Overpopulation: Theoretical Perspectives

European Journal of the History of Economic Thought

History of Political Economy, 2012

The violence of the attacks on Malthus by Marx and Engels and the virulence of their criticism cannot but strike the reader of Capital and especially the Theories of Surplus Value, although they are not overtly political or polemical works (like The Communist Party Manifesto, The Eighteenth Brumaire Of Louis Bonaparte, The Class Struggle in France or The Poverty of Philosophy). The criticism is directed towards the law of population, which is the very core of Malthus's thinking and the main complaint against him is the accusation of plagiarizing from James Stewart, Benjamin Franklin, Walace and Townsend. 1 Further, had Marx and Engels confined themselves to refuting the demographic aspects of Malthus's thinking, their persistence in this matter could be explained quite easily for he was held intellectually responsible for the 1834 Poor laws reform abolishing all assistance at the parish level. But the truth is far more complex: Marx had taken care to acquaint himself with Malthus's work in the field of economics and his attitude was much more ambivalent. He scornfully rejected his theory of value calling it "a very model of intellectual imbecility", but also gave him credit for his decisive inputs as compared to Ricardo. 2 He respected Ricardo intellectually, but he accused Malthus of servilely defending the interests of the landed aristocracy. It therefore follows that there must be something fundamental in Malthus's writings that drives Marx to refute him so persistently. Explaining Marx's ambivalence towards Malthus is the primary aim of this chapter. Marx's and Engel's principal thoughts on population are to be found in The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844 (published by Engels in 1845), Capital (1867) and the Theories of Surplus Value, written between 1861 and 1863, but published by Kautsky in 1905 after Marx's death. 3 Like Malthus, Marx too can be interpreted at two levels. Capital is essentially a treatise on economic theory

2017

Thomas Malthus has become, over more than two centuries, one of the most frequently referenced economists with regard to demographics. As the author of An Essay on the Principle of Population (1798), he was the main disseminator of one of the most intriguing theories of population growth. His thinking has influenced many – from contemporaries, such as David Ricardo – to most of the “neo-Malthusian” schools of thought from the mid1960s to the present day. This paper addresses some aspects of population theory discussed prior to the Essay, and the impact that this work had – with respect to both its influence and the critiques and replicas that his work suffered throughout the 19 th and 20 th centuries. The paper’s purpose is to draw up guidelines for a more precise interpretation of Malthus’ contribution to demographic, economic and, finally, social thought.

The many editions of Thomas Robert Malthus’s Essay on the Principle of Population were influential throughout the nineteenth century and beyond. They caused heated debate about both economics and social policy, and could be said to be the foundation of modern demography. Less attention has been paid, however, to the theology presented in the last two chapters of the first edition. This is surprising since the theology is unusual, controversial and, on the face of it, central to the work. In this paper I examine Malthus’s intentions in writing these last two chapters and the relationship between them and the rest of his argument. I also consider whether the theology was antecedent or consequent to Malthus’s principle of population, and the causes of their excision from later editions of the Essay.

European Demographic Information Bulletin, 1980

Thomas Robert Malthus was one of the few, demographers who was aware of the fact that the ‘natural desire to have children’ can be manipulated by man’s reason, i.e. that this desire in reality is not natural at all. When formulating his “principle of population”, Malthus, however, denounced the use of man’s reason and applied instead their ‘natural desire for children’ for a particular calculation of population policy, which has not been recognized sufficiently by interpreters of his population theory. Our paper demonstrates that Malthus’ fear that men would not procreate sufficiently was at least as large as his well-known fear of the misery of increasing population and that he, therefore, had to propagate moral restraint, not contraception as check to population.ABSTRACT

Hamilton Historical, 2023

Robert Malthus’ 1803 Essay perpetuated multiple political myths about indigenous peoples, not because Malthus had malicious intent to speak about these people negatively, but because his views aligned comfortably with his greater society in metropolitan England. Whether the myth at hand was indigenous indolence, infanticide, or cannibalism, Mathus unconsciously supported them in his aim to create a universal human history where population was the solely important variable, similar to how his contemporary stadial theorists wrote their histories. Because his sources on indigenous peoples were popular, accepted, and respected in his society, Malthus’ discourse on indigenous peoples did not divert from his society’s norm. While Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus’ An Essay on the Principle of Population is no longer a reputable work of demography, it instead offers insight into how English society around the turn of the nineteenth-century viewed far-off people who lived in distant worlds.

Comparative Studies in Society and History, 2009

Malthus published his Essay on Population in 1798 and for the next century, as the new discipline of political economy incorporated his thought into its central tenets, population theorizing took place largely within a Malthusian framework. A stark simplicity marks his argument, especially as presented in the succinct first edition of the essay. He presents the reader with two self-evident natural laws: “that food is necessary to the existence of man,” and “that the passion between the sexes is necessary and will remain nearly in its present state” (1798: 11). He then observes, “The power of population is indefinitely greater than the power in the earth to produce subsistence for man” (13), and contends that population, when unchecked, increases in a “geometrical ratio” while subsistence in only an “arithmetical ratio” (14). In this first edition, Malthus had the particular ideological goal of proving that “the advocates of equality and of the perfectibility of man” had an unattaina...