Malthusian Neocolonialism
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A reflection on the persistent Western
concern with global population growth
The various theories of human population growth
can be placed into three broad categories:
Malthusian
Malthusian population theories view population as an independent
variable increasing of its own volition and controlled only through an
increase in mortality. (see slide 3)
Neo-Malthusian
Neo-Malthusian population theories, like Malthusian theories, view
population as an independent variable, but argue that population growth
can (and must) be controlled through a reduction in fertility. (see slide 4)
Non-Malthusian
Non-Malthusian population theories see population systemically as
simultaneously an independent and a dependent variable, both influencing
and being influenced by other variables. (see slide 5)
MALTHUSIANISM
(population control through mortality)
⁺
POPULATION
carrying capacity
TIME
NEO-MALTHUSIANISM
(population control through fertility)
⁺
POPULATION
carrying capacity
TIME
NON-MALTHUSIAN POPULATION ECOLOGY
⁺
carrying capacity
Level of productivity
Fertility rate
Technological input
Mortality rate
Cost of rearing
children
Labor value of
children
Support of elderly
Energy expenditure
Labor investment
⁺
POPULATION
-
Social and political
organization
Resources exploited
Environmental
impact
Infant mortality rate
Demand for labor
Resource
competition
Migration
carrying capacity
-
Malthusianism
&
Neo-Malthusianism
Non-Malthusian
Population Ecology
October 12, 1999
Y6B*Day
SOURCE: J.W. Wilmoth & P. Ball. 1992. "The Population Debate in American Popular
Magazines, 1946-90." Population and Development Review 18: 640.
The Population Bomb
The most prolific author
promoting the issue of
overpopulation has been
Paul Ehrlich, with 24
articles published on the
subject in popular
magazines alone.
Statements made by Ehrlich . . .
“The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s
and 1980s hundreds of millions will starve to death in
spite of any crash programs embarked upon now.”
--The Population Bomb (1968)
“By 1985 enough millions will have died to reduce the
earth's population to some acceptable level, like 1.5
billion people.“
--“Eco-Catastrophe” (1969)
Other Statements . . .
“The population bomb threatens to create an
explosion as disruptive and dangerous as an
explosion of the atom, and with as much influence
on prospects for progress or disaster, war or peace.”
--Greissimer, Population Bomb (1954)
continue . . .
“. . . No other phenomenon casts a darker
shadow on the prospects for international
development than the staggering growth of
population.”
--Pearson Report (1969)
continue . . .
“. . . To put it simply: the greatest single
obstacle to the economic and social
advancement in the underdeveloped world is
rampant population growth.”
--Robert MacNamara, President
World Bank (1969)
continue . . .
“There are too many Asians for their own
good. They have been breeding trouble for
themselves --and for the world as a whole.”
--J. Robbins, Too Many Asians (1959)
continue . . .
“China quite literally cannot feed more people . . . The
greatest tragedy that China could suffer, at the present
time, would be a reduction in her death rate. . . . Millions
are going to die . . . . There can be no way out. These men
and women, boys and girls, must starve as tragic sacrifices
on the twin alters of uncontrolled reproduction and
uncontrolled abuse of the land.”
--W. Vogt (1960)
Humanity was predicted to exhaust critical
resources in the following order . . .
gold . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1981
mercury . . . . . . . . . . 1985
tine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1987
zinc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1990
petroleum . . . . . . . . . 1992
copper . . . . . . . . . . . 1993
lead . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1993
natural gas . . . . . . . 1993
--Club of Rome, Limits to Growth (1972)
Harrison (1993) conceded that . . .
“Over the past two centuries, Malthus’ basic
theorem has been turned upside down. Human
ingenuity has so far been able to increase world food
production in line with the increase in human
numbers.
but argued instead that . . .
“It is not a resource crisis but a pollution crisis. . . .
Life may survive in some lowly form, but we may
not.”
Others have also claimed that human population growth
threatens the global environment.
“. . . nearly one-third of the world's cropland (1.5 billion
hectares) has been abandoned during the past 40 years
because erosion has made it unproductive.”
--Pimentel et al. (1995).
“As the Worldwatch Institute has pointed out, if China's
population increases by 500 million and their soil erosion
continues unabated, it will need to import 200-400
million tons of food each year by 2050. . . . But by then,
sufficient food imports probably will not be available on
the international market.”
-- Pimentel, et.al. (1996)
continue . . .
