IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/vid/yearbk/v22y2024i1oid0x003fb8c9.html

Towards a better understanding of the role of population policies in tackling climate change

Author

Listed:
  • Raya Muttarak

Abstract

As the global population hit eight billion in 2022 and climate change-induced extreme events have become more visible worldwide, there has been renewed public interest in the impact of population growth on climate change. This has also sparked a debate about the role of population control policies as a key strategy to curb global warming. This essay argues that the relationship between population dynamics and climate change is highly complex, and that having specific background knowledge could be beneficial for participating in this debate. To this end, this essay presents three points that readers may wish to consider when forming their judgements: (1) the role of demographers in assessing how human population impacts climate change; (2) the importance of acknowledging the demographic heterogeneity and complexity of the relationship between human populations and climate change; and (3) the disparities in resource consumption and the resulting emissions in the context of climate justice.

Suggested Citation

  • Raya Muttarak, 2024. "Towards a better understanding of the role of population policies in tackling climate change," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 22(1), pages 45-51.
    • Handle: RePEc:vid:yearbk:v:22:y:2024:i:1:oid:0x003fb8c9
    DOI: 10.1553/p-cmag-mcb5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://austriaca.at/0xc1aa5576_0x003fb8c9.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1553/p-cmag-mcb5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Emilio Zagheni, 2011. "The Leverage of Demographic Dynamics on Carbon Dioxide Emissions: Does Age Structure Matter?," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 48(1), pages 371-399, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Liddle, Brantley, 2013. "Population, Affluence, and Environmental Impact Across Development: Evidence from Panel Cointegration Modeling," MPRA Paper 52088, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Helena Fornwagner & Oliver P. Hauser, 2022. "Climate Action for (My) Children," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 81(1), pages 95-130, January.
    3. Estiri, Hossein & Zagheni, Emilio, 2018. "Evaluating the Age-Energy Consumption Profile in Residential Buildings," SocArXiv yqkva, Center for Open Science.
    4. Ameer, Ayesha & Munir, Kashif, 2016. "Effect of Economic Growth, Trade Openness, Urbanization, and Technology on Environment of Selected Asian Countries," MPRA Paper 74571, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Mahendra Kumar Singh & Deep Mukherjee, 2019. "Drivers of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States: revisiting STIRPAT model," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 21(6), pages 3015-3031, December.
    6. Ziad Malas Lgto, 2022. "Les jeunes générations seront-elles plus sobres que leurs aînées ? Une ébauche sur l’effet de génération en matière de consommation éco-responsable," Post-Print hal-04715612, HAL.
    7. Teixidó-Figueras, Jordi & Duro, Juan Antonio, 2015. "The building blocks of International Ecological Footprint inequality: A Regression-Based Decomposition," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 30-39.
    8. Haiyang Shang & Yue Hu & Jiaojiao Fan & Nini Song & Fang Su, 2023. "Analysis of Farm Household Livelihood Sustainability Based on Improved IPAT Equation: A Case Study of 24 Counties in 3 Cities in the Qin-Ba Mountain Region of Southern Shaanxi," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-17, April.
    9. Fanny A. Kluge & Emilio Zagheni & Elke Loichinger & Tobias C. Vogt, 2014. "The advantages of demographic change after the wave: fewer and older, but healthier, greener, and more productive?," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2014-003, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    10. Underwood, Anthony & Zahran, Sammy, 2015. "The carbon implications of declining household scale economies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 182-190.
    11. Wen Guo & Tao Sun & Hongjun Dai, 2016. "Effect of Population Structure Change on Carbon Emission in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-20, March.
    12. Zhou, Yang & Wang, Heng & Qiu, Huanguang, 2023. "Population aging reduces carbon emissions: Evidence from China's latest three censuses," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 351(C).
    13. Dirk Ulbricht & Dmitry Chervyakov, 2015. "Population Ageing and Its Effects on the German Economy," DIW Roundup: Politik im Fokus 78, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    14. Emilio Zagheni & Marina Zannella, 2013. "The life cycle dimension of time transfers in Europe," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 29(35), pages 937-948.
    15. Bobin Wang & Chunfu Shao & Xun Ji, 2017. "Influencing Mechanism Analysis of Holiday Activity–Travel Patterns on Transportation Energy Consumption and Emissions in China," Energies, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-20, July.
    16. Nicola Francescutto, 2024. "Retirement decision and household's gasoline consumption: Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Design," IRENE Working Papers 24-01, IRENE Institute of Economic Research.
    17. Vanesa Zorrilla-Muñoz & Marc Petz & María Silveria Agulló-Tomás, 2021. "GARCH model to estimate the impact of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions per sociodemographic factors and CAP in Spain," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 4675-4697, March.
    18. Wang, Yafei & Wu, Siyang & Xu, Lixiao, 2025. "Global carbon emission implications of China’s demographic ageing," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 767-781.
    19. Carlhoff, Henrik, 2019. "Carbon footprint, demography, and employment status?," Thuenen-Series of Applied Economic Theory 163, University of Rostock, Institute of Economics.
    20. Ethan Sharygin, 2013. "The Carbon Cost of an Educated Future: A Consumer Lifestyle Approach," VID Working Papers 1304, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:vid:yearbk:v:22:y:2024:i:1:oid:0x003fb8c9. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Bernhard Rengs (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.oeaw.ac.at/vid/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.