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Poverty, Gender, and Youth

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Articles 691 - 720 of 745

Full-Text Articles in Demography, Population, and Ecology

Measuring Living Standards With Proxy Variables, Mark R. Montgomery, Michele Gragnolati, Kathleen A. Burke, Edmundo Paredes Jan 1999

Measuring Living Standards With Proxy Variables, Mark R. Montgomery, Michele Gragnolati, Kathleen A. Burke, Edmundo Paredes

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Very few demographic surveys in developing countries gather information on household income or consumption expenditure, despite the theoretical importance of these measures. Consequently, researchers have been forced to rely on ad hoc collections of proxy measures for living standards, and the properties of these proxies have not been systematically analyzed. In this research, we ask what hypotheses can be tested using proxy variables, and evaluate the performance of proxy measures in relation to consumption expenditures per adult, our preferred measure of living standards. We find that the proxy variables commonly employed in demographic research are very weak predictors of consumption …

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The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation [Arabic], Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark Jan 1999

The Decline Of Female Circumcision In Egypt: Evidence And Interpretation [Arabic], Omaima El-Gibaly, Barbara L. Ibrahim, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Female circumcision is widespread in Egypt. Research suggests that the practice persists because of a belief that circumcision will moderate female sexuality, that it will assure a girl’s marriageability, and that it is sanctioned by Islam. Using data from a nationally representative survey of adolescents, this paper investigates the prevalence and social correlates of circumcision among girls aged 10-19, the circumstances surrounding the procedure, and the attitudes of adolescents towards it. While the vast majority of adolescents are circumcised, a life table analysis indicates that girls today are at least 10 percentage points less likely to undergo female circumcision than …

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The Quantity-Quality Transition In Asia, Mark R. Montgomery, Mary Arends-Kuenning, Cem Mete Jan 1999

The Quantity-Quality Transition In Asia, Mark R. Montgomery, Mary Arends-Kuenning, Cem Mete

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Societies in which fertility is falling and human capital investment per child increasing are experiencing a “quantity-quality transition.” Such transitions imply, over the long term, both slower rates of labor force growth and higher levels of human capital per worker. They are fundamental to economic development. Yet, these transitions are neither automatic or self-propelling. Their momentum depends on competing forces acting at both the family and the macroeconomic levels; the balance can easily tip against further transition. Family decisions about schooling are largely motivated by its private economic returns. These returns are determined in labor markets, and here the logic …

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Incentive Schemes For School Attendance In Rural Bangladesh, Sajeda Amin, Gilda Sedgh Jan 1998

Incentive Schemes For School Attendance In Rural Bangladesh, Sajeda Amin, Gilda Sedgh

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This paper examines the impact of two incentive schemes on school attendance in rural Bangladesh: a food-for-education program for poor primary school children and a female secondary school scholarship scheme. The data come from an in-depth village study, before and after the programs went into effect. Both programs provide direct financial incentives to families to send their children to and keep them in school. The data also allow for an assessment of an informal school program sponsored by BRAC, a national non-governmental institution, at the study sites. School enrollment in the target population increased more rapidly than would have been …

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Ethnicity And Child Mortality In Sub-Saharan Africa, Martin Brockerhoff, Paul C. Hewett Jan 1998

Ethnicity And Child Mortality In Sub-Saharan Africa, Martin Brockerhoff, Paul C. Hewett

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Analysis of recent survey data reveals large differentials in child mortality among ethnic groups in countries throughout sub-Saharan Africa. These disparities correspond with the prominence of specific ethnic groups in the national political economy. In many countries where heads of state since independence have come from one or two ethnic groups-as in Côte d’Ivoire, Kenya, and Niger-these groups have experienced levels of early child mortality at least one-third lower than those of other groups. In other countries where there have been several transitions in state control, as in Ghana and Uganda, descendants of precolonial kingdoms such as Ashanti and Buganda …

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La Familia En La Mira: Nuevas Perspectivas Sobre Madres, Padres E Hijos, Judith Bruce, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Ann Leonard, Patrice L. Engle, Niev Duffy Jan 1998

La Familia En La Mira: Nuevas Perspectivas Sobre Madres, Padres E Hijos, Judith Bruce, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Ann Leonard, Patrice L. Engle, Niev Duffy

