MALTHUSIAN THEORY OF POPULATION GROWTH

 

POPULATION THEORIES

BIOLOGICAL	SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC
Thomas Robert Malthus	Henry George
Thomas Doubleday	A Dumont
Thomas Sadler	David Ricardo
Herbert Spencer	Karl Marx

MALTHUSIAN THEORY OF POPULATION GROWTH

The economist Thomas Robert Malthus (1766-1834) published ‘An Essay on the Principle of Population’ in 1798, revised in 1803.

Assumptions/ Postulates:

• Food is essential to the existence of life.
• The passion between sexes is also necessary and it will remain constant in its present position.
• Low of diminishing returns operates in agriculture.
• Having assumed these postulates, he stated that the power of population to reproduced is greater than power to produced means of subsistence.

Ø The main principles of this theory are :-

               i.         Population increases in geometrical progresssion and it doubles in each 25 years, i.e.

1 – 2 – 4 – 8 – 1 6 – 3 2 – 64 – 128 – 256 - - -

(200 years)

              ii.         Food production increases in an arithmetical progression, i.e.

1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7 – 8 – 9 - - -

(200 years)

Since population increases in geometrical ratio and mean of subsitance in arithmetic ratio, the population tends to out runs to food supply. Thus it craetes imbalances between population and food supply and becomes the cause of overpopulation. It is shown in the following figure.

Fig: Malthusian Population Curve

According to Malthus, the over population caused by imbalance between population growth and means of subsistence is controll by two types of checks namely prevetive checks and positive checks:

Preventive Checks

They are related with the measures to controll over the birth rates. According to him, the preventive or cruden checks to controll on birth are moral restraint, delaid marriage, celyvacy chastity ( conrol of sex after marriagr) etc. He was against the use of contraceptic and abortion because he was a priest in a church. Though in those days conracetive was used in France.

Positive Checks

If the people fail to control populatrion by preventive checks than it is control by the deaths of thr prople by nature like droughts, floods, faimines, Earthquick, pastilence vis mise etc.

However, the preventive checks are more effective in developed countries/advanced society while positive checks in the underdeveloped and backward society.

Criticism:

The doctrine/principle of the Malthusian theory have been criticised by a number of scholars. The main drawbacks of this theory as follows:

He is criticised for mixing desire for sex with the desire to have children, the desire of sex is a biological instinct while the desire of child is social instinct.His principle that the population grows in a geomaterial proportion has been proved wrong, i.e. in Mexico the population doubled in 20  years but across the border in USA the population doubled in 120 years.

He has also been proved wrong in his arithmetical ratio of increase in means of subsistence because by adoption of Green Revolution technology like use of fertilizers, HIV seeds, modern means of water supply etc. the food production may be increase up to a number of times within 25 years.He neglected the man power and his various economic activities in his theory.

According to Prof. Canan, “A child comes on the earth with not only be mouth and stomach but also pair of hands”. It means that man is not only dependent on agriculture for earning his means of livelihood, but the returns and income level is very high in industry and trade and commerce. Moreover, man can satisfy himself not only by food grain but also by fish, meets, egg etc.

In his preventive checks he rejected the use of contraceptive to control on population. Now a days, modern means of family planning like contraceptive, contraceptive pins etc. are more popular and effective as compare to moral restrains.

The natural calamities like earthquake, flood, droughts, not only occur in population area but also in non-ecumene areas. It is also the view of critics that self-control is the cause of various health and psychological problems and moral problems. Therefore, the use of contraceptives is the best way to make a symbiosis between desire for sex and desire for children.

However, whatever may be the drawbacks of Malthusian theory created goes to Malthus for the development the theory population growth. The family planning program have been adopted by all the countries of the world and recent.