“29% of the nation’s 16,000 plant species are at risk of disappearing
forever.”
--Mark W. Nowak, NPG (1998)
“34,000 species of plants in 200 countries threatened with extinction.”
--World Conservation Union (1998)
70% of the biologists polled believe a mass extinction is already
underway and that up to 20% of all living species could disappear
within the next 30 years due to human activity.
--J. Warrick, Washington Post (1998)
The following claims of species loss have already
been made . . .
40,000 species per year
250,000 species per year, with half
the earth’s species gone by the year
2000, and all species gone by 2025.
--Norman Myers, The Sinking Ark (1979)
--Paul Ehrlich (1981)
40,000 species per year
--Al Gore, Earth in the Balance (1992)
27,000 - 100,000 species per year
--E.O. Wilson, Diversity of Life (1992)
Population growth is also
seen as the ultimate cause
of “global warming”.
Even our social problems are viewed as a consequence of
population growth.
“As population growth in our cities has increased, so
have crime and competition for housing. As a result,
Americans have taken to the suburbs to find cheaper
housing and to regain open space and solitude.”
--Mark W. Nowak, NPG (1998)
“You tell me. Is the world in 2000 more crowded, more
polluted, less stable economically and more vulnerable
to disruption than the world in 1980? The answer has
to be yes.”
--John Weeks, Population: An Introduction to
Concepts and Issues (2000)
The whole literature has the feel of . . .
. . . Chicken Little on Acid!
Population Growth
and
Economic Development
“. . . millions of dollars spent on empirical research
have failed to provide convincing support for the
view that population growth is an obstacle to
economic development.”
--Frank Furedi, Population and Development (1997)
“The specialist literature exhibits a profound tension
between the intuition that population growth has negative
consequences for the living standards of developing
societies, and the absence of empirical evidence to
substantiate this sentiment. . . . when it comes to
deciding on the impact of population growth, ‘feelings’
still tend to account for more than facts. ”
--Frank Furedi, Population and Development (1997)
Would Ehrlich have had the same reaction and felt the same way about
overpopulation if he were walking down Fifth Avenue in New York, rather
than through the hot sweltering slums of Delhi?
Would Ehrlich
have reacted the
same way while
walking through
downtown
Tokyo? . . .
. . . or taking the Tokyo subway?
“No statistical association …(exists)… between
national rates of population growth and growth
rates of income per capita.”
--National Research Council (1986)
Increased Food
Production
Average global
caloric consumption
has steadily
increased over the
past 40 years . . .
*
*
*
. . . during the same
period that world
population more
than doubled.
SOURCE: FAO 2001 presented in Lomborg 2002:109)
SOURCE: IMF 2001 presented in Lomborg 2002:62)
Food today cost less than one-third of what it cost in the 1950s.
U.S. Population Growth
Year
U.S. Population
Increase
1800
5,000,000
---
1900
75,000,000
1,400 %
2000
280,000,000
273 %
U.S. Population Growth
1. Only about 3% of the population growth in the U.S. throughout
the 17th and 18th centuries is attributed to immigration.
2. The crude birth rate in the U.S. at that time was 55 births per
1000 population, comparable to the highest national birth rates
in the world today, causing the U.S. population to double every
25 years.
3. During the 19th century, the U.S. population grew even faster:
from about 5 million in 1800 to 75 million in 1900 (1400%)
4. The U.S. population continued to increase from 75 million in
1900 and to nearly 280 million in 2000. (280%)
5. Although contemporary American birth rates are low, the U.S.
still maintains one of the highest population growth rates in
the world --comparable to those of Zimbabwe and Thailand.
New England vs. the American South
1. New England has historically had much higher birth rates and
population growth rates than the southern U.S.
2. In the 17th century, New England was characterized by
especially high birth rates.
3. In one sample of 90 families, an average of 7-8 children per
family grew to adulthood, compared to only 2-3 children in the
South.
4
Birth rates in New England during the 17th century were as high
--and in some cases higher-- than birth rates in contemporary
Africa, where the highest birth rates presently exist.
4. Yet, throughout American history, New Englanders have
maintained, on average, a higher standard of living than
Southerners and, indeed, among the highest standard of living
in the entire U.S.
Japanese Rice
Production
A.D. 600 - 2000
* * * * *
Compared to
Other Asian
Countries Today
Population
Land Area
Population
Density
(sq.mi.)