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

A pesar de la retórica de los últimos años que lamenta la pérdida de la "familia tradicional," las familias jamás se han podido encajonar en modelo único. "Familia" puede referirse a la gente que se ha vinculado entre sí por matrimonio o parentesco, o a los que pretenden descender de antecesores comunes. Las personas pueden formar y extender familias, ya sea mediante la adoptación o crianza de niños, o definiendo como familiares a gente no emparentada o mediante el establecimiento de sociedades consensuales. Las familias son tan adaptables como diversas, pues se reconfiguran a sí mismas en el transcurso de …

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The Uncharted Passage: Girls' Adolescence In The Developing World, Barbara Mensch, Judith Bruce, Margaret E. Greene Jan 1998

The Uncharted Passage: Girls' Adolescence In The Developing World, Barbara Mensch, Judith Bruce, Margaret E. Greene

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Adolescence is a formative time of transition to adulthood. What happens between the ages of 10 and 19 shapes how girls and boys live out their lives as women and men—not only in the reproductive arena, but in the social and economic realm as well. Yet, despite its impact on human development, adolescence has been sidelined as a research and policy subject in developing countries. While all adolescents deserve our attention, the needs of adolescent girls in the developing world are particularly pressing. This monograph focuses on these girls, presenting statistics to examine the social and economic context of their …

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Covert Contraceptive Use: Prevalence, Motivations, And Consequences, Ann E. Biddlecom, Bolaji M. Fapohunda Jan 1998

Covert Contraceptive Use: Prevalence, Motivations, And Consequences, Ann E. Biddlecom, Bolaji M. Fapohunda

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This paper examines women’s covert use of contraceptives, that is, use without the knowledge of their husbands. Covert use may highlight conflict between husbands and wives about family planning, or it may reflect behaviors that spouses find difficult to discuss together. This study addresses three questions: 1) How is covert use measured in different settings? 2) How prevalent is it? and 3) What are the factors underlying covert use? We examine these questions by drawing on existing studies and detailed survey and qualitative data collected in 1997 in an urban setting in Zambia from married women and a subsample of …

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Women's Lives And Rapid Fertility Decline: Some Lessons From Bangladesh And Egypt, Sajeda Amin, Cynthia B. Lloyd Jan 1998

Women's Lives And Rapid Fertility Decline: Some Lessons From Bangladesh And Egypt, Sajeda Amin, Cynthia B. Lloyd

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

In some of the more traditional parts of the world, fertility is falling steadily, sometimes rapidly, in environments where women’s lives remain severely constrained. The recent experiences of Bangladesh and Egypt, both predominantly Muslim countries, are illustrative in this regard. Since the late 1970s, rural and urban areas in both countries have experienced steady declines in fertility, with recent declines in rural Bangladesh similar to those in rural Egypt, despite lower levels of development and higher rates of poverty. This paper provides an in-depth exploration of the demographic transition in these two societies as seen through the dual lens of …

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The Impact Of An Integrated Micro-Credit Programme On Women's Empowerment And Fertility Behavior In Rural Bangladesh, Fiona Steele, Sajeda Amin, Ruchira Tabassum Naved Jan 1998

The Impact Of An Integrated Micro-Credit Programme On Women's Empowerment And Fertility Behavior In Rural Bangladesh, Fiona Steele, Sajeda Amin, Ruchira Tabassum Naved

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This paper examines the impact of participation in women’s savings and credit groups organized by Save the Children USA on women’s empowerment, contraceptive use, and fertility in a rural area of Bangladesh. The data are drawn from a panel survey conducted in 1993, shortly before the groups were formed, and in 1995 after interventions began. This quasi-experimental design enables us to identify the characteristics of women who chose to join savings groups. The findings show that those who joined tend to more educated and more socially independent than are women who did not. Thus, to control for selection bias, preintervention …

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Migration, Sexual Behavior And Hiv Diffusion In Kenya, Martin Brockerhoff, Ann E. Biddlecom Jan 1998

Migration, Sexual Behavior And Hiv Diffusion In Kenya, Martin Brockerhoff, Ann E. Biddlecom

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

The association of migration with the spread of AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa is well documented, yet the social and behavioral mechanisms underlying this relationship remain poorly understood. Using data from the 1993 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey, this paper examines whether migrants are more likely than nonmigrants to have multiple recent sexual partners and not to use condoms with those partners. Results indicate that migation is a critical factor in high-risk sexual behavior and that its importance varies by gender and by the direction of movement. Independent of marital and cohabitation status, social milieu, awareness of AIDS, and other crucial …

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Fertility And Reproductive Preferences In Post-Transitional Societies, John Bongaarts Jan 1998

