The relationship between the number of people and the amount of resources available to feed them and satisfy their level of consumption has always been a matter of great concern. After all, will the available natural resources be capable of meeting the successive population growths in the future?
These questions have long been asked, and different answers have emerged. it is about the demographic theories, also called theories of population growth. The first of these was the proposal by Thomas Malthus, known as Malthusianism.
Malthusianism
Thomas Robert Malthus (1766-1834), liberal economist and English historian, developed a population theory at the end of the 18th century. which pointed to the existing imbalance between demographic growth and the availability of resources in the Earth. in your book Essay on the principle of population, he categorically stated that the planet, in a short time, would not be able to meet the number of existing inhabitants.
According to the Malthusian Theory, populations always accelerated their growth rate, which followed the line of a
geometric progression (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, …), while the availability of resources and food would increase as a result of a arithmetic progression (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, …), being smaller, therefore.As a solution, Malthus pointed to the moral control of the population. Due to his religious affiliation, he was against the adoption of any type of contraceptive method, saying that couples should only procreate if they were able to support their children. Furthermore, Malthus also said that the poorest workers should only be paid the minimum for the their livelihood, as he believed that the improvement in social conditions would further increase the number of births.
Although his predictions were based on the demographics of his time, Malthus was wrong to underestimate the advances. technologies in production processes, which made the supply of resources and food expand far above the foreseen. Furthermore, it is currently observed that the trend is that more developed societies generate fewer children, contrary to what the English economist imagined.
reformist or marxist theory
Many challenges were made to the thought of Malthus, who was often accused of legitimizing the perverse effects of the capitalist economy on social inequality and favoring the ideals of bourgeoisie. After all, Malthusian theory suggested that misery and the spread of disease, catastrophes, and wars would help to contain sharp population growth.
The 19th century utopian socialist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon stated: "There is only one surplus man on Earth: Malthus." And along that same line, many theorists who believed that the inequality in the relationship between resources natural resources, food and population growth was not in the number of inhabitants, but in the distribution of income. In general, many of these ideas were close to the ideals defended by Karl Marx, being then related to what was called Marxist Theory or Reformist of the population.
Thus, for this conception, the “moral control” of the population is not what is necessary to combat the occurrence of hunger and poverty, but the adoption of social policies to combat poverty, with the application of labor laws that ensure an improvement in the income of the worker. The democratization of social and production means is also considered a strategy in the same sense.
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neomalthusian theory
Right after the end of World War II (1939-1945), the main developed countries in the world started a process of demographic explosion, with a rapid and sudden increase in their population. Likewise, in the following years, many underdeveloped countries (including Brazil) went through the same process, especially because in these countries, with histories of high births and mortality, the number of deaths was reduced and the life expectancy, high.
Because of this, the population of the planet again began to grow, that's why Malthus' theories gained a new echo among many thinkers and rulers. O Neomalthusianism it is, therefore, the resumption of this thought, with differences with regard to the ways of controlling population growth.
For neo-Malthusianism, populations, especially low-income ones, should have their birth rates controlled. For this, the diffusion of contraceptive methods has become fundamental. In some countries, governments have adopted mass sterilization measures on poor people, in addition to distributing free contraceptives and promoting awareness campaigns. Up to the present day, many advertising campaigns or images are spread with the ideal family model formed by parents and two children only.
demographic transition
The demographic transition conception is a more current proposition that states that all countries, sooner or later, will present general patterns with regard to the order of population growth.
The demographic transition considers that the population explosion it is a transitory phenomenon, generally caused by the economic and social development of nations, which results in an immediate drop in mortality rates, which increases the number of inhabitants. On the other hand, the birth rate also decreases, but at a slower pace, which causes the explosion initial demographic is gradually replaced by a decrease in the rate of growth in the number of population.
This was, for example, what happened in Europe, which today has very low population growth. In Brazil it was not different either, as the population increased rapidly throughout the 20th century, but its growth has slowed down in recent decades. The main effect of this – and also the main cause for concern – is population aging.
Brazil, until recently, was considered a young country, with a good part of the population with an average age of young. At the moment, started to be considered an adult country, with the potential to become an elderly country in the coming decades. In Europe, population aging is already a reality, which causes a series of problems related to social security and the reduction of the EAP (economically active population).
Ironically, on the European continent, the current problem is exactly the opposite imagined by Malthus, as it doesn't it is the rapid population growth that is the main focus of the issue, but the moderate growth is beyond counting. In countries like France and Germany, birth incentive policies are carried out, including the payment of scholarships and benefits for couples who have a third child.
By Me. Rodolfo Alves Pena