(per sq.mi.)
____________________________________________________
Japan
California
128 mil.
145,374
880
33 mil.
155,973
211
U.S.
278 mil.
3,717,780
75
____________________________________________________
The majority of land surface in Japan is covered with forests.
Japan is Mostly
Mountainous
In Japan, it is as if half the population
of the U.S. lived in southern California.
Is Africa
Overpopulated?
Western Image
of Africa . . .
. . . and other
developing
countries
Common terms used:
“Population Bomb”
*
*
*
“Teeming Masses”
Developed Countries
Country
Total
Population
(in thousands,
1999)
Population
Density
GDP Per
Capita
Energy
Consumption Per
Capita
(kilograms oil equiv.,
1990-99)
______
_____________
(per square km.,
1997)
______________
France
58,886
106
23,843
3,918
Germany
82,177
230
25,468
4,086
Italy
57,343
191
19,962
2,817
Japan
126,505
333
33,265
3,658
Netherlands
15,735
376
23,270
5,622
U.K.
58,744
240
21,921
3,938
U.S.
276,219
29
28,789
8,040
(US$, 1997)
__________
_____________
______________________________________________________
SOURCE: United Nations
Underdeveloped Countries
Total
Population
(in
thousands,
1999)
_____________
Ethiopia
Population
Density
GDP Per
Energy
Consumption Per
(per square
km., 1997)
____________
Capita
(US$,
1997)
____________
Capita
(kilograms oil equiv.,
1990-99)
__________________
61,095
54
104
287
Kenya
29,549
57
356
494
Nigeria
108,945
128
1,376
753
Sierra Leone
4,717
62
260
--
Sudan
28,882
11
59
--
Uganda
21,143
85
313
--
Congo
50,336
20
52
311
Country
_________
______________________________________________________
Annual Per Capita Fresh Water Withdrawals by Country
(in cubic meters , 1987-1997)
Developed Countries
United States
1,677
Developing Countries
Ethiopia
50
Japan
735
Kenya
87
U.K.
160
Nigeria
46
Germany
583
Sierra Leone
98
Italy
1,005
Sudan
Canada
1,623
Uganda
669
20
France
700
Congo
8
____________________________________________________
SOURCE: World Resources Institute
Population density in Germany or Great Britain is:
--twice that of Nigeria
--5 times that of Ethiopia or Kenya
--30
times that of the Congo!
Yet, it is the African countries that are
considered “overpopulated” . . .
Per capita energy consumption in Germany and
Great Britain is:
--8
times that in Kenya
--14
times that in Ethiopia!
. . . Yet, it is population growth in the Africa that is
seen as a threat to the global environment.
Per capita energy consumption in the U.S. is . . .
--3 times that of Germany or Great Britain
--16 times that of Kenya or Nigeria
--28
times that of Ethiopia!
Total U.S. Energy consumption could support . . .
--4.5 billion Kenyans or Nigerians
--7
--
billion Congolese
8 billion Ethiopians!
What the scientific research shows . . .
“No statistical association . . .(exists). . . between
national rates of population growth and growth
rates of income per capita.”
--National Research Council (1986)
• Fertilizer use in Africa averages 12 kilograms per
hectare:
•
1/4th that of India
•
1/36th that in Japan
• Irrigation covers only 4% of cultivated land in subSaharan Africa compared to:
•
26% in India
•
44% in China.”
-Robert Paarlberg (1994)
Due to the failure of Malthusian-based theory
to explain economic underdevelopment, the
focus of the population debate shifted . . .
. . . to a concern with the claimed
negative effect of population growth
on the global environment.
Machakos District,
Kenya
Population Growth
Machakos District, Kenya, 1932-1989
Annual Growth Rate
Year Total Population
(percent)
_________________________________________________
1932
240,000
---
1948
366,000
2.68
1962
566,000
3.17
1969
707,000
3.22
1979
1,023,000
3.76
1989
1,393,000
3.09
_________________________________________________
SOURCE: Mortimore and Tiffen (1994)
The Machakos region was described in rather bleak terms in
1937 by a British soil conservation officer as . . .
“. . . an appalling example of a large area of land which
has been subjected to uncoordinated and practically
uncontrolled
development
by
natives
whose
multiplication and the increase of whose stock has been
permitted, free from the checks of war and largely from
those of disease, under benevolent British Ruse. . . .
