Transizione demografica e urbanizzazione: alcuni spunti di riflessione di un processo in corso

The world population will increase by two billion, from the current 8 billion to 9.7 billion in 2050. According to the United Nations (2022), it is estimated that it could reach its peak around the end of the current century, at a level of nearly 11 billion. This scenario also confirms the trend of an increasingly urbanized global population. Nowadays, almost 57% of the world’s population, over 4.5 billion people, live in cities. Demographic phenomena can also be associated with migratory phenomena, which have constituted approximately 3% of the global population in the last two decades. However, although the migration of large masses of populations from the rural lands to the cities (urbanism and relative urbanization) has characterized different industrialized and developing countries, the growth dynamics cannot be generalized on a global scale. As a matter of fact, the current demographic stage shows that if the oldest industrialized countries are experiencing demographic stabilization or decline, the newly industrialized or developing ones show, generally and with exceptions, increases in population at decreasing rates, with a global trend towards stabilization. The contribution resulting from the increase in global population between 2020 and 2050 will depend on only nine countries. It means that as the population of sub-Saharan Africa probably doubles, the European population will decrease significantly. In this framework, the study proposes a literature review on demographic transition, declined in relation to several aspects: the considerable contributions of scientific research; the role of public and private organizations to support the national governance; the systematization of the main reciprocal impacts between demographic transition and urbanization, according to the 5 stages of the demographic transition model. The study proposes research questions to encourage future discussions and advancements in disciplinary fields directly or indirectly related to the topic of demographic transition.