Fertility And Reproductive Preferences In Post-Transitional Societies, John Bongaarts

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Conventional theories have little to say about the level at which fertility will stabilize at the end of the transition although it is often assumed that replacement fertility of about 2.1 births per woman will prevail in the long run. However, fertility has dropped below the replacement level in virtually every population that has moved through the demographic transition. If future fertility remains at these low levels populations will decline in size and age rapidly.This paper attempts to contribute to the understanding of levels and trends of post-transitional fertility by examining the causes of discrepancies between reproductive preferences and observed …

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The Onset Of Fertility Transition In Pakistan, Zeba Sathar, John B. Casterline Jan 1998

The Onset Of Fertility Transition In Pakistan, Zeba Sathar, John B. Casterline

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Recent trends in fertility and contraceptive prevalence indicate that the marital fertility transition in Pakistan, which has been anticipated for three decades, has begun in the 1990s. Before that decade, the total fertility rate had exceeded 6 births per woman for at least three decades, and fewer than 10 percent of married women practiced contraception. The most recent survey data, collected in 1996- 97, show a total fertility rate of 5.3 births per woman and a contraceptive prevalence rate of 24 percent. Underlying this development are macroeconomic trends that have led to widespread economic distress at the household level, and …

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The Changing Social Environment For Adolescents In Kassena-Nankana District Of Northern Ghana: Implications For Reproductive Behavior, Barbara Mensch, Daniel Bagah, Wesley H. Clark, Fred N. Binka Jan 1998

The Changing Social Environment For Adolescents In Kassena-Nankana District Of Northern Ghana: Implications For Reproductive Behavior, Barbara Mensch, Daniel Bagah, Wesley H. Clark, Fred N. Binka

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This study reports on a primarily qualitative investigation of adolescent reproductive behavior in the Kassena-Nankana District, a rural isolated area in northern Ghana, where traditional patterns of marriage, family formation, and social organization persist. The study is based on in-depth interviews and focus groups with adolescents, parents, chiefs and traditional leaders, teachers, youth leaders, and health workers, supplemented by quantitative data from the 1996 wave of a panel survey of reproductive-aged women conducted by the Navrongo Health Research Centre. The social environment faced by adolescent boys and girls in the Kassena-Nankana District and its links to reproductive behavior are described. …

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The Impact Of Family Planning Household Service Delivery On Women's Status In Bangladesh, James F. Phillips, Mian Bazle Hossain Jan 1998

The Impact Of Family Planning Household Service Delivery On Women's Status In Bangladesh, James F. Phillips, Mian Bazle Hossain

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Since 1982, the Maternal and Child Health and Family Planning Extension Project has compiled longitudinal panel data on rural women’s contact with household service providers who visit homes to discuss family planning and offer services to women on request. This study tests the hypothesis that home-based services reinforce customs of purdah (female seclusion) by sustaining the dependency and isolation of the women served by the program. Results show that household services improve women’s status. This effect is largely attributable to the impact of outreach on effective fertility regulation. Findings do not support the hypothesis that household service delivery is detrimental …

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Social Networks And The Diffusion Of Fertility Control, Mark R. Montgomery, John B. Casterline Jan 1998

Social Networks And The Diffusion Of Fertility Control, Mark R. Montgomery, John B. Casterline

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Theories of the fertility transition now routinely reserve a place for diffusion effects. Two fundamental behavioral mechanisms account for such effects: social learning and social influence. Social learning refers to the acquisition of information from others. The information might have to do with a new technology or with the health, social, and economic consequences of decisions. In the case of fertility, individuals might learn from others about the availability of a new contraceptive, or about health side effects of certain contraceptives, or about the apparent gains and losses from having fewer children and investing in their schooling. Social influence refers …

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What Can Be Done To Foster Multisectoral Population Policies? Summary Report Of A Seminar, Population Council, Overseas Development Council Jan 1998

What Can Be Done To Foster Multisectoral Population Policies? Summary Report Of A Seminar, Population Council, Overseas Development Council

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

The 1994 International Conference on Population and Development in Cairo was a watershed moment in the definition of population policies. The meeting put an end to the unproductive debate on which is more instrumental in achieving voluntary fertility decline: providing family planning (FP) services or improving social and economic development. The answer was that both are essential. The Cairo meeting also defined the most desirable services and the kind of development that was most empowering, particularly with respect to achieving reproductive choice. Despite this strong dual message from Cairo, only the call for a move away from a narrow vision …