Every phase of misuse of land is vividly and poignantly
displayed in this reserve, the inhabitants of which are
rapidly drifting to a state of hopeless and miserable
poverty and their land to a parching desert of rocks,
stones and sand.”
However, . . .
1. During the 1950s: 40,000 hectares of land in
Machakos District were terraced.
2. Hiatus in terracing during independence movement.
3. Terracing resumed and by 1985 the majority of
arable land in the district was terraced.
4. 1994: 100% of arable land in the district protected.
5. Farmers use moldboard plows; manuring fields
instead of fallowing; stall-feeding livestock replaced
pasture-grazing.
6. Increased agricultural productivity.
7. Tree-density increased to 34 trees per hectare.
Kano CloseSettled Zone,
Nigeria
Kano Close-Settled Zone
African Sahel
1918 --average population density was 300-400 people per square mile, and
that they were entirely supporting themselves from the produce of
a soil which was considered not very fertile and which had been
under cultivation for several hundred years.
1950 --Kano close-settled zone village of Tumbau cultivated 75.8 % of the
land.
1971 --87.2% of land in the village was cultivated.
1990 --bulk density, particle size distribution, percent organic carbon, total
nitrogen, pH, cation exchange capacity (CEC), and exchangeable
potassium, calcium, magnesium and sodium were stable (compared
to analysis completed in 1977).
--No evidence of yield decline.
The rate of
population
growth actually
peaked in the
early 1960s and
has been
decreasing every
year since.
SOURCE: USCB 2001 presented in Lomborg 2002:47)
The percent of
world population
living in countries
with a fertility rate
at or below
replacement has
been steadily
increasing.
“. . . the U.N.'s new proposal acknowledges that fertility is falling
more rapidly than expected in some big, less developed countries
with "intermediate" levels of fertility. These include India,
Pakistan, Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, Egypt, Bangladesh and the
Philippines. (China at 1.8 is already below replacement level.) The
U.N. concludes that the less developed nations are heading toward a
fertility rate of 1.85, down significantly from the 2.1 of earlier
projections. This would yield a maximum global population in the 8
billion to 9 billion range.“
--Wall Street Journal (March 4, 2002)
Over the past 50 years, the Population Lobby’s
justification for population control policies and
programs directed at Third World countries has
undergone repeated change.
The principal justifications have been (in chronological
order) . . .
 Poverty and Underdevelopment
 Political Instability and Revolution
 Environmental Degradation
 Women’s Health and Human Rights
Which raises the following questions . . .
1. If “overpopulation” was never a serious factor
compromising economic development . . .
2. If population growth has been declining steadily
for several decades and no longer poses a serious
threat to global environmental health . . .
3. . . . then why has a concern with “overpopulation”
persisted for so long and in the face of scientific
evidence to the contrary?
What underlying concern persists in the West as each of
the apparent explanations for population control fades
and disappears?
The obsession with population growth in the absence of
clear demographic evidence that such growth portends
peril requires explanation.
We, thus, need to ask . . .
. . . whose interests has the population
control movement served?
Malthusian Neocolonialism
Malthusian Neocolonialism . . .
. . . suggests that the Western concern (sometimes
bordering on hysteria) over population growth in
developing countries may derive more from a concern
about its own economic and political position in the world
than from a concern for the welfare of peoples in
developing countries.
This presentation also suggests that Malthusian population
theory persists because it provides an appropriate
ideological justification for neocolonial population control
policies.
Neocolonialism . . .
A policy whereby a major power uses economic and
political means to perpetuate or extend its influence over
underdeveloped nations or areas.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
.
Competitive Fertility:
--exists where fertility is linked to considerations
of power.
Strategic Demography:
--The direction by groups with more power of
population policies and programs against those
groups with less power whose growth is
considered a threat to existing power relations.
“As history and science refute each argument in turn,
population control groups simply shift to their next
explanation in their war against people. The arguments
change with time and circumstance, but the ‘solution’
remains remarkably familiar: ever more population
control directed at the poorer, darker peoples of the
developing world . . .(in ). . . the unspoken belief that
too many of the ‘wrong’ kinds of people are procreating
too quickly.”
--Mary Haynes (1999)
“. . . If the lower classes of Englishmen multiply more
rapidly than those which are morally and physically
superior, not only will the population of England
deteriorate, but also that part of the population of
American and Australia which descends from Englishmen
will be less intelligent than it would otherwise be. Again if
Englishmen multiply less rapidly than the Chinese, this
spiritless race will overrun portions of the earth that
otherwise would have been peopled by English Vigour.”
