Introduction
Background (Demographics and Population Growth Policies)
The fact that the global population rates have been growing exponentially over the past few decades clearly is a reason for concern given the challenges that it implies, with poverty being the key challenge. Indeed, a closer look at the global statistics will show graphically that the increase in the number of people in certain states has been rather drastic. For example, the recent UNO data indicates that the 2100 population growth (PG) rates will reach a stunning mark of 11,000,000,000 people, which is nearly a 1.5-fold increase (146%) compared to the 2016 statistics. The fact that the identified variable is linked directly to social phenomena such as poverty, unemployment, an increase in development of health issues, rise in crime rates, etc., cannot possibly be doubted, according to the existing studies on PG.
The Malthusian theory of population also points to the negative effects that an increase in population growth will inevitably trigger. According to the principal tenets of the theory, the population growth occurs at an exponential rate (particularly, the number of people supposedly doubles with every generation), whereas the amount of food increases in an arithmetic progression. Therefore, the number of people is certain to exceed the amount of the produced food at a certain point of the humankind’s evolution. The implications of the theory are beyond drastic.
Population Growth
The population growth policies, in their turn, can be viewed as the constraining factor for the issues associated with consistent increases in the number of people. According to the official statement of the Bangladeshi authorities, the population growth rates have been reduced significantly after the introduction of the pro-choice opportunities and the promotion of family planning as the foundation for childbirth-related decision-making (see Fig. 1).
At this point, though, one must mention that the actual number of Bangladeshi residents has been on the rise since the 1970s (see Fig. 2). Nevertheless, the opportunities for controlling the childbirth rates that the introduction of family planning options has provided to the residents of the state allows changing the growth rate from exponential to static.
Compared to Egypt, the identified change in the childbirth rate can be viewed as a significant progress. According to the global ranking based on the identified criterion, Egypt lands on the 64th place based on its population growth rates, whereas Bangladesh takes the 76th spot, according to the recent statistical analysis. Although the difference might seem minor, the gap in 12 positions makes it quite clear that Bangladeshi authorities made quite a breakthrough in designing the policies that allow for a more rigid control of the issues related to high childbirth rates (i.e., poverty, crime, health concerns, etc.), whereas Egypt could use assistance.
Research Question, Thesis, and Aim of Research
The current study aims to answer the following question: Will the introduction of birth control tools and the concept of Planned Parenthood in Egypt, in general, allow for a drop in some of the most controversial and topical social issues in the state, such as crime rates increase, a rise in the number of maternal deaths, overpopulation, and the following threat of economic collapse caused by high unemployment rates, etc., and how can the cultural constraints (particularly, the Muslim concept of abortions as a sin) be addressed?
By introducing the principles of family planning into the Egyptian communities, one is likely to create premises for a change in people’s mindset, allowing them to focus on the wellbeing of their families as opposed to following the cultural traditions blindly, thus contributing to a gradual reduction in the population growth so that the crime-, economy-, and society-related issues also are reduced.
Method and Approach
The study is aimed, therefore, at considering the effects of the introduction of family planning principles into the environment of Egyptian society and the subsequent drop in population growth rates as the tool for eradicating some of the crucial issues related to the increase in crime rates, maternal deaths, health issues, societal problems, etc. For these purposes, a qualitative case study will be used as the research tool.
Population Growth and Relevant Theories in Demographics and International Relations
Population Growth and Theories of Development
It should be noted that the Malthusian theory has been criticized for the lack of substantial proof. The mathematical aspect of the framework has received an especially harsh criticism. For instance, numerous researchers pointed to the lack of evidence for the formula that Malthus suggested (i.e., the exponential growth of the population and the arithmetic growth of the food supplies). Nevertheless, the prognoses proposed by Malthus are very unsettling. Specifically, the neo-Malthusian theory, which implies a more careful analysis of the critical factors and provides profound empirical evidence for its postulates, warns about the threats that overpopulation conceals, stressing the issue of water scarcity: “The world’s population is growing at a very rapid rate and will lead to a growth in the demand for food. This would constitute the single most important cause of pressure on water resources.” Similarly, the essential tenets of the structural human ecology theory indicate that overpopulation and the lack of vital resources are linked closely. Hence, the current approach to childbirth in certain states needs to be reconsidered, and the principles of family planning have to be promoted on both the state the personal levels.
The rates of population growth, however, hinge on a variety of social, political, economic, and cultural factors. Therefore, the increase in the population varies depending on the state. As a result, the issue of family planning programs’ significance has been raised several times in Egypt, even though local scholars have been maintaining a rather rigid position against the innovation: “Recently, some Egyptian scholars have questioned the continuing need for government support of family planning programs.”
It should be borne in mind that the benefits of the family planning programs’ implementation are only going to become apparent in the long run. Expecting an immediate change and a rapid improvement can hardly be justified, given the time that it takes for the effects to take place.
