Population Control vs Individual Rights?

Black Swan · 06-09-2014 4:34am #1

Do governments or religions have the right to control or foster population growth, or should such decisions remain with the individual?

The International Conference on Population Development recognised the individual right to voluntarily choose "to decide on the number, timing and spacing of children."

Personally, I would like to have one or two children, but not more, suggesting that I would fall below the 2.1 zero population growth rate for couples. It's a personal, voluntary decision, but if I wanted to have 6 or 8 children, would it matter? If all families in Ireland decided to also have 6 to 8 children from now on, would that too matter to Éire a century or two from now? To the EU?

In terms of birth control being used to control population growth by individuals or governments, Catholic.com states today:

In 1968, Pope Paul VI issued his landmark encyclical letter Humanae Vitae (Latin, "Human Life"), which reemphasized the Church’s constant teaching that it is always intrinsically wrong to use contraception to prevent new human beings from coming into existence.

The world population has been growing, and the World Bank projects that it will continue to grow, especially in the developing countries. Does continued population growth matter?

Daily, GC, Erhlich, AH, and Erhlich, PR (1994) in "Optimal Population Size," Population and Environment, Vol 15, No 6, suggested (back then with 5.5 billion) that the optimal size human population had been exceeded given consumption patterns and technologies. Does this conclusion merit consideration, is it dated, or what?

The real time population clock of the US Census Bureau shows over 7.1 billion people and climbing. Does this matter?

jaymcg91 · 06-09-2014 8:43pm

Of course it does. All these people need resources (food, water, energy etc). Where on earth will it come from? Europe and the US are OK, we have the infrastructure, but it's primarily developing countries that are experiencing these explosions in population growth. Are they equipped to deal with it? I'd have to say no.

I don't know what the answer is.

Pat Mustard · 08-09-2014 12:33am

At the risk of sounding unnecessarily pessimistic, there are finite resources in the world, at least at the moment.

If the world's human population continues to grow, there may be a question as to whether those resources will continue to be sufficient to satisfy demand for the population.

I'm no economist, so maybe I may be getting out of my depth when I mention Thomas Malthus and his visions of food shortages in the face of a growing population. However, Malthus had not taken account of advances in technology and agriculture, which have increased capacity for food production.

Here is an article which seems to take both sides of the argument, where, on the one hand, it is argued that an increasing human population may assist in the development of technology which may assist in feeding the expanding population. On the other hand, it is supposed that we will have to conserve our resources. The author rounds off with an admission that it is not known whether we have beaten Malthus.

There are certain advances such as vertical farming (which uses hydroponics and ultra violet light), which may be able to overcome food production problems.

I think that the answer to the question may be that at the moment, we cannot be certain if there will be sufficient resources to support everyone.

If that is the case, it would seem to make sense to take certain measures to control the expansion of populations, whether by way of taxation or control of social benefits (or otherwise).

Peregrinus · 08-09-2014 3:37am

The Mustard wrote: »

. . . If that is the case, it would seem to make sense to take certain measures to control the expansion of populations, whether by way of taxation or control of social benefits.

You’re arbitrarily confining yourself to a very narrow range of options, there. There are a lot more things than tax and social welfare that influence people’s reproductive choices.

Family size in Europe has been falling steadily from about 1800 - there are blips here and there, but the long-term trend is clear. Clearly, this isn’t all down to advances in contraceptive technology - in fact they play a fairly small part in the story. The creation of opportunities for personal advancement, the spread of education - particularly the education of women - and the creation of a more equal society are all associated with delay in having children, and smaller family sizes once we do start to have children.

Pat Mustard · 08-09-2014 10:23am

Peregrinus wrote: »

You’re arbitrarily confining yourself to a very narrow range of options, there. There are a lot more things than tax and social welfare that influence people’s reproductive choices.

To be fair, this isn't exactly my argument. I wasn't attempting to give a comprehensive list of methods of population control, nor was I attempting to say that the list of options was so limited.

EDIT: previous post now amended for clarity.

Black Swan · 27-09-2014 12:22am

The Mustard wrote: »

If the world's human population continues to grow, there may be a question as to whether those resources will continue to be sufficient to satisfy demand for the population.

World population projections suggest continued growth with year 2100 estimates at over 10.8 billion people. This compares dramatically with the 1950 estimates of just over 2.5 billion.

Source: United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. World Population Prospects: The 2012 Revision (Medium variant).

KomradeBishop · 27-09-2014 11:23am

Lower birth rates are highly correlated with good quality of education and living standards, which would imply achieving and maintaining/improving these standards over time, is the way to go, for stalling population growth and eventually making it decline.
Add to that, greater worldwide acceptance and practice of birth control methods (and education surrounding that) - which would also go further to improving this situation.

The problem with any 'predicted' changes in world population, is that there is no way to know how countries are going to develop socially/politically/economically, in ways that indirectly bring the birth rate down.

If the problem of population sizes gets out of hand in the future, the main way that's going to cause problems, is with a shortage of resources, and since 'political economy' is basically the study of allocation of resources, that means population control will probably happen indirectly, through economic incentives/disincentives - the cost of raising a child, is frequently a factor in how many children parents will decide to raise, and the higher the standard of living (if that's associated with greater resource usage), usually the more costly this is.

However, given that the economic system in use by much of the world depends upon endless economic growth, this is likely to create a greater demand on resources over time anyway, and the more resources are made available to sustain a greater population, the greater the population is likely to grow. This is even likely to lead to wars over more resources as well, as already happens with oil, such as over water.

So in the long term, changing the actual economic system to one that is not growth based (to e.g. a 'steady-state-economy' "A steady state economy is an economy of relatively stable size. It features stable population and stable consumption that remain at or below carrying capacity.") might be necessary to solve this problem, as well as to solve the problem of climate change (which is also largely rooted, in using an economic system requiring endless economic growth, and thus more and more power/fossil-fuel usage).

So ya - this is a good topic for seeing the way that economic theory and practice, is fundamentally a political topic, better fitting the term 'political economy' - which is what 'economics' used to be called - the political/economic framework we use to run countries/societies, will determine not just how equitably a countries resources are allocated (a highly political topic also), but will also determine if we can bring population levels under control.

Black Swan · 27-09-2014 7:40pm

KomradeBishop wrote: »

Lower birth rates are highly correlated with good quality of education...

Especially for women, per a PRB (Population Reference Bureau) article I had read awhile back. Advancing women's education was considered the best contraceptive for a nation, and they were not specifically addressing birth control methods, rather overall education; i.e., the higher women's education, the lower the birth rate.

Population Control vs Individual Rights?

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