Poverty, Population & Pill

Since Maithus the capitalist world has been haunted by the spectre of an ever-increasing population devouring all resources, swallowing up the land like the biblical Leviathan. Lately this discussion has also been confused on both sides by linking it to that round the right of every woman to control her own body and have easy access to contraception. This is especially clear in the Church’s position i.e. — “the way to feed the world’s population lies in better distribution of wealth and use of resources, therefore women have no right to contraception.