understanding of people'sintentions and aspirations regarding the creation of the family unit.Decision models will be extremely useful in population studies because they can bestructured to provide for the incorporation of both deterministic and self-regulatory fac-tors. These would be conceptualized in a decision model as "completely determined alter-natives and those which are completely optional" (Quinn 1975:41). By viewing alter-natives as a continuum (Quinn 1975) with completely determined alternatives at one endand completely optional alternatives at the other, it is no longer necessary to formdichotomies of deterministic and self-regulatory factors, or worse, to ignore one in favorof the other.

The use of a decision-making continuum immediately introduces the notion that fac-tors affecting demographic process must be assessed for the degree to which they offer theindividual a choice. Such a conceptual framework explicitly directs the investigator tospecify where on the continuum a variable falls and why. It forces the issue of deter-minacy by requiring that the investigator be made to account for the possibility that in-dividual choice affects demographic outcome. At the same time, it allows for completelyconstrained choices; the important difference is that the investigator must specify howand why such choices are completely constrained.

Whether one is primarily interested in self-regulation or biology, there is nothing to begained by casting demographic problems in terms of either deterministic or self-regula-tory factors, and everything to be gained by making use of the continuum frameworkwhich serves to draw attention to both kinds of variables and to position them in relationto each other. The previous hypothetical example of two societies in which demand forhousehold labor is identical but breast-feeding practices differ, illustrates how a studywhich may have self-regulatory factors as its primary focus will be inadequate without aconsideration of deterministic variables.

On the other hand, a comparison in which deterministic factors are found to be thesame, but levels of growth are different, calls for a focus on factors which affect optionalalternatives. Where comparisons are not being made and effort is directed towardexplaining population levels in one society, it is perhaps even more important to includethe many factors which can affect population process since nothing can be held constant.The decision framework is preferable to the current practice of regarding somevariables as strictly determined and others as fully subject to individual choice when con-sidering how these variables can change over time. For example, the decision to breast-feed, which can affect family size, may be regarded by a mother as a completely deter-mined alternative if substitute foods are not available. If however, infant formula is one


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50 A M E R I C A N A N T H R O P O L O G I S T [83, 1981model of choice, rather than seen as a deterministic factor, changes in breast-feedingpractices can be easily hand led without ma jor conceptual upheavals. T he adv ent of test.tube babies and the possibility of an operation to restore fecundity after a venerealdisease provide other examples of changes which could affect deterministic variablesassociated with infertility and sterility. If such changes occur, the variables in questionca n be shifted conveniently to a new position on a co ntinuu m of choice, rather th an hav -ing to be continually reclassified.T hu s decision models would provide anthropologists with a framework for th e study ofpopu lation dynamics which would center upo n self-reg ulation , but incorp orate impor-tant biological and environmental variables in a precisely defined way. Using suchmodels, it will be impossible to depict Third World citizens as irrational peasants in-capable of calculating the costs and benefits of children, or as benighted individualswhose reproductive lives are beyond their control. By looking from the very start at thealternatives confron ting the indiv idual, attention will be focused upon the individual an dhis or her response to the environm ent. At th e same time it can be recognized tha t peoplemay face biological a nd en vironm ental condition s which severely or completely constraintheir choices.It is not possible at this time to elabora te fur the r upon how decision models can be usedin popula tion studies because their utilization an d developmen t await futur e research ef-forts. Anthropological contributions to pop ulation studies will com e from research whichcon cen trate s upo n the decision processes of indiv iduals as they crea te their fam ilies withdefinite goals an d plans in m ind , a nd w hich incorporates factors such as infant m ortalityand changing patterns of breast-feeding that constrain and influence the decision pro-cess. Comparative studies in which some control over the many variables affectingpopulation growth is possible would be particularly valuable in furthering efforts tounderstand demographic process in the Third World.

NOTESAcknowledgments. I would like to offer enthusiastic thanks to Naomi Quinn who provided in-

spiration and encouragement at every step in the writing of this paper. I profited immeasurablyfrom the comments and criticisms of Hugh Gladwin, Mayling Simpson-Hkbert, and ChristopherDarrouzet. Errors and omissions are my own.

' Triage refers to the strategy of deciding which members of a group will be sacrificed in a life-threatening situation in which resources do not permit the survival of all-here, which

modes of explanation in anthropological theorical model

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