Thomas Malthus – författare

Malthus' life's work on human population and its dependency on food production and the environment was highly controversial on publication in 1798. He predicted what is known as the Malthusian catastrophe, in which humans would disregard the limits of natural resources and the world would be plagued by famine and disease. He significantly influenced the thinking of Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace and his theories continue to raise important questions today in the fields of social theory, economics and the environment.With an introduction by Robert Mayhew.

Malthus's Essay looks at the perennial tendency of humans to outstrip their resources: reproduction always exceeds food production. Today Malthus remains a byword for concern about man's demographic and ecological prospects. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

First published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

An Essay on the Principle of Population was first published in 1798 under an alias, but Thomas Robert Malthus's identity was soon made public. The book foresaw problems in the future because, according to one interpretation, population growth would follow a geometric progression (doubling every 25 years) while food production would follow an arithmetic progression. This discrepancy would lead to food shortages and famine unless birth rates were to fall. Despite not being the first book on population, Malthus's work sparked discussion about the size of the population in Britain and helped the Census Act of 1800 become law. A national census was made possible by this Act, starting in 1801 and continuing every ten years to the present in England, Wales, and Scotland. Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace both regarded the book's sixth edition from 1826 as having had a significant influence on their work on the idea of natural selection. The Malthusian Law of Population, as it is presently called, received significant attention in this book. According to the hypothesis, rising population rates result in a greater supply of labor, which eventually drives down wages. Malthus essentially believed that poverty is a natural byproduct of population expansion.