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The Effects Of Primary School Quality On The Educational Participation And Attainment Of Kenyan Girls And Boys, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark Jan 1998

The Effects Of Primary School Quality On The Educational Participation And Attainment Of Kenyan Girls And Boys, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Barbara Mensch, Wesley H. Clark

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

In Kenya, adolescent girls fare poorly relative to boys in an educational system characterized by enormous growth, deteriorating quality, and rising costs. Girls are more likely than boys to drop out of school prematurely and are less likely to do well on the primary school leaving exams that come at the end of grade eight. Using data from nearly 600 adolescents aged 12-19 in combination with data collected from 36 primary schools in which those adolescents reside, this paper investigates the effect of school quality on the likelihood of dropping out from primary school in three districts of Kenya. In …

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On The Quantum And Tempo Of Fertility, John Bongaarts, Griffith Feeney Jan 1998

On The Quantum And Tempo Of Fertility, John Bongaarts, Griffith Feeney

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Demographers have known since the 1940s that standard measures of period fertility, such as the widely used total fertility rate, are distorted by changes in the timing of childbearing. Period fertility rates are depressed during years in which women delay childbearing and inflated in years when childbearing is accelerated. This problem is usually ignored because there has been no generally accepted method for solving it. This study proposes a method for removing the tempo distortions from the total fertility rate. The key assumption of the method is that period effects, rather than cohorts effects, are the primary force in fertility …

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Government And Fertility In Transitional And Post-Transitional Societies, Geoffrey Mcnicoll Jan 1998

Government And Fertility In Transitional And Post-Transitional Societies, Geoffrey Mcnicoll

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Five categories of possible government influence on a nation’s fertility are explored: (1) through publicly funded programs that explicitly seek to affect family-size outcomes (2) through the legal order and system of public administration (3) through measures that affect economic opportunity, social mobility, and gender relations; (4) through public-sector expenditures and transfer payments keyed to age or family status; and (5) through the state’s supplanting of local beliefs and traditions with the symbols of national identity and through the parallel expansion of cultural frames of reference. Aside from the first of these, intentions to influence fertility are either incidental or …

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Fertile, Plump, And Strong: The Social Construction Of The Female Body In Low-Income Cairo [Arabic], Farha Ghannam Jan 1997

Fertile, Plump, And Strong: The Social Construction Of The Female Body In Low-Income Cairo [Arabic], Farha Ghannam

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

No abstract provided.

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Reproductive Control In South Africa, Carol E. Kaufman Jan 1997

Reproductive Control In South Africa, Carol E. Kaufman

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

The controversial state-sponsored family planning program officially began in South Africa in 1974. Although the government did not implement the program on a racial basis, the program was widely believed to be linked with white fears of growing black numbers, and was attacked by detractors as a program of social and political control. In spite of the hostile environment, black women’s use of services steadily increased. Using historical and anthropological evidence, this paper delineates the links between the social and political context of racial domination and individual fertility behavior. It argues that the quantitative ‘success’ of the family planning program …

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Transition To Adulthood Of Female Factory Workers: Some Evidence From Bangladesh, Sajeda Amin, Ian Diamond, Ruchira Tabassum Naved, Margaret Newby Jan 1997

Transition To Adulthood Of Female Factory Workers: Some Evidence From Bangladesh, Sajeda Amin, Ian Diamond, Ruchira Tabassum Naved, Margaret Newby

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

The rapidly expanding sector of garment manufacturing for export is unusual for Bangladesh in that it employs young, unmarried women in large numbers. This paper examines data from a study on garment workers in Bangladesh to explore the implications of work for the early socialization of young women. For the first time young women are given an alternative to lives where they move directly from childhood into adulthood through early marriage and childbearing. Work creates a period of transition as contrasted with the abrupt assumption of adult roles at very young ages that marriage and childbearing mandate. It is argued …

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Absent And Problematic Men: Demographic Accounts Of Male Reproductive Roles, Margaret E. Greene, Ann E. Biddlecom Jan 1997

Absent And Problematic Men: Demographic Accounts Of Male Reproductive Roles, Margaret E. Greene, Ann E. Biddlecom

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Both men and women make important contributions to the production of children, yet demographic studies of fertility and family planning have tended to focus on women alone. This paper traces the development of demography’s emphasis on women and describes how the limitations of its theoretical approaches to reproduction and empirical neglect of men have been mutually reinforcing. The paper is structured around four aims: 1) to describe why men have had a relatively low profile as subjects in demographic research on reproduction; 2) to explain growing interest in studying men’s roles; 3) to evaluate existing research on men in developing …

