The natural counter question is : Well, does the youth bulge guarantee economic success ? The answer is a resounding NO. In fact, it would be a miracle if violence can be avoided and conditions created for economic transformation. This is the essence of the popular youth bulge theory. The Law and Other Things blog makes a great attempt to put it in an Indian context. The theory is very compelling partly due to its plain speaking German author - Prof Heinsohn. After all, it simply says that violence needs young unattached male fighers. Duh! I think there is much more in this simple theory than meets the eye.
First this theory in a nutshell.
Gunnar Heinsohn, a social scientist and genocide researcher at the University of Bremen, has an explanation for why this might be so. Since its publication in 2003, his eccentric and eye-opening Sons and World Power* (not available in English) has become something of a cult book. In Mr Heinsohn’s view, when 15 to 29-year-olds make up more than 30 per cent of the population, violence tends to happen; when large percentages are under 15, violence is often imminent.
I will not bore you more with explaining this theory further. There are plenty of resources on the web. I want to focus on what this theory has for India.
A common misconception :
The population growth could “transform into a demographic dividend if every child was born healthy and was educated,” said Health Minister Ambumani Ramadoss.
Really, is it that simple ? According to the youth-bulge theory, education and health has little bearing on the proclivity to violence. In fact, well fed and educated youth are even more dangerous. The north-east, Kashmir, Punjab have lower poverty and higher education. Sri Lankans, both Tamils and Sinhalese have high literacy levels. So, obviously the excellent & free education system in Sri Lanka did not help them. The less said about our public primary education the better.
What bulge
I pulled stats for India from the US Census bureau. Our population in 2020 looks is shown in the graphic below. This is when the youth bulge (15 - 35 ) appears to be most pronounced.
Fast forward into the future, in 2050 the population for India would be
You can see that in 2050, the youth bulge has passed.
If the youth bulge indeed correlates with violence, then
- the worst years would be between 2020 to 2030.