The Lottery of Birth

This free online course will look at both the big picture of the ‘lottery of birth’ and the smaller, human stories. You will examine the inequalities of birth, particularly being born rich or poor and being born female or male. You will also look at the lottery of birth as it relates to becoming a parent. You’ll consider how individual countries and global organisations are responding to demographic changes and predictions and how this plays out in the lives of individual women and men in different parts of the world. You’ll use a variety of disciplines in the course such as demography, health studies, sociology, comparative social policy, history, political science and economics. This interdisciplinary nature brings different perspectives together to create fresh insights and provide a bridge for different ideas to feed into social and political change. Towards the end of the course, you’ll have the opportunity to critically analyse an initiative of your choosing from your own country and review the analysis of a fellow learner.