As population growth seems irreversibly headed to destroying the natural world, it is instructive to look historically at how population can grow without check, as in China.
Chinese habit and doctrine put a premium on the growth of population, which appears to Western eyes unnatural and artificial. Sentiment, hallowed by immemorial tradition, makes it a duty to leave sons, and the communism of the patriarchal family dissociates the production of children from the responsibility for their maintenance. Hence prudential restrains act with less force than elsewhere and population, instead of being checked by the gradual tightening of economic pressure on individuals, plunges blindly forward, till whole communities go over the precipice.
(Quoted from page 104 of Land and Labor in China, by Richard H. Tawney. M. E. Sharpe Publisher, 1932)
For a brief biography of Richard H. Tawney, click here.
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