Future Population Developments in Europe. Is the Concept of Convergence Indisputable? Towards the Role of Geographical T
- PDF / 2,259,947 Bytes
- 23 Pages / 439.37 x 666.142 pts Page_size
- 92 Downloads / 143 Views
Future Population Developments in Europe. Is the Concept of Convergence Indisputable? Towards the Role of Geographical Thinking in Population Forecasting Branislav Bleha 1 Received: 18 April 2019 / Accepted: 6 December 2019/ # Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract The paper summarizes (not exhaustively) opinions on the potential convergence and divergence of population developments in general and within Europe particularly. There is an attempt to answer the question, whether the convergence concept is irrefutable or not. We discuss the major geographical factors of future convergence/divergence. We also present the empirical demographic projection of the EU countries, which we see as a boundary from the viewpoint of possible convergence and divergence. This empirical evidence is quite a unique view on the boundaries among which the population developments are likely to go on in coming decades. Instead of the probabilistic approaches, we just model the potential extremes (total equalization and current differentiation) using the deterministic approach. We demonstrate what differences would be if given assumptions were actual. The simpler this approach, the more readable for decision makers. Further, we explicitly stress and present the role of geographical thinking in the regional forecasting. We see the key role of geography mainly in measuring and shaping of future inequalities with respect to the national and regional population developments. If Europe is perceived as a multi-regional demographical system of countries, a systematic geographical approach is an essential base for quality forecasts. Since demographers do not often deal with purely geographical and spatially oriented methods, the role of geography is irreplaceable in the process. Keywords Europe . Future . Population forecasting . Convergence . Divergence
* Branislav Bleha [email protected]
1
Department of Economic and Social Geography, Demography and Territorial Development, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University in Bratislava, Mlynská dolina, Bratislava, Slovak Republic
B. Bleha
Introduction There is a general consensus that demographic behaviour should homogenize. With the exception of stochastic approaches (for instance Scherbov and Mamolo 2006; Alders et al. 2007; Scherbov et al. 2007; Azose et al. 2016) and some modelling projections (Bijak et al. 2007; Bijak 2010), the official EUROSTAT projections (the last one published in 2019 and the UN projection World Population Prospects, the 2019 Revision as the latest) represent the basic source of information on the demographic future of Europe or groups of European countries. These two deterministic projections are prepared in multiple variants. The convergence scenario within the frame of the EUROSTAT projection predicted that (not total) convergence of demographic development in Europe occurs. In general, there are assumptions that the trajectories of future population development within countries should approach each other. Will the demographic convergence really happen, is i
Data Loading...
