To my earlier statement: "population is not a problem-- poverty is", Eban
Goodstein observes: "My own view is that population growth is better seen as
one of the 'real' issues in its own right." I think we getting at the basic
question in the debate. Though I do not have a firm opinion on this issue, I
think it would be fruitful to pose a few questions to the 'population is a
problem' thesis.
(1) Would population be a "problem" if you were part of the population that is
supposed to be the "problem". This is not a sentimental question, but a
theoretical question.
(2) What does control mean, and who does the controling.
(3) What would "family planning" mean if there is nothing to plan for; i.e.
no sense of a future-- life is nothing but hopeless stagnation generation after
generation after generation ...
Cindy Cotter asks me, why poverty cause high rate of growth of population? I
sincerely don't know why. My guess is, there must be a lot of factors. Religon,
which is independent of poverty, can be one important reason. For example, in
predominantly catholic or muslim cultures one may find high rate of growth of
population independent of economic considerations. But I think economic
reasoning generally prevails (by economic reasoning I don't mean economism of
indevidual decision makers, but an economic culture in general such as urban-
rural, advanced-backward, etc.). One good way to test some of the population
theses would be to look at average family size of the first two generations of
emigrants from high population areas to first world countries. Most of these
people are from working class families. If they are behaving "rationally" here,
then they probably were behaving "rationally" there too. Poverty for me is not
simply an economic category, it is a sociological category rather. We won't
call many tribes living in Rain Forest "poor" simply because they don't even
have clothes.
In Indian context one can argue that poor people in rural areas have large
families because children soon become "earners", infant and child mortality
rate is high-- so a conservative insurance policy would result in large
families, children are the only social security in the old age, average life
expectancy is extremely low (I guess 35-40), ect., and, of course, no future
for your children. "Family planning" has been a great success in the urban
middle class population. I have seen drastic changes before my eyes.
I never said that US unser-class has high rate of growth of population. If it
is true, then of course we should think about the reasons why it is so?
Cheers, Ajit Sinha
