Road to 8 Billion: Censuses and data population.
According to the United Nations, on November 15th, our planet hit the historic landmark of 8 billion people. Technological advances in medicine, the food industry, and science, in general, have allowed us to get older and obtain better living conditions. Yes, we still have a long way to go to get the best and equal opportunities for everyone, but it is worth noting the landmark.
It hasn’t been easy to get to this number, to actually know it. Knowing how many of us are there and what type of situation we face requires enormous effort and resources, but the benefits are more than enough to justify its price for developing public policies and a deep understanding of our society. According to the U.S Government Accounting Office (GAO), the 2020 Census cost around US $14.2 Billion, which was, in fact, a slowdown in an increasing cost trend from the previous censuses.
From Clay Tablets to Bronze Arrowheads
The Babylonians, considered one of the first civilizations, are also credited with developing the first known census in 3800 BCE. The goal was to know how much food was needed for their entire population, how much tax they could charge, and how much military force was available. They did this by sending people to knock on doors and writing on clay tablets that, after, it is said, were probably destroyed so none of the outsiders could have access to the information.
Other curious systems have been used throughout history. A Scythian king, Ariantas (from what is today part of Iran), ordered people to bring a bronze arrowhead to his palace, threatening people with death penalties if they didn’t comply. Sticks and stones and many other objects have also been used to answer a similar question: How many human and economic resources are available?
Censuses have been so relevant that they are even mentioned in religious texts like the Bible, having fundamental roles like motivating Mary and Joseph to travel to Bethlehem to be counted, referencing a census for the Roman governor Quirinus in Judea, AD 7.
The Romans set the essential elements for our current census processes, but with critical differences mainly related to who was allowed to participate directly. Women, enslaved people, and orphans were counted separately and not included in the total. People who didn’t attend received harsh penalties, including losing freedom and being sold as enslaved people.
One of the most extensive antique censuses was made in China under the Han dynasty in AD 2, reaching 59.2 million people; the Chinese dynasty was considered the most crowded at the time, and this Census is believed to be reasonably accurate even by today’s standards.
May the force be with your Census
There is usually a lot of preparation and investment in censing the population, and by now, we have gotten pretty good at counting heads, but it’s practically impossible to get a completely accurate number of people and their living conditions. Sometimes the approaches are not the best, or some factors are not considered.
Australia’s hacked census is an example. In 2016, the tools intended to ease the process became a headache for the Australian Bureau of Statistics when the website, proposed as an innovative way to optimize the census process and meant to fill the forms, overloaded and shut down for nearly 40 hours. The first reports talked about a massive cyber attack that could have even involved foreign states but was later dismissed. A relatively “modest in scale” DDoS attack was the cause of the failure, causing an overload that was described as “the contractor’s fault for not delivering the contractual obligations needed to take such a process.”
Other factors like people, culture, and how they react to the process are also important. For the 2001 New Zealand census, more than 53,000 people claimed to be of the “Jedi” religion after an email campaign that stated that if 8,000 people said “the force was with them,” it would become an official religion. Although funny, this meant that the results did not reflect an accurate picture of people's beliefs. The campaign also extended to countries like Australia, with 70,000 believers, and sparked discussion around participatory processes, belief systems, how to define them, and their institutional recognition.
Innovations in data distribution
Although reliance on technology during data collection has been questioned due to previous attempts, most improvements are implemented successfully, especially when processing and visualizing data. Public and private organizations in several countries are using innovative sites to make data accessible to a broader audience. Platforms that combine datasets to connect demographic with socioeconomic and geographic data give a more comprehensive perspective that allows for better public policies and strategies for development as both an internal tool for governments, decision-makers, and the general public, creating room for transparency and accountability.
DataUSA is one of the most comprehensive websites and visualization engines for public US Government data, including demographic and economic data (among others), allowing a deep understanding of US society and its behavior.
Making census data publicly available benefits public officers, researchers, private and public organizations, and citizens who want to know more about a specific state or city. Having a platform to find a place to live with a broader job availability for your field or universities that will allow an easier transition from student to the workforce could be a pivotal instrument to a strategic decision on a much more practical and individual scale.
DataMexico is another example of a platform that makes data more accessible, in this case, focusing the platform as a tool to promote Mexico’s economy, innovation, and diversification.
These platforms are also fundamental to developing research by providing a reliable source for the academic community and, therefore, extensive investigation and analysis of patterns over the years to improve and evaluate, for example, public policy implementation, accountability, and performance.
The fact that a variety of datasets can be combined allows for a much better understanding of a place in economic and cultural terms; for example, knowing how many young people, immigrants*, or workers in a specific field populate a place can shed light on cultural implications that might affect the performance of education and health policies, as well as developing industries.
If you are curious about the history of migration data, you can visit one of our past blog posts.*
Conclusion
Our society has known the importance of population data since the early civilizations, and we have come a long way from that. We have grown as a species, our ability to know more about ourselves and the techniques used to do it.
A new era has brought technological advances that are being used to get more data and better analysis of our socioeconomic contexts. Allowing better ways to display data also makes it easier to understand and apply information to policymaking, getting us closer to reaching a more equal society with better access to information and more efficiency in the process. Data platforms could be one of the keys to a prosperous 8 Billion society.
