The State of the Urban Centres in Line with the Populations in Towns in India - Literature review Example

Population and Urbanization Name Lecturer Institution Date Table of Contents Introduction 2 Justification 3 Ethical challenges in controlling world population growth 3 Ethical challenges in controlling immigration 5 Methodology 6 Results 7 Presentation Speech 8 References 10 Introduction Population and urbanization are common challenges in the contemporary times. Many countries in the world are faced with the challenges that come with the ever growing populations in the urban centres. The rapid growth of populations in these urban areas has been a pressing area and the residents of these urban centres and the government have been on the rise in making efforts to improve the state of the urban centres with regard to the condition of population. The self drive from individuals to respond to this situation is however insignificant, as people tend to wait for the government intervention in solving the problem. Non-governmental organizations also have put efforts in response o the crises in the urban areas of many countries all over the world. It should be noted that the conditions in the urban areas differ greatly, depending on the country in question. This presentation of a case study seeks to find out the state of the urban centres in line with the populations in these towns in India. Justification India is among the developing nations in the world, and just like other developing countries, the urban centres have experienced rapid increase of population, and many ethical problems have arisen as a result of the high population growth rates. In Kumar et. al. (2010), the government of India has set up strategies that are expected to control the high population growth rates that the world is experiencing, with the aim of controlling its own population in its urban centres. According to Rajan et. al. (2011) and Srinivasan & Vlassoff (2001), sensitization of people on the need for practicing family planning is a means of controlling the population of the urban centres. The state encourages its citizens to bear a total number of children that they can be able to cater for. The parents should be in a position to cater for the needs for education, health, shelter and food. The government proposes that family planning should be embraced even by the well off individuals, as this step ensures that the resources of the country are not over-exploitation. The government has set up health centres where its citizens can be enlightened on the ways and benefits of safe family planning. Ethical challenges in controlling world population growth Illiteracy is such one of the ethical. Close to half of India’s population is illiterate. Mishra (2011) proposes that India’s illiterate population finds consolation in child bearing. India’s members of societies who have received formal education have not internalized the need for controlling the population in the country do not recognize the relationship between high populations and its impacts on their standards of living. In addition, women have been discriminated against in India in terms of education, thus the chances of understanding of the necessity of controlled birth rates, as a result lack of knowledge. It proves a challenge for the uneducated to link high populations in India and its effects of lowering the living standards. Measures of improving the standards of living go hand in hand with controlling the population. The illiterate and ignorant people fail to find the connection between the high rates of population growth and the maternity rate. Mobilizing such people greatly hinders the success of the campaign against high populations in urban areas. Unequal distribution of resources has hampered the process of population control in the Indian urban centres. Jayaraj & Subramanian (2010) propose that unequal distribution of resources among the citizens of India has caused varying classes socially. While the high social class members of society do not directly feel the impact of poverty, the low social class members of society are greatly affected by poverty. The poor in society have been identified as members with big families, while the rich have smaller families. The rich are more cautious when it comes to family sizes. Out of the feeling of security economically, the rich are found to have large family sizes. Such reasoning among different social classes counters the efforts controlling population in urban places. The general trend between population and per-capita income assumes an indirectly proportional relation. As the people have a lower per-capita income, they try to raise their per-capita income through child-bearing, thus making it impossible to control the population in the urban areas. Immorality is the next factor that presents challenges in the process of controlling the population of individuals in the urban areas in India. Prostitution is a popular act in the urban areas in the world, and the urban areas of India are no exception. In view of Darity (2008), prostitution contributes to the high birth rate in the urban areas in India. These birth rates contribute to the general population count in the country. Extended families are a common phenomenon in the interior parts of India. Due to shared responsibility, parents are encouraged to give birth to many children. This form of family organization greatly encourages high birth rates. The slow rate of urbanization and industrialization in India has been blamed for this ill. Urbanization and industrialization comes with civilization, which is defined by the family sizes of individuals. Lack of civilization champions for early marriage, and girls get married at an early age, at which females tend to give birth to a higher number if children compared to their counterparts who get married at later ages (Shiva Kumar et al., 2010). Ethical challenges in controlling immigration There is increased migration into the urban areas of India by its natives and other foreigners to permanently settle in India. The Indian citizens also do move to from India in order to settle in foreign countries. The Indian government has the responsibility of controlling the massive movements of people, whether into or out of its urban areas. However, there are drawbacks to controlling these movements. These challenges stem from ethical issues in the society, and they are herein discussed. Lack of employment opportunities has negative effects on the war against overpopulation in the cities and towns of India. Murray & Forstater (2013) are of the view that population in urban areas increases due to the immigration of people into the urban areas in order to look for jobs. Though the government of India is trying to discourage migration into the urban centres of India, more people move into these centres each day with the hope of securing a job. With this movement into the towns, the population of urban areas in India is bound to remain high, despite the attempts to reduce the population growth rates in India. Murray & Forstater further argue that lack of proper social amenities in the interior parts of India presents a challenge to the efforts of controlling immigration of people in India. People move into the urban centers in order to get access to better health care facilities, quality education as well as easier forms of transport. Therefore most people tend to immigrate in search of these facilities, which in the contemporary generation are receiving much attention as the basic needs. Many cultural factors, including family ties are a challenge towards the efforts to contain the high rates of immigration and emigration (Leong & Berry, 2010). Most people move into the urban areas of India in search of employment in order to meet their needs, and provision for their families. In case an individual secures an employment opportunity, they invest well and later invite their family members into the cities. Most of these immigrants who move to the urban areas to be with their family members do not have any significant economic engagements. The case is similar to those moving out of India in search of opportunities. It is difficult to control immigration as people can be able to provide for themselves. Bhatti & Voight (1999) argue that immigration into India has been experienced due to deteriorating peace conditions in the neighbouring countries. Refugees run for their lives and settle in India in times of civil wars or persecution based on religious grounds. Lack of food during famine crises sees many people moving into India. In other cases, natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods render people homeless and helpless, thus they are compelled to move into India in search of shelter, food and medical care. The recent move by the Indian government to open doors for displaced refugees, though a positive move, will see India receive more of immigrants, mostly from countries like Syria, Congo, Somalia and Sudan, where civil and political wars are common and in a way, unending Methodology The analysis of the situation of population and urbanization in India greatly relies sampling, where information is collected from a portion of India’s residents, both from the urban and rural settings. The information collected is qualitative, as this form of data is better placed to give a clearer picture of the situation. For most developing countries, the governments are faced with multiple areas that require a lot of financial investment. Most of the systems are not yet stable; be it financially or in line with their productivity. The country therefore has to split its resources in order to meet every demand, though the government has to respond to more urgent issues such as provision and betterment of the healthcare services and provision of food to individuals who lack adequate food in areas faced with food crises. However, there is need for full economic development in such countries if such problems as unemployment, low per-capita income, reduced industrialization and poor public services are to be solved. Therefore, the first move in solving these problems starts with ensuring that the country has a controlled and manageable population with regard to its resources. I chose on India due to its high population growth rates in the recent past. This choice was as well influenced by the fact that India has potential of development. The methodology used to gather the necessary information relating to the challenges of overpopulation in India and the ethical challenges of controlling world population and immigration in light of the urban areas of India were; interviews, questionnaires, surveys and reference to written secondary materials. Results Face to face interviews were carried out on native and non-native refugees in India, who revealed the reasons of their displacement. Most of these refugees were people who had been displaced in their own country and fled to India to seek security and peace. Political wars due to differing ideologies of the political leaders had seen their countries’ peace torn into shreds. Questionnaires were used in the highly populated and the interior parts of the country. The questions were structured in the open ended form in order to allow the respondents give as much information as they felt comfortable, without restriction. The respondents felt that the government had the responsibility of ensuring popularity of family though setting up of adequate family planning facilities. Survey method was also used. A close study on the lifestyles of the Indian population revealed that the urban areas were congested though most people were not engaged in any economic activity. They were being provided for by their guardians or spouses while all they did was attend to the simple house chores. Review of secondary written sources was the main method of data collection. This method was effective as information relating to the immigration and population control was mostly obtained from this source. India has put legislative measures in place in order to control the population growth rate and immigration concerns. Another assumption reached was that the government should extend its industrialization to the rural and sub-urban areas by avoiding centralization of industries. This will ensure creation of jobs which consequently will reduce immigration to the urban areas and overexploitation of resources in the urban areas. This will also reduce the birth rate as people will have increased per-capita income. The main problem encountered in the data collection was language barrier with some of the respondents in interviews who would not speak in English. Another limitation was the open ended questions to which respondents did not give relevant answers. Presentation Speech Most countries in the world are faced with the many problems, among them population and urbanization. These countries may respond to the issues arising from population and urbanization in varied ways. This is commonly influenced by the economic resources that the given countries own. Developed countries such as the USA are not under as much pressure as developing countries, such as India. India is among the developing nations in the world, and just like other developing countries, the urban centres have experienced rapid increase of population. Many problems have arisen as a result of the high population growth rates. The problems arising from high population in the urban areas result from inadequate resources. The number of residents is high thus the available resources are over utilized. Crime and prostitution are the main social problems. Poverty in the urban areas forces people to engage in unlawful and immoral activities in order to obtain money. The most common of such acts include involvement in crime and prostitution. Crime and prostitution, however, have worse impacts to the lives of the individuals. Such problems include spread of diseases and imprisonment. The government of India has put measures in place to control the high rates of population increase in its urban centres. The effectiveness of the government initiative to respond to problems of high population in the urban places is negatively affected by ethical challenges. These challenges have made it difficult for the government to control urban and world population through stabilization of population growth rates. Community structures and beliefs affect the government’s effort in controlling overpopulation. In the interior parts of India, the extended family structures are popular. This structure encourages giving birth to many children. Lower per-capita income of residents in urban areas hinders control of population in the urban areas. Lack of adequate capital causes parents to resort to giving birth to many children in order to gain confidence. The parents hope that their children will be able to help them economically upon maturation. Individuals with lower per-capita income are linked to high birth rates. There also are ethical challenges that have been associated with the difficulty in controlling the immigration and emigration of people in India. Frequent wars in other countries have led to massive immigrations into India. Though the government is interested in controlling immigration, it receives displaced victims of civil wars. People in India move from the rural areas to the urban areas in search of job opportunities and better social amenities. In the rural areas, underdevelopment prompts the people to move to the towns where access to quality education and health care. Unequal distribution of resources compels youths to move to urban areas in search for jobs. The Indian government is, in conclusion, faced with serious population problems in its cities, India being the second most populous country. Its attempts to control the high rates of population increase can be fruitful, if only it ensures growth of the economy. References Top of Form BHATTI, A., & VOIGHT, J. H. (1999). Jewish exile in India, 1933-1945. New Delhi, Manohar in association with Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi, pp. 23-24. DARITY, W. A. (2008). International encyclopedia of the social sciences. Detroit, Mich, Macmillan Reference USA. http://go.galegroup.com/ps/infomark.do?action=interpret&id=GALE%7C1RIY&v=2.1&it=aboutBook&source=null&p=GVRL&authCount=1 [Retrieved on May 10, 2014.] .International encyclopedia of the social sciences. Detroit, Mich, Macmillan Reference USA. http://go.galegroup.com/ps/infomark.do?action=interpret&id=GALE%7C1RIY&v=2.1&it=aboutBook&source=null&p=GVRL&authCount=1. [Retrieved on 10 May, 2014] JAYARAJ, D., & SUBRAMANIAN, S. (2010). Poverty, inequality, and population: essays in development and applied measurement. Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 45-54. LEONG, C.-H., & BERRY, J. W. (2010). Intercultural relations in Asia migration and work effectiveness. Singapore, World Scientific. http://site.ebrary.com/id/10422503. [Retrieved on 16th May, 2014] MISHRA, L. (2011). Human bondage: tracing its roots in India. New Delhi, India, SAGE Publications, pp. 13-15. MURRAY, M. J., & FORSTATER, M. (2013). Employment guarantee schemes job creation and policy in developing countries and emerging markets. New York, NY, Palgrave Macmillan. http://www.palgraveconnect.com/doifinder/10.1057/9781137313997. [Retrieved on 16 May 2014]. SHIVA KUMAR, A. K., PANDA, P., & VED, R. R. (2010). Handbook of population and development in India. New Delhi, Institute for Human Development, pp. 12-14. SHIVA KUMAR, A. K., PANDA, P., & VED, R. R. (2010). Handbook of population and development in India. New Delhi, Institute for Human Development, p. 41. IRUDAYA RAJAN, S., VARGĪS, V. J., & JAYAKUMAR, M. S. (2011). Dreaming mobility and buying vulnerability: overseas recruitment practices in India. New Delhi, Routledge, pp. 23-39. SRINIVASAN, K., & VLASSOFF, M. (2001). Population-development nexus in India: challenges for the new millennium. New Delhi, Tata McGraw Hill Pub. Co., p. 112. Bottom of Form Read More