Furthermore, the fact that the concept of family planning contradicts the principles of Islam needs to be brought up as the crucial impediment to overcome when promoting the change. As stressed above, faith plays a tremendous role in the decision to introduce the concept of family planning into the environment of a particular state or community. Nevertheless, it is imperative to make sure that the principles of family planning should coexist with the religious beliefs of the target population. The latter should not be coerced into making the choices that they consider wrong; however, it is essential to provide them with options.
Scrutinizing closely some of the recent examples of successful family planning policy implementation, one should consider the example of Bangladesh. The state authorities managed to make the religious beliefs of the target audience compatible with the idea of family planning. Naturally, the process of promoting the identified notion in the target environment was also challenging and required a lot of diplomacy and time. Nevertheless, the state currently implements the policy of family planning without any objections from the Bangladeshi residents, which can be viewed as an impressive achievement.
The existing evidence shows that the effects of reinforcing the significance of family planning and allowing the members of the population make sensible choices are beyond impressive. For example, in Bangladesh, maternal mortality rates have dropped by a stupendous 40%.
Liberal Feminism and Birth Control
Freedom for women can be considered one of the foundational tenets of liberal feminism. Freedom of choice when it comes to the issue of childbirth is among the crucial issues that liberal feminism implies. Although Bangladesh is a Muslim state, and, therefore, its core values are based on the idea of patriarchy, women are provided with an opportunity to fight for their independence, freedom, and equal rights because the identified concepts are included in the set of provisions of the Bangladeshi constitution. Therefore, being established on a legal level, the principles of equality can be promoted actively in the identified environment.
In fact, the postulates of liberal feminism imply that the relationships exist in the context of the liberal society, including the domains such as electoral institutions, workplace environments, and the private environment of the household. In other words, the concept of abstract individualism is viewed as the foundation value on which the social justice and the relationships in the society should be based.
The principles that the proponents of liberal feminism herald as the basis for the relationships between the two genders, thus, can be interpreted as the main reasoning behind the promotion of birth control policies. The attempt to envision women primarily as wives and mothers, while admittedly having positive reasons behind it, restricts the options that women have as far as their personal development is concerned and, thus, infringes their rights.
This model not only excluded the health needs of women who were not wives or mothers (particularly younger or older women, lesbian/transgender women, sex workers etc.), but it also ignored the gendered constraints of women trying to access health care, whether related to their reproductive role or not.
Therefore, the idea of childbirth control sits well with the principles of liberal and neo-liberal feminism. The philosophy, thus, can provide a foil for the promotion of a sensible approach to family planning in Egypt similar to the compromise that was made in Bangladesh.
Bangladesh
Background on the Issue of Overpopulation
As stressed above, Bangladesh is one of the countries that has been suffering from overpopulation for quite a while. However, the opportunities to promote feminist ideas in the identified environment, thus, making the state policies more flexible, can become the leeway for improving the current state of affairs in the social, political, and economic landscape of the country.
Analysis of the Governmental Approach
A closer look at the effects of the governmental approach will reveal that the focus on the introduction of the birth control policy into the social context of Bangladesh has affected it positively on a number of levels. As explained above, the increase in the population rates has become less sharp over the past few decades; in fact, shortly after the enhancement of the identified principles in the target environment, the population growth has been showing the tendency to drop, though not quite consistently.
Much to its credit, the government approached the subject matter very wisely. Instead of foisting the new principles onto the local population with no regard for the traditional values of the people living there, the state authorities focused on the reinforcement of the state legal regulations, which detailed that every person is entitled to the same set of rights in the state. Therefore, the introduction of the family planning principles was viewed as a sensible addition to people’s lives and the chance to improve the well-being of the citizens. In other words, the change was promoted at the national level with the government standing firmly behind it. The support from the state authorities has clearly had its effect on the change in the birth rates in the identified environment.
However, as impressive as the effect of the state government supporting the changes Bangladesh is, the activists who are at the helm of the feminist movement deserve even more credit. Changing not only the political but also the social, the political, and the economic backgrounds of the state, women use social media actively to convey the ideas about the necessity to reconsider the policy that prevents providing the Bangladeshi citizens with equal rights.
Apart from the effect that women engaged in media communication have on the changes in the cultural and social context of the state environment, the alterations on the political level need to be addressed. As stressed above, Bangladesh was one of the first and among the few Muslim states that attempted to engage religious authorities into the process of changing the landscape of gender relationships as opposed to giving them too much power or, on the contrary, preventing them from intruding into the identified realm. As a result, prerequisites for cooperation and negotiations instead of an ongoing conflict that the situation could have resulted in were created.
Social Response to Family Planning Programs
Naturally, it would be wrong to claim that the issue of family planning has not faced any objections from some of the orthodox representatives of the Muslim religion. The social response to the alterations to the concept of femininity from the Muslim perspective, which the introduction of the planned parenting principle implied, varied from positive to mixed to negative. It should be noted, though, that the negative responses were surprisingly few. The reasons for the change to occur so smoothly concerns primarily the fact that the Muslim religion, which remains official in Bangladesh, defines the ethical standards in the society, therefore preventing the principles of childbirth control and the acceptance of planned parenthood as the basis for a cultural and economic breakthrough to take place. Understandably enough, there are objections voiced by a more conservative part of the population. Furthermore, one must take into account the threats that the proponents of the movement subject them to because they have to counter not only conservative members of the public but also their extremist behavior that poses a threat to their lives:
In just over a month, two bloggers were hacked to death in public places, following three similar attacks in 2013, in which one blogger died. A decade back, a famous author also fell victim to a similar attack for his critical views on Islam. Indeed, over the last decade, Bangladesh saw a rise in the number of large and small militant Islamist organizations, which carried out explosives attacks on courts and at cultural events around the country.