--Alfred Marshall (1842-1924)
“Numbers tell.
France dreads prolific Germany.
Germany trembles before yet more prolific Russia.
Europe fears the awakening of the teeming yellow race.
In South Africa, the whites stand aghast at the rabbit-like
increase of the blacks.”
--Edward Ross (1907)
Providing development assistance to the newly emerging nations of
the South without explicit population control . . .
“. . . Would yield populations that would be larger and
stronger than those that would arise from the perpetuation
of past [colonial] policies . . . The now dominant powers
would in effect be creating a future world in which their
own peoples would become progressively smaller
minorities, and possess a progressively smaller proportion
of the world’s wealth and power.”
--Frank W. Notestein, United Nations (1944)
A decline in the Euro-American population in relation to Asia
...
“. . . might be decisive in its effects on the prestige
and influence of the West. . . . The question is not
merely one of military strength and security: it
merges into more fundamental issues of the
maintenance and expansion of Western views and
culture.”
--British Royal Commission on Population (1946)
“These peoples are problems, even hazards, for all of the
countries of the world as endemic and epidemic diseases, as
areas of economic dependency, as explosive centers of unrest
and rebellion and as possible disturbers of world peace if
and when they should attempt the age-old nostrum of
alleviating their population pressure by aggressive action
against presumably more favourably situated peoples. It is
desirable, in fact essential, that they be extricated from their
adverse state at the earliest possible moment.”
-- J.O. Hertzler, The Crisis in World Population (1956)
“China with a projected 1975 population almost double
the expected figures from the United States and Russia
combined, would be the strongest contender for world
leadership. Such a mass, equipped with modern arms
and disciplined by a dictatorship, if bent on conquest,
could be stopped only by a united world outside.”
--Kingsley Davis, sociological demographer (1959)
“Opinion in the West is now conscious of the fast
demographic growth in the Third World. Large scale
publicity is given to the ‘rise of the coloured people’ or to
the ‘swarming of the hungry’; Westerners feel rather like
masters or servants in a castle, watching great masses of
ragged people multiplying in the countryside around
obviously to no good intent.”
--Alfred Sauvy (1969)
“The ever-mounting tidal wave of humanity now
challenges us to control it or be submerged along with all
our civilized values.”
“A world with mass starvation in underdeveloped
countries will be a world of chaos, riots and war. And a
perfect breeding ground for Communism. . . . We cannot
afford a half a dozen Vietnams or even one more. . . .
Our own national interest demands that we go all out to
help the underdeveloped countries control their
population.”
-- Campaign to Check the Population Explosion
“In the domain of evolutionary theory, the consequence of
any sustained difference between the rates of growth of
two populations occupying the same ecological niche is
straightforward: the eventual complete displacement of
the slower growing by the faster growing one.”
--Paul Demeny (1990), Editor, Population
and Development Review
“Virtually all current population projections anticipate
slow population growth in today’s more developed regions
and comparatively rapid growth in the less developed
regions. . . . If trends continue for another generation or
two, the implications for the international political order
and the balance of world power could be enormous.”
--Foreign Affairs (1991)
Regarding the falling birth rates in the North and the rising birth rates in
the South . . .
“The implications for the international political order
and the balance of world power could be enormous . . .
Diminution of the influence of the West. . . .(as a result
of existing demographic trends). . . could create an
international environment even more menacing to the
security prospects of the Western alliance than was the
Cold War.”
--Nicholas Eberstadt, American Enterprise
Institute (1991)
Paul Kennedy asks if democratic values can . . .
“. . . maintain their prevailing position in a world
overwhelmingly peopled by societies which did not
experience the rational scientific and liberal
assumptions of the Enlightenment.”
--Paul Kennedy, Preparing for the
Twenty- First Century. (1993)
“At the end of World War II, the developed countries
accounted for almost 40 percent of the world population.
Today they hold about 20 percent, heading --if growth in
the developing countries does not slow-- towards as little
as 12 percent. . . . The cost of our population program is
a fraction of not doing it.”
--Timothy Wirth, U.S. State Dept. (1993)
The Malthusian Solution
“Instead of recommending cleanliness
to the poor, we should encourage
contrary habits. In our towns, we
should make the streets narrower,
crowd more people into the houses,
and court the return of the plague. In
the country we should build our
villages near stagnant pools. . . . But,
above all, we should reprobate
specific remedies for ravaging
diseases.”
