A Trap at the Escape from the Trap? Some Demographic Structural Factors of Political Instability in Modernizing Social Systems

Andrey Korotayev (1) , Sergey Yu Malkov , Leonid Grinin (1)

1 RAS - Russian Academy of Sciences [Moscow]

The escape from the 'Malthusian trap' is shown to tend to generate in a rather systematic way quite serious political upheavals. Some demographic structural mechanisms that generate such upheavals have been analyzed, which has made it possible to develop a mathematical model of the respective processes. The forecast of political instability in Sub-Saharan African countries in 2015– 2050 produced on the basis of this model is presented.

Keywords: demographic; demographic dynamics; mathematical modeling; Malthusian trap; urbanization; Africa; modernization; instability; youth bulge; transition; political dynamics; political demography

Domains: History, Philosophy and Sociology of Sciences; History; Philosophy

Andrey Korotayev, Sergey Yu Malkov, Leonid Grinin. A Trap at the Escape from the Trap? Some Demographic Structural Factors of Political Instability in Modernizing Social Systems. Leonid Grinin, Andrey V. Korotayev History & Mathematics: Trends and Cycles. , 2014, Uchitel, pp.201-267, 2014, 978-5-7057-4223-3. ⟨hprints-01863067⟩