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The authors argue that human ecology theory can help to respecify and revive demographic transition theory. From the human ecology perspective demographic regimes are adaptive outgrowths formed in response to changes in the social and physical environments. Rationality is always 'bounded' by that same environment, making inseparable rational and irrational action without some understanding of constraints and opportunities. Human ecology posits that reproductive behavior is the product of the tension among biological drives, ecological constraints, and the structural demands of the social context. Therefore, it is sensible to view fertility as an externally constrained behavior rather than as a function of individual or family attitudes and attributes. The author's argue that during nascent industrialization, the service sector's shares of employment and gross domestic product tend to increase faster than the industrial sector's shares. In addition, socioeconomic changes that affect women's lives and opportunity costs should strongly impact fertility. Services are the predominant nonagricultural source of employment for women in the developing world. Many require some level of basic literacy or experience, making them unsuitable for children. The authors contend that service economies limit fertility more sharply than simple development or affluence. In addition, an ethnic or cultural dimension operated to decrease fertility in Europe, however such a component could also operate to retard fertility decline in pronatalist populations. Racial and ethnic diversity often leads to competition, which may weaken normative commitments to lower fertility and family planning. And finally, the level of population pressure should reduce fertility because it forces populations to adjust their nuptiality and engage in contraceptive behavior. The authors use longitudinal, cross-national data on developing countries to evaluate determinants of fertility decline. The dependent variable is lagged by a quarter century. It is the average annual percentage change in the total fertility rate between 1965 and 1990. Three variables represent the ecological model: service sector dominance (% of GDP from services in 1965), ethnic homogeneity (largest ethnic group's % of population), and demographic inheritance (geometric mean of agrarian density and agrarian labor force size in 1960). Demographic transition theory is represented by the child mortality rate in 1965 and industrial dominance (sum of the %of GDP in industry and of the labor force in industry in 1965), as well as both of these terms squared. TFR in 1965 is controlled in all models. Gender perspectives are controlled using female secondary school enrollment in 1970 and the proportion of all women working in industrial and service-sector employment. To represent dependency school critiques of demographic transition theory the authors include average exports as proportion of GDP for 1965, 1970, and 1975. They also control for family planning program effort in 1982. Even after controlling for the demographic transition theory variables, dependency theory, gender theory (which shows no significant effect), and family planning program effort, service sector employment, ethnic homogeneity, and demographic inheritance all have independent effects on fertility decline. The authors conclude that other variables that have had inconclusive support are all symptoms of more fundamental macroorganizational processes. Each economic regime has its own unique demographic logic and just because tertiary (service) production apparently reduces fertility does not mean that future economic systems will do the same. According to human ecology theory, both neo-Malthusian and demographic transition theory mistakenly identify surplus or affluence as the principle regulator of fertility. Instead, the economic complexity required to maintain modern production makes strenuous demands on individuals and families, which constitutes the principal brake on fertility.
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