Thomas Malthus
Margaret Sanger called for the . . .
. . .(extermination of). . . "weeds … overrunning the human
garden" . . .(and the sterilization of). . . "genetically inferior
races” . . .(producing). . . "more children from the fit; less
from the unfit".
--Margaret Sanger, Pivot of Civilization 1922
“Since the inferior is always numerically superior to the best,
the worst would multiply itself so much faster . . . Given the
same opportunity to survive and procreate . . . That the best
would necessarily be pushed to the background. Therefore, a
correction in favor of the better must be undertaken.”
--Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf (1934)
*
*
*
*
*
Note the similarity of the above quote to the statement below . . .
“In the domain of evolutionary theory, the consequence of any
sustained difference between the rates of growth of two populations
occupying the same ecological niche is straightforward: the eventual
complete displacement of the slower growing by the faster growing one.”
--Paul Demeny (1990),
Neo-Malthusianism
a.k.a.
Malthusianism -
“Light”
or a
“Kinder &
Gentler”
Malthusianism
“It cannot be expected that the most powerful military
nations will sit still while other nations reverse the
balance of power by the mere process of breeding.”
--Bertrand Russell (1929)
Comparing international migration to the growth of a disease . . .
“It is comparable to what happens in human
cancers. . . . it is perfectly legitimate to compare
the invasions of Puerto Ricans in New York and
of Jamaicans in London and other parts of
Britain to metastases in cancer.”
--Sir Julian Huxley, UNESCO (1963)
“(The) . . . greater prolificacy of the non-white
population is wholly a function of the relatively
less restrained reproductivity of those with meagre
schooling. . . . (This) . . . trend hampers the
advance of the nation as a whole, and particularly
tends to retard the economic and social advance of
non-white communities.”
--Frank Lorimer, Sociologist (1969)
“. . . nations which control their birth rates in order
to maintain a high standard of living should . . .(not
have to). . . provide for the surplus populations of
other countries which breed without consideration of
economic and social consequences.”
--Karl Sax (1945)
“Family planning programs provide information and
services to help people achieve their own fertility
objectives. By contrast, population policy involves explicit
demographic goals.”
--World Bank Report (1984)
“Why does the family planning movement . . . Which is the
predominant approach to population policy have as its
slogan ‘every woman has the right to have as many children
as she wants’? We would not justify traffic control by saying
that ‘every driver has the right to drive as he pleases.’”
--Kingsley Davis, Sociologist (1982)
“The degree of coercive policy brought into play should be
proportional to the degree of seriousness of the present
problem and should be introduced only after less coercive
means have been exhausted. Thus, overt violence or other
potentially injurious coercion is not to be used before
noninjurious coercion has been exhausted.”
--Berelson and Lieberson (1979)
Bernard Berelson is a former president of the Population Council
“For a coercive program to work, a hugely expanded
commitment of administrative and financial resources will
be necessary. The world will be watching India’s policy
closely to see if and how state governments follow up their
new legislation with bigger budgets and more effective
action.”
--Population Crisis Committee
“A cancer is an uncontrolled multiplication of cells;
the population explosion is an uncontrolled
multiplication of people. Treating only the
symptoms of cancer may make the victim more
comfortable at first, but eventually he dies -- often
horribly. A similar fate awaits a world with a
population explosion if only the symptoms are
treated. We must shift our efforts from treatment of
the symptoms to the cutting out of the cancer. The
operation will demand many apparently brutal and
heartless decisions.”
--Paul Ehrlich (1971)
Praise for Indira Gandhi for establishing Emergency Rule in 1975, which
called for the mandatory sterilization of all Indian men with three or more
children and which resulted in coercive sterilization programs. . .
“. . . The political will and determination shown by the
leadership at the highest level in intensifying the family
planning drive with rare courage and conviction.”
--Robert McNamara, President, World Bank (1975)
Criticism of the U.S. for not supporting Indira Gandhi’s mandatory
sterilization proposal . . .
“We should have volunteered logistical support in the
form of helicopters, vehicles and surgical instruments.
We should have sent doctors. . . . (Is this) . . . Coercion?
Perhaps, but coercion in a good cause.”