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Urbanization, Unemployment And Migration In Africa: Theory And Policy [Arabic], Michael P. Todaro Jan 1997

Urbanization, Unemployment And Migration In Africa: Theory And Policy [Arabic], Michael P. Todaro

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

During the past three decades, the cities of the developing world in general, and of Africa in particular, have witnessed a remarkable and in many ways unprecedented demographic growth spurt. Despite some slowdown in rates of increase in the past few years as a result of falling wages, contracting social services, and changing demographic trends, contemporary urban areas remain the growth poles of economic progress and the lightning rods of political and social unrest. Nowhere is this dilemma more visible nor the resulting problems more intractable than in the crowded cities of sub-Saharan Africa, where projections of urban population growth …

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Population And Poverty: A Review And Restatement, Geoffrey Mcnicoll Jan 1997

Population And Poverty: A Review And Restatement, Geoffrey Mcnicoll

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Worldwide in the 1990s over one billion persons are estimated to have a purchasing power of below a dollar per day, the conventional demarcation of “absolute poverty.” Other dimensions of poverty, extending beyond income measures to encompass a person’s broader capabilities and social functioning, are less empirically accessible. Poverty is commonly thought to be associated with high fertility and rapid population growth (regionally, South Asia and Africa have the highest poverty rates), but that view finds little support in the extensive statistical research literature on population and poverty. However, a clear-cut depiction of such an institutionally contingent relationship is not …

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Schooling And The Experience Of Adolescents In Kenya, Ayorinde Ajayi, Wesley H. Clark, Annabel Erulkar, Karin Hyde, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Barbara Mensch, Cecilia Ndeti, Barry Ravitch, Elisabeth Masiga, Shiprah Gichaga Jan 1997

Schooling And The Experience Of Adolescents In Kenya, Ayorinde Ajayi, Wesley H. Clark, Annabel Erulkar, Karin Hyde, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Barbara Mensch, Cecilia Ndeti, Barry Ravitch, Elisabeth Masiga, Shiprah Gichaga

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

The Government of Kenya is committed to providing equal education opportunities to all of its citizens. As a result, there has been rapid development in education since independence to ensure that as many children as possible enroll in schools and complete their studies. This study was carried out primarily to get a holistic picture of the school environment for adolescents and other relevant factors that might interfere with the whole learning/teaching process. Special attention was paid to the education of girls and the factors that might lead to their dropping out of school. The study was conducted jointly by the …

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Gender Differences In The Schooling Experiences Of Adolescents In Low-Income Countries: The Case Of Kenya, Barbara Mensch, Cynthia B. Lloyd Jan 1997

Gender Differences In The Schooling Experiences Of Adolescents In Low-Income Countries: The Case Of Kenya, Barbara Mensch, Cynthia B. Lloyd

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

Little research on education in developing countries has focused on adolescent issues at the same time, despite the fact that a growing proportion of young people are spending some time in school during the phase of their lives between puberty and marriage, there is little research on schooling as a key dimension of the adolescent experience. This paper examines the school environment in Kenya and the potential ways it can help or hinder adolescents. We focus on gender differences with a view toward illuminating some of the factors that may present particular obstacles or opportunities for girls. The paper begins …

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Urbanization, Unemployment And Migration In Africa: Theory And Policy, Michael P. Todaro Jan 1997

Urbanization, Unemployment And Migration In Africa: Theory And Policy, Michael P. Todaro

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

During the past three decades, the cities of the developing world in general, and of Africa in particular, have witnessed a remarkable and in many ways unprecedented demographic growth spurt. Despite some slowdown in rates of increase in the past few years as a result of falling wages, contracting social services, and changing demographic trends, contemporary urban areas remain the growth poles of economic progress and the lightning rods of political and social unrest. Nowhere is this dilemma more visible nor the resulting problems more intractable than in the crowded cities of sub-Saharan Africa, where projections of urban population growth …

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Gender Inequalities And Demographic Behavior: Egypt [Arabic], Nora Guhl Naguib, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Barbara L. Ibrahim Jan 1996

Gender Inequalities And Demographic Behavior: Egypt [Arabic], Nora Guhl Naguib, Cynthia B. Lloyd, Barbara L. Ibrahim

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

No abstract provided.

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