ABSTRACT
The previous chapter demonstrated that the demographic transition model and associated theory are able to offer us useful insights into the patterns and causes of population change at various scales, from the global to the national. The essence of demographic transition theory is that fertility and mortality are systematically linked. Together they describe a regularly experienced pattern of population change: from a high equilibrium but low growth, through a period of rapid growth when mortality is falling more rapidly than fertility, followed by a period of slowing overall growth when fertility is falling more rapidly than mortality, to a low equilibrium, with low fertility and mortality
roughly in balance with each other. However, since these two natural components – mortality and fertility – are very different from each other, not only in their trends and timings, but also in their causes and implications for development, they also require separate treatment in their own right. This chapter on mortality and the subsequent chapter on fertility consider these components in similar ways – with discussions of how they are measured, the patterns they describe, their basic causes, and how each affects and has been affected by types and levels of development.
