ABSTRACT
The greater part of the data presented here refer to Ban Pong villageI in Chiengmai Province of Northern Thailand, where I spent two years conducting fieldwork (fig. 7). A pilot family planning programme (McDaniel 1969) was initiated in the village early in 1967, and a follow-up study conducted two years later (McDaniel 1973) indicated high levels of acceptance and continuation of contraceptive methods. At first glance the data presented might easily be mistaken for evidence in support of the simplistic assumption mentioned above (that provision of contraceptives will automatically lead to their acceptance), and evidence against the more recent suggestion (that cultural factors might inhibit acceptance). However, I will argue that in the case of a village in Thailand, the rapid and widespread adoption of family planning can be directly attributed to certain traditional cultural features combined with changing environmental and demographic conditions. Furthermore, I hope to show that in contrast to macro-economic and demographic analyses, which tend to obscure the complexities of behavioural change, detailed studies conducted by an anthropologist can highlight the differential responses to population pressure within a community, and point to the types of cultural phenomena involved in the process of modification of fertility behaviour.
