Today, in the beginning of the second decade of the XXI century, humanity is acutely feeling the pressure of the global challenges. These problems remind about them more and more often, and in the future threaten the very existence of life on Earth, which can lead the mankind to major ecological and social disasters. One of the most pressing social problems that mankind if facing is the overpopulation of the planet.
The number of people on the planet is growing rapidly. According to scientists, about 35-40 thousand years ago, there were only about one million inhabitants, and by 1900 the world population exceeded 1.5 billion. By 1960 the number of inhabitants of the Earth reached 3 billion. It is not difficult to calculate that a doubling of world population occurred within 60 years (Jargin 2010). The next doubling (up to 6 billion) happened within just 39 years (registered in 1999).
The dynamic increase in the number of people on the planet is creating new social and environmental problems. For normal existence everyone should use different natural resources. It should be noted that population growth is happening mainly in underdeveloped and developing countries. But these states look at the countries where the standard of living is high and the amount of resources consumed by each resident is enormous. The bulk of the population in countries with high population growth lives in poverty, or suffers from hunger. If the standard of living in countries with high population growth was the same as in the developed countries of Europe and the USA, the planet simply couldn’t last for a long time (Sample 2007).
There are several ways out of the problem, and one of the most effective of them is implementation of effective birth control policies and improvement of the quality of life. Of course, birth control has certain obstacles, namely, the reactionary social relations, religions that encourage large families, primitive communal forms of management. Environmental problems, overpopulation and underdevelopment are directly related to the possible threat of food shortages in the future.
There are certain methods for artificial limitation of overpopulation:
Political propaganda – creation of a political model, characterized by a single transmission channel (mass media), transmitting the information from authoritative leaders with the appropriate encouragement and support in carrying out this model from the population.
Economic promotion – creation of an economic model that allows for transferring a certain amount of resources to those people who give life to many children.
Religious propaganda – creation of a religious model, which includes prohibition on the person’s control to dispose of their own lives and destiny (man belongs to God, a ban on abortion, unofficial ban on creation of the paradise on earth and utopian states, political regimes, etc.).
Normative and moral control model – development of a control model, which can force people to refer to the historical nature of human civilization, when it is characterized by insufficient population to ensure the progressive development of civilization (Furuoka and Munir 2011).
The goal of artificial limitation of the overpopulation is getting excessive amounts of resources (taxes, increase in the number of work force, leading to its reduction in price), by reducing the quality of life of the individual before the end state of depletion of the resource base. Also, it should be noted that this policy of limitation leads to the destruction of the regenerative system of the planet's resources and the renewal of the region in particular. Upon reaching the end point of the state of depletion, the remaining individuals will be doomed to extinction, except for those who have access to funds that were obtained by collecting a large amount of resources to the vast majority of the population.
Works Cited
Furuoka, F., Munir, Q. “Population growth and standard of living: A threshold regression approach.” Economics Bulletin 31.1 (2011): 844-859. Web. 9 Apr. 2012.
Jargin, S.V. “Ethical challenges in an age of overpopulation.” SAMJ 100.11 (2010): 694. Web. 9 Apr. 2012.
Sample, I. “Global food crisis looms as climate change and population growth strip fertile land.” The Guardian. The Guardian, 31 Aug. 2007. Web. 9 Apr. 2012.