--Paul Ehrlich (1976)
“Most donor representatives here greatly admire the
Chinese for their achievements: a success story brought
about by massive direct and indirect compulsion. . . . It
is time for donors to get away from too narrow an
interpretation of volunteerism and certain governments
in Asia using massive incentive schemes, including
disincentives and other measures of pressure, still
deserve international support.”
--Walter Holzhausen, UNFPA (1984)
Garrett Hardin
Lifeboat Ethics
&
Mutual Coercion Mutually Agreed Upon
__________________________________________________________________________
“...no single person or institution has the right to destroy, waste or use
more than a fair share of its resources.” . . .
“It is a mistake to think that we can control the breeding of mankind in
the long run by an appeal to conscience.” . . .
“Coercion is a dirty word to most liberals now, but it need not forever be
so.” . . .
“Every new enclosure of the commons involves the infringement of
somebody's personal liberty.” . . .
“The only kind of coercion I recommend is mutual coercion, mutually
agreed upon by the majority of the people affected.”
_______________________________________________________________
SOURCE: Tragedy of the Commons
•
Development theories consistently argue that economic
development in the Third World requires the
elimination of traditional values and practices.
•
Policies which seek to eliminate “traditional” practices
have, therefore, been a dominant theme in Western
development theory.
“For all their talk of rights, the right of people to live
according to the customs and practices that they have
evolved over hundreds of years, appears to be one right
which population activists can casually reject.”
--Furedi (1997)
The concept of unmet need implies that . . .
“. . . two billion people in the past 30 years were added
to the world’s population because their parents were
two stupid to figure what to do.”
--Paul Demeny (1994)
Timothy King of the World Bank argued that China’s onechild policy violated the basic human right of each couple to
bear two children. Being allowed only one child . . .
“. . . does not deny individuals their complete rights of
reproduction or the joys of family life, but it undeniably
reduces them, both for parents and for children, and puts
great strain on the emotional ties between the two.”
--Timothy King, World Bank (1984)
“It creates a very disagreeable impression to see people
who are white, European, or of European origin, trying to
sow the seeds of sterility in populations that are about to
escape from under their domination.”
--Alfred Sauvy (1949)
Interests served by a focus on overpopulation:
1. Minimizes role of colonialism in underdevelopment.
2. Downplays inequalities in global economy.
3. Draws attention away from the high consumption
levels in the West. (see next three slides)
4. Serves Western strategic interests.
5. Supports a growing environmentalist and population
control/research constituency. (see fourth following
slide)
The American Dream
Who pose more of
a threat to the
environment?
*
*
*
Africans and Asians
or
Europeans & Americans
Environmental
solutions for the
privileged . . .
Yuppie
Environmentalism:
Use an "environmentally
responsible" credit card to
ease your conscience
while you buy your TV's,
VCRs, designer clothes
and the gas to feed your
new SUV!
. . . all the things that fill
up the landfills and pollute
the air!
Fund it and they will come . . .
The Family Planning Funding Trough
Challenging Neocolonial
Assumptions
Globalization Alert!
A major multinational corporation has allocated one
quarter of a billion dollars for the purchase of land in
developing countries. The money will be funneled
through a Western-dominated international organization
whose voting members disproportionately represent
individuals and corporations from the U.S. and Europe.
The land purchase is designed to remove valuable land
from indigenous ownership and control in order to have
it be at the disposal of the mostly white employees and
customers served by the international organization in
question.
announcement translated . . .
Intel Corporation has announced that it is donating $250
million to Conservation International for the purchase of
land in developing
countries.
Conservation
International is a major international organization that
undertakes biodiversity research, conducts its own
ecotours and supports the ecotourism industry. The
principal beneficiaries of both the biodiversity research
and ecotourism industries are disproportionately white
middle and upper-middle income citizens from the
economically advantaged countries in Europe and North
America.
”The Malthusian motive: the will to control the population of the poor
rather than the consumption of the rich; the desire to eliminate poverty
by reducing the numbers of the poor rather than the inequalities of
society. . . .
. . . If we claim that there are too many people on the earth, then why
are we so sure that we are not the excess ones --we westerners who
individually consume and pollute as much as 50 or more African or
Indian peasants? In all my years in the field of population, I have never
one single time heard a member of the population establishment say that
there were too many upper-middle class white Anglo-Saxon Protestants
in the world. . . .”
--Pierre Pradervand, Africa Report (1974)
. . . This solution is never considered . . .
. . . Stop middle-class white people from breeding!
Whew, . . . Done!