The impact of international population assistance on population policy, program and fertility change in the developing countries.

Population assistance as a sector of development assistance has a history that spans more than two decades since the United Nations started to contribute to population work in 1969. The impact of population assistance has been embedded in the debate over the effectiveness of family planning programs in the Third World. While increasing evidence has demonstrated the effect of family planning programs, the question of the effectiveness of population assistance supporting these programs remains less clear. The present study was designed to address this question. First, the determinants of assistance were examined to understand how the flow of assistance was affected by demographic and socioeconomic conditions, and the development of policy and program in 80 recipient countries. Second, the effect of assistance on the timing of policy adoption, quality of family planning program services, and fertility decline was assessed. Receipt of assistance, or years of assistance, was used to explain the date of policy decision, when demographic and socioeconomic conditions were adjusted for. Assistance, together with policy strength, socioeconomic development, and population density, were employed to predict the level and change of program services. Finally, the effect of program quality on fertility decline was investigated with the presence of socioeconomic development and assistance. Two major analytic methods were employed: a Hazard model for predicting policy date, interactive regression models for explaining the level and change of program services and first-order regression models for the other tests. The study concluded that most assistance was given to smaller countries, better programs, and the most needy countries. Countries receiving assistance, or receiving more years of assistance, were more likely to have policy changes, and the timing of policy adoption was positively related to program quality. Assistance was found to be associated with higher program quality only in countries with moderate levels of development. For the weak programs, it appeared to improve program services only after policy activities were greatly promoted. Lastly, program quality was strongly associated with fertility decline, which implied a fertility effect of assistance in the moderately developed countries. No independent effect of assistance was observed on fertility decline.Ph.D.Population PlanningUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/104418/1/9513518.pdfDescription of 9513518.pdf : Restricted to UM users only