An article published in the journal Bioscience entitled “World Scientists’ Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice” warns, “We are jeopardizing our future by not reining in our intense but geographically and demographically uneven material consumption and by not perceiving continued rapid population growth as a primary driver behind many ecological and even societal threats. By failing to adequately limit population growth, reassess the role of an economy rooted in growth, reduce greenhouse gases, incentivize renewable energy, protect habitat, restore ecosystems, curb pollution, halt defaunation, and constrain invasive alien species, humanity is not taking the urgent steps needed to safeguard our imperilled biosphere.” Further, this 2016 article published in the Chinese Journal of Population Resources and Environment presents an instructive discussion of why population growth remains largely unacknowledged as a primary driver behind such threats. And a 2010 article published in The Globalist introduces dissects ‘Ponzi Demography’, asserting that “the sooner nations reject Ponzi demography and make the needed gradual transition from ever-increasing population growth to population stabilization, the better the prospects for all of humanity and other life on this planet.
Indeed there are people, some very influential with letters after their names and prominent positions in the ivory towers of academia who consider the population problem the most important and pressing problem. But are they right?
The fear of overpopulation is very old. It existed with the Greeks and Romans. They claim that the danger of overpopulation in the not too distant future lies in the law of "diminishing returns" Our soil has become "exhausted", increasing harvests can no longer be expected and, since the land fit for cultivation constantly becomes scarcer, the danger of a scarcity of food is imminent if the population continues to increase. In a socialist society, overpopulation will not be an issue. The solution to the “population problem” is to overthrow capitalism and establish the cooperative commonwealth, for if production is geared to the needs of the people and not for filling a few greedy pockets there will be no population problem.
Engels says, “There is, of course, the abstract possibility that the number of people will become so great that the limits will have to be set to their increase. But if at some stage communist society finds itself obliged to regulate the production of human beings, just as it has already to come to regulate the production of things, it will precisely be this society, and this society alone, which can carry this out without difficulty. At any rate, it is for the people in the communist society themselves to decide whether, when and how this is to be done, and what means they wish to employ for the purpose. I do not feel called upon to make proposals or give them advice about it. These people, in any case, will surely not be any less intelligent than we are.”
One common belief even held by leftists and liberals is that expanding human populations present one of the greatest ecological problems yet seen. Blaming environmental problems on population pressure is all too common, particularly among environmentalists. Many are convinced that the amount of land and resources used by humans have already far outstripped the carrying capacity of the planet. There is an intuitive logic here that lends itself to widespread popularity. In this view, all organisms of the species are more or less equally responsible, and the organisms with the highest birth rates and population density are the most responsible. Yet the simplistic "population bomb" theory does not stand up to closer scrutiny. Focus on population is misguided and can lead to unintended consequences, particularly for women and their bodies.
Peoples with the highest birth rates are in the Third World and tend to use a fraction of the world's resources, while a minority with low birth rates in the "developed" countries use most of those resources. In spite of the facts about social reality, a crude and strictly biological version of the "population bomb" theory has been used to target "too many people" for authoritarian population birth-control policies, while ignoring the glaring social inequality. These targets have tended to be non-white, poor, mostly women, suffering from a severe lack of food, healthcare, education, and political power. Smaller family size is the global norm because of factors like improved health services, education, and status of women.
The problem for "surplus" people isn't so much population growth and density as it is lack of control over capitalism. In addition to looking at the problem of resources from the narrow view of "natural limits," one must also focus on the question of how wealth and power are distributed. Overpopulation does not account for scarcity and hunger. There is more than enough food produced to sustain the current level of the world's population. Yet food somehow manages to evade those who can't afford to pay the price, being fed to livestock to increase profitability. While others overconsume the natural wealth of the planet, the poor get the blame.
This is not to say that the idea of overpopulation is inapplicable; the general logic of recognizing ecological limits is correct, recognising when population trends like urbanisation and density do have an environmental impact. Population definitely plays an important role in determining the levels of resource use and environmental degradation. But it does not play the only role. The Socialist Party challenges the notion that population is inevitably the source of environmental problems.
No doubt under socialism there will be an increase of population, for the fear of insecurity will have disappeared. However, women will not agree to be merely child-bearing machines. The family will be limited for reasons to provide more time for the attainment of education and culture. Socialists fully accept that all people should have access to a range of contraception and abortion as part of overall health services. Family planning, however, is not the answer to our planet's problems. The root causes of environmental deterioration are far more complex than any population control proponents advocate. For example, the Research Institute for Peace Policy in Starnberg, Germany estimates that twenty percent of all global environmental degradation can be directly or indirectly attributed to the military. This includes global air pollution, carbon dioxide, ozone-depletion, smog and acid rain. But the alarm bell is never rung for the military.
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