Nevertheless, one must admit that the instances such as the one referred to above are rather rare occurrences. Although the women in Bangladesh are exposed to a consistent jeopardy, they clearly contribute to the change that it bound to alter both the social and the economic landscapes of the state. The sharp focus on the economic implications of the subject matter combined with the attempt to invite the representatives of the Muslim religion to cooperate can be viewed as a solid step in the right direction.
Egypt
The Demographic Scene and Population Growth
The issues related to population growth appear to go out of proportion in Egypt currently. Having been on the rise for quite a while, the identified indicator of the national well-being points directly to the threat of economic, social, and cultural problems to start brewing. Seeing that the consistent increase in population rates entails an inevitable reduction in the quality of life, it can be assumed that the rise in the unemployment rates is to be expected rather soon in Egypt. The increase in 2.18% that could be witnessed last year makes it quite clear that the state is on the verge of serious demographic issues. Furthermore, the drastic correlation between the births and the deaths of infants (2,585,028 and 564,088 correspondingly) makes it evident that the country is likely to have to deal with the issues related to unemployment, poverty, and crime in the nearest future due to the increase in the population and the lack of opportunities for jobs and education.
Governmental Approaches to the Issue
The case of Egypt, as opposed to the one of Bangladesh, can be viewed as a mismanagement of the birth control policy. Succumbing to the cultural and religious traditions (namely, the Muslim religion), the state authorities have contributed to a massive rise in the population growth rates. The results are quite predictable: a subsequent increase in the population rates caused to the aggravation of a range of social and economic concerns. The population growth rates have been on the increase over the past few decades, and they have still a propensity to rise with every passing year. Seeing that the steep rise in the population rates triggers a vast array of social, economic, and financial issues, as established above, there is not much surprise to the fact that Egypt has not seen much progress for a significant amount of time. The increasingly large number of child deaths, as well as maternal ones, along with other health concerns, points to the fact that the current approach to family planning – or, to be more accurate, the lack thereof – requires reconsideration.
What Has Gone Wrong?
When considering the problems in the current policy of the Egyptian authorities, as far as the issue of family planning is concerned, one must admit that the religious issues clearly remain the primary stumbling block for the representatives of the feminist movement and the proponents of the Planned Parenthood principles to suggest their tools for improving the current situation. The reluctance that the Egyptian Muslim authorities displayed toward the issue of birth control points to the fact that the very discussion of the subject matter is currently impossible in the realm of Egyptian society.
Case Studies Comparison
It could be suggested that the case of Bangladesh should be viewed as the prime example of how the issue under analysis can be addressed. To be more exact, the idea of inviting the proponents of the family planning movement and the representatives of the Muslim religion in Egypt to cooperate and find the solution that could satisfy all parties should be viewed as the possible solution to the current situation.
One must admit, though, that the use of the strategy that has already been chosen by Bangladesh requires that the approach should be customized to the specifics of Egypt. The first difference that needs to be brought up as the essential obstacle in implementing the policy is that the feminist movement in favor of family planning is unlikely to be welcomed and supported by the members of the state government. Unlike Bangladesh, whose constitution states clearly that all people are entitled to the same set of rights and privileges, Egypt is much more rigid on the gender issue.
Therefore, active use of media along with the enhancement of the participants’ security, including both the digital and the physical one, needs to be considered as the priority.
Finally, the issue of the social stigma that contraceptives and birth control are linked closely needs to be addressed. As explained above, the arguments against the use of birth control measures in Egypt stem from prejudices, which are cultural, in general, and religious, in particular. By stressing the significance of cooperation between the states, the members of the feminist movement, and the religious authorities, one is likely to alter the current situation in Egypt, therefore, providing the target population with more opportunities as far as the family planning issues and the economic opportunities are concerned. It would be far too optimistic to assume that the decision to cooperate will have an immediate effect on the status of family planning and the use of contraception as a concept. Quite the opposite: it is expected that most of the representatives of the Egyptian society, as people of the Muslim faith, are bound to confront the idea of providing women with the right to use the concept of family planning and, therefore, prevent regular childbirth.
Conclusion
In order to manage the problems that the reinforcement of the identified policies are certain to cause, one should consider using not only the support of the religious authorities, but also the evidence and arguments from the women who participate in the movement. Particularly, the use of the modern online media and especially the social network platforms that invite the readers to take part in the discussion must be viewed as the essential tools for carrying out the change in the Egyptian society. Afterward, significant changes can be expected.
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