POPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW Nan Marie Astone et al. Family VOLUME 25 NUMBER 1 demography, social theory, M A R C H 1 9 9 9 and investment in social capital James Lee and Wang Feng Malthusian models and Chinese realities: China’s demographic system 1700–2000 John C. Caldwell et al. The Bangladesh fertility decline: An interpretation Deon Filmer and Lant Pritchett The effect of household wealth on educational attainment: Evidence from 35 countries Notes and Commentary E. A. Wrigley on Malthus and the high price of provisions Data and Perspectives S. Scherbov and H. van Vianen on marital and fertility careers of Russian women born between 1910 and 1934 Archives Eleanor Rathbone on the remuneration of women’s services Book Reviews by D.G. Johnson, N. Keyfitz, K. Hill, T.W. Guinnane, R.P. Cincotta, P. Fargues, T. 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KIM Malthusian Models and Chinese Realities: The Chinese Demographic System 1700–2000 33 JAMES LEE WANG FENG The Bangladesh Fertility Decline: An Interpretation 67 JOHN C. CALDWELL BARKAT-E-KHUDA BRUCE CALDWELL INDRANI PIERIS PAT CALDWELL The Effect of Household Wealth on Educational Attainment: Evidence from 35 Countries 85 DEON FILMER LANT PRITCHETT NOTES AND COMMENTARY Corn and Crisis: Malthus on the High Price of Provisions 121 E. A. WRIGLEY DATA AND PERSPECTIVES Marital and Fertility Careers of Russian Women Born Between 1910 and 1934 129 SERGEI SCHERBOV HARRIE VAN VIANEN ARCHIVES Eleanor Rathbone on the Remuneration of Women’s Services 145 BOOK REVIEWS J. C. Waterlow, D. G. Armstrong, Leslie Fowden, and Ralph Riley (eds.), Feeding a World Population of More Than Eight Billion People: A Challenge to Science D. GALE JOHNSON 159 Daniel Callahan, False Hopes: Why America’s Quest for Perfect Health Is a Recipe for Failure NATHAN KEYFITZ 164 Alain Bideau, Bertrand Desjardins, and Héctor Pérez Brignoli (eds.), Infant and Child Mortality in the Past KENNETH HILL 167 Noël Bonneuil, Transformation of the French Demographic Landscape, 1806–1906 TIMOTHY W. GUINNANE 169 J. Clarke and D. Noin (eds.), Population and Environment in Arid Regions RICHARD P. CINCOTTA 174 Gad G. Gilbar, Population Dilemmas in the Middle East: Essays in Political Demography and Economy PHILIPPE FARGUES 177 James L. Newman, The Peopling of Africa: A Geographic Interpretation TUKUFU ZUBERI 181 Short Reviews 182 DOCUMENTS The Council of Economic Advisers on Work and Retirement Among the Elderly 189 The Hague Forum on the Implementation of the Cairo Program of Action 196 ABSTRACTS 203 AUTHORS FOR THIS ISSUE 210 Family Demography, Social Theory, and Investment in Social Capital NAN MARIE ASTONE CONSTANCE A. NATHANSON ROBERT SCHOEN YOUNG J. KIM MANY DEMOGRAPHERS TRAINED in sociology frame their work with ideas from economics, if only implicitly. While economic concepts are of great value, the field of demography, especially family demography, can benefit from the introduction of sociological theory and, conversely, sociological theory can be enhanced and refined by the work of social demographers. The subject of this essay is “social capital,” a concept that originated in sociology and is being widely incorporated into much current social sci- ence. The social capital concept is an extension of social exchange theory. This theoretical perspective is in common use by family demographers (Edwards 1969; Schoen and Weinick 1993; Scanzoni 1972; Scanzoni et al. 1989; South 1991). It shares with neoclassical economics (Becker 1973, 1974, 1981; Willis and Haaga 1996) and materialist anthropology (Green- halgh 1995; Kertzer and Fricke 1997) the premise that demographic phe- nomena are the outgrowth of human behavior that is purposive, future- oriented, and reflective, although externally constrained. According to social exchange theory, exchange takes place in a vari- ety of institutional contexts, including, but not limited to, the markets that economists usually envision (Cook 1991). In addition, a premise of social exchange theory is that exchange occurs between individuals who are known to each other, as well as between the anonymous traders of eco- nomic exchange (Ben-Porath 1980). Moreover, social exchange theorists assume the rules that govern exchange include, but are not limited to, the POPULATION AND DEVELOPMENT REVIEW 25(1):1–31 (MARCH 1999) 1 Click to print article Click to return to Table of Contents 2 F AMILY DEMOGRAPHY, SOCIAL THEORY, AND SOCIAL CAPITAL rational calculation of costs and benefits that structure economic exchange (Curtis 1986; Meeker 1971). These premises allow social exchange theo- rists, more easily than economists, to incorporate into their models moti- vations for exchange beyond its intrinsic benefits. This is a particular advantage for family demographers, since exchanges between sexual partners, siblings, parents, children, and housemates, which constitute the subject of family demography, cannot readily be put into a conventional framework of utilitarian motivations. To explain them, re- searchers often resort to vague assertions about norms or preferences, with- out any explicit reference to the processes that bring about norms and pref- erences. The result is that we lack a full account of why systematic ethnic, social class, and gender differences in these norms or preferences occur, how they emerge, or how they change over time. To date, family demographers who have employed the social capital concept have not placed it within the larger framework of social exchange theory. Substantively, they have focused almost exclusively on the conse- quences of having or not having adequate amounts of social capital. To fully exploit the concept’s