The Malthusian Theory, also known as Malthusianism, is a demographic theory developed by English Thomas Robert Malthus.
According to Malthusian thinking, the population would grow very quickly and in geometric progression (1, 2, 4, 8, 16...), while food production, in turn, would have a slow growth and in arithmetic progression (1, 2, 3, 4, 5...).
This line of reasoning is known as Malthus' law.
Thomas Robert Malthus
According to Malthus' studies, after a period of 200 years the population would be 28 times greater than the growth in food production, which would be a major catastrophe for the world.
The objective of the theory was to draw attention to the problem of lack of food generated by the great demographic increase in the world.
Solution for food shortages
In his work, Malthus even proposed what he called the moral subjection.
According to him, the population had to avoid an uncontrolled growth through late marriage, by decreasing the number. of planned children and the voluntary deprivation of their respective sexual desires, in order to reduce the rate of birth.
Malthus considered that, in this way, the increase in population would be balanced against the possibility of growth in food production.
For him, food production growth was much slower than population growth. While production followed an arithmetic progression (1, 2, 3, 4, 5...), the population increased in geometric progression (1, 2, 4, 8, 16...).
As a religious (in addition to being a statistician, demographer and economist, Thomas Malthus was a pastor of the Anglican Church), he was against the use of contraceptive methods.
know more about arithmetic progression.
Other Demographic Theories
THE Malthusian demographic theory (or Malthusian Population Theory) was published in the book Essay on the Population Principle, the economist's main work, in 1798.
At that time, the Malthus theory could not predict the advances in science and technology that the future held.
The use of machines as substitutes for human labor in the field, for example, provided a gigantic increase in food production capacity.
With this, it became clear that the cause of the misery situation in which some countries and regions of the world lived was not related to production. of food itself, that is, it was not an inability to produce, but a poor distribution of these foods. produced.
These findings ended up confronting the Malthusian population theory and with that, other demographic theories were formulated, such as, for example, the neomalthusian theory and the reformist theory.
neomalthusian theory
This theory started to emerge in the beginning of the 20th century and was based on the Malthusian Theory.
Neo-Malthusians argued that if the acceleration of population growth were not slowed down, in a few years the Earth's natural resources would run out.
In order to prevent this from happening, neo-Malthusian theorists resorted to proposals aimed at birth control.
These proposals became popular and were called Family planning.
Family Planning was mainly applied in underdeveloped countries and according to the local population.
Check below some of the main measures applied:
- Mass sterilization.
- Free distribution of contraceptives.
- Medical assistance for the use of an IUD (Intra-Uterine Device).
- Promotion of an ideal family model, consisting of only two children.
See also the meaning of birth rate and sterilization.
reformist theory
Unlike Neomalthusian theory, which is based on Malthusian thought, reformist theory, in turn, is totally contrary to this concept.
According to the reformers, the Industrial Revolution and the consequent technological revolution came to solve the problem of food production, disagreeing with the Malthusian idea that food production grew in significantly smaller numbers than population growth.
Another feature of the reformist theory that opposes Malthus' theory is related to the cause of poverty.
For the Malthusians, poverty was caused by overpopulation. The reformers, for their part, believed just the opposite. For them, poverty was what caused excess population.
The reformist theory argued that if there was no poverty, there would be better access to education, hygiene and health, which would eventually regulate population growth.
The reformists believed that the origin of poverty was due to the poor social distribution of income that would be caused mainly by the exploitation under which the developed countries subjected the countries underdeveloped.
Reformist theorists considered that there should be social reform by the government regarding this distribution.
Learn more about Industrial Revolution.