The Development of Contraceptive Pills by Ulrich Beck - Essay Example

This paper attempts to apply the concept of World Risk Society as enunciated by Ulrich Beck to that of the development of contraceptive pills. We live in a world that is more interconnected and interlinked than at any point in time because of globalization and the development of the network society. In this context, Beck’s definition of a world risk society is all too relevant and apt when we consider the propensity to predict world events that is the pet theme of all sociologists and futurists. Beck defined risk as ‘the modern approach to foresee and control the future consequences of human action’ which were the ‘unintended consequences of radicalized modernization’ (Beck, 1999, 3). Using this definition as the starting point, we get the subsequent argument that ‘Systemic events’ showed that industrial societies were generating hazards ‘that they could not control’ (Beck, 1999, 51, 44, 72). ‘Compounded risk’ had become the new meta-norm in a networked society (Daniell, 2000, 18). Hence, the thinking here is that the world is spinning out of control with people in the grip of “blind and impersonal” forces that they can neither control nor comprehend. In this context (Obama, 2006), the development of contraceptive pills and their widespread use has to be seen as a valiant effort at providing “space” to the marginalized (ethnic minorities, women) as a means of empowering them and providing them with reproductive choices. Ulrich Beck’s World Risk Society (1999) was a sociological meditation on the interlinked forces of ‘globalization, individualization, gender revolution, underemployment, and global risks (as ecological crisis and the crash of global financial markets)’ (Beck, 2000, 2). Beck examined the ‘risk calculus’ concept, the power dynamics and sociology of risk (why groups profit from ‘manufactured uncertainty’), the ‘sub-politics’ of global dissent (anti-globalist and environmental campaigns), and how reflexive modernity uses conjecture in response to crises. Beck’s work was essentially a treatise on the chaos that the processes that we shall talk about subsequently were unleashing on the world. In this context, Beck was in consonance with other social scientists that foresaw a dystopian vision for humanity and tried to warn us to the inherent dangers. In such a bleak scenario, it is worthwhile to consider the fact that the development of contraceptive pills is indeed a bright spot in an otherwise anarchical situation. For instance, Kaplan in his book The Coming Anarchy foresaw what was in store for much of Africa and the third world as a result of these processes. And recently, there have been several influential authors who have written about how reproductive rights and the choices that women make with regards to having or not having children is “the” issue on which the future of the world depends. A couple of books that are worth mentioning are The Means of Reproduction by Michelle Goldberg and Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof. Both these books talk about how family planning and access to contraception have changed the lives of people around the world. To quote from Goldberg’s book, “The global spread of family planning has vastly changed the world. Even as the planet’s population increased nearly fourfold in the twentieth century, from 1.6 billion to 6.1 billion people, fertility rates have declined sharply in most countries, and smaller families have become the norm. “In the 1950s, women in women in less developed regions had an average of six children,” wrote UN demographer Joseph Chamie. “Today’s average is closer to three. By midcentury, the global fertility average is anticipated to be close to replacement levels of around two children per couple.” There are many reasons women are having fewer children, but many studies show that a substantial part of the decrease is due to increased access to contraception, now used by more than half the couples in the world”. (Goldberg, 2009) From a sociological perspective, the development of contraceptive pills has to be viewed as a necessary mechanism in the fight against poverty. Since having lesser children automatically raises the biological health of the family as a unit and does wonders to reduce infant mortality, it is indeed a welcome change when women start using contraceptive pills as a family planning mechanism. According to Beck, the world was always characterized by “natural risks” like floods and epidemics. However, what are different in the world risk society are the manufactured risks arising out of globalization and industrialization. Industrialization created obvious problems of its own: pollution and other urban poverty-related conditions, what Beck calls manufactured risks, risks that are human-made. Hence, the problem of overpopulation and high rates of infant mortality has to be seen in this context. It is useful to distinguish between natural and manmade risks as the latter are that much more difficult to contain since they are “invisible” risks. Further, as the next paragraph shows these “contemporary risks” affect the global poor more than the rich. As Beck (1992:35) puts it "wealth accumulates at the top, risks at the bottom." The global poor are exposed to more risks than the global wealthy, which include not just extremely rich individual, but the quasi-totality of the population of core areas. Additionally, the wealthy (in terms of income, power and education) have access to more information on how to avoid risks. In other words, under conditions of global uncertainty, information becomes itself a source of wealth that is unequally distributed. However, contemporary risks involve what Beck calls a boomerang effect: those who produce risks or try to avoid them always end up being affected as well because those risks have a global impact. If we examine each of the processes that Beck was talking about i.e. globalization, individualization, gender revolution, underemployment and global risks with respect to the development of contraceptive pills, we get a mosaic of a bigger picture overview of where these interlinked forces are taking us as far as empowerment and emancipation of women are concerned. Globalization has rendered boundaries meaningless and the world is “one market under god” (Frank, 2009). However, this has had attendant risks as enunciated by Beck. Hence, we have a set of intersecting risks brought upon by globalization interacting with a set of positive variables that are the result of coordinated policy action and responses by the global health community. The gender revolution that is another process enunciated by Beck has contributed to the empowerment of women across the world though the benefits of the same are yet to reach the majority. This aspect is linked to the other processes and the contribution of TV in changing perceptions about the manmade risks cannot be underestimated. A recent cover story by the Foreign Policy magazine was titled, “Can TV save the world?” and contained references to how the medium of TV can be used to educate women about the usage of contraceptive pills and the necessity of having smaller families. It is this intersection of risks with possible solutions and the interplay between these two that would determine the future of the world. For instance, contraceptive pills and their distribution to millions of women has significantly reduced mortality rates and contributed to a decrease in the number of children that women have. Hence, the fact that contraceptive pills have contributed to the issue in a positive way is proof of the fact that their development needs to be welcomed. It is obvious that the development of contraceptive pills is a step in the right direction as far as mitigation of these types of risks is concerned. Since the issues of overpopulation and birth-control are manmade risks, the solution has to be manmade as well. As the following quote from Goldberg’s book states, “Overpopulation, with all its pernicious consequences for human development and environmental sustainability; under-population, and its threat of economic decline and cultural stasis; sex ratio imbalances, which may someday threaten the security of Asia; even the AIDS pandemic tormenting Africa—all are tied up with gender inequality, and none can be addressed successfully without increasing women’s freedom. Women’s rights must not be treated as trivial adjuncts to great questions of war and peace, poverty and development. What are at stake are not lifestyles but lives.” (Goldberg, 2009). In conclusion, Beck foresaw a dystopian future for humanity and warned us about the dangers inherent in the production and distribution of manmade risks. He was among the many theorists to have pointed the inherent instability in the world risk society. This paper concerned itself with the development of contraceptive pills as an antidote to the chaos that we might witness if we do not change course. However much the issue of contraception is opposed by religious fundamentalists, there is a need for policy makers around the world to act in unison and ensure that women have access to contraception and that they are empowered enough to take decisions regarding how many children they would have etc. This paper has not considered male contraception as it is a separate topic altogether. Suffice to say that it is an important area of development in its own way. Sources Beck, U. (1999). World Risk Society. Malden, Polity Press. Daniell, M.H. (2000). World of Risk: Next Generation Strategy for a Volatile Era. John Wiley & Sons (Asia), Singapore, Frank, Thomas. (2009). One Market under God. New York, Allen Lane. Global Sociology Blog. (2010). Global Sociology Blog. [Online] Available from: http://globalsociology.com/tag/risk-society/ [Accessed Mar 25 2010] Goldberg, Michelle. (2009).The Means of Reproduction. New York, The Penguin Press. Kristof, Nicholas. (2009). Half the Sky. New York, Simon and Schuster. Kenny, Charles. (2009). Revolution in a Box. Foreign Policy Magazine [Online] Available from:http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/10/19/revolution_in_a_box [Accessed Mar 25 2010] Read More