Ask the Scholar

{
    "localId": "26413421",
    "label": "Visions of the Future from Leading Thinkers [Binder] [2]",
    "core": "doc",
    "dtoType": "document",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/26413421"
}

{
    "id": "26413421",
    "sourceUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/26413421",
    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "Visions of the Future from Leading Thinkers [Binder] [2]",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/26413421",
    "collections": [
        "Records of the Domestic Policy Council (Clinton Administration)",
        "Bruce Reed's General Files"
    ],
    "iiifBase": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/21/4134/26413421/content/presidential-libraries/clinton/foia/2011-0299-S-General/2011-0299-S-General-JPG/Box_155/42-t-7367462-20110299S-155-011-2015/42_t_7367462_20110299S_155_011_2015_Page_001.JPG",
    "thumbnailUrl": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/21/4134/26413421/content/presidential-libraries/clinton/foia/2011-0299-S-General/2011-0299-S-General-JPG/Box_155/42-t-7367462-20110299S-155-011-2015/42_t_7367462_20110299S_155_011_2015_Page_001.JPG",
    "largeImageUrl": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/21/4134/26413421/content/presidential-libraries/clinton/foia/2011-0299-S-General/2011-0299-S-General-JPG/Box_155/42-t-7367462-20110299S-155-011-2015/42_t_7367462_20110299S_155_011_2015_Page_001.JPG",
    "imageCount": 81,
    "hasImages": true,
    "source": "import",
    "hasTranscription": false
}

{
    "url": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/26413421",
    "naId": 26413421,
    "levelOfDescription": "fileUnit",
    "otherTitles": [
        "42-t-7367462-20110299S-155-011-2015"
    ],
    "recordType": "description",
    "ocrSource": "nara-archive"
}

{
    "seq": 46,
    "pageIndex": 0,
    "type": "photo",
    "url": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/21/4134/26413421/content/presidential-libraries/clinton/foia/2011-0299-S-General/2011-0299-S-General-JPG/Box_155/42-t-7367462-20110299S-155-011-2015/42_t_7367462_20110299S_155_011_2015_Page_046.JPG",
    "mediaId": "6504fbd170bbeca9",
    "ocrText": "Freedom and Our Future\nPage 6\nMemorandum for the President\nAmartya Sen, February 25, 2000\nclassic confrontation between pro-freedom and anti-freedom outlooks.\nThis particular example of the debate about freedom is not hard to settle empirically. Not\nonly have fertility rates come down over time (and it is hard to deny the role of \"the progress of\nreason\" in explaining the new norm of smaller families), but also cross-section comparisons across\ncountries show that the decline of fertility rates relates closely to the empowerment of young women\nwhose lives are most battered by over-frequent bearing and rearing of children.\nThis particular lesson also emerges clearly from cross-section comparisons across the\nhundreds of districts that comprise India. Not surprisingly, women's education and \"gainful\"\nemployment, which increases women's voice in family decisions, emerge as the two biggest influences\nin reducing fertility rates.⁷ While the total fertility rate for India as a whole - despite a drop from\n6 to just above 3 children per couple - is still substantially higher than the replacement level of 2\n(that is 2 children per couple), it is also the case that many districts in India have substantially lower\nfertility rates than China, the USA, the UK, or France.\nThe fertility declines in the states of Kerala, Tamil Nadu or Himachal Pradesh in India can\nbe closely linked to the rapid enhancement of female education and other sources of empowerment\nof young women, including extensive public discussion of the predicament of women. China is often\ntaken as an example on the other side, as positive evidence of the good effects of coercion in family\nplanning (through its \"one child\" policy and other policies of enforcement). Indeed, fertility decline\nhas been sharp in China, but a roughly similar decline would have been expected because of China's\nachievements in female education and employment. The Indian state of Kerala, which has also had\n7 See Mamta Murthi, Anne-Catherine Guio and Jean Drèze, \"Mortality, Fertility and Gender\nBias in India: A District Level Analysis,\" Population and Development Review, 21 (December 1995);\nand Jean Drèze and Mamta Murthi, \"Female Literacy and Fertility: Recent Census Evidence from\nIndia,\" mimeographed, Centre for History and Economics, King's College, Cambridge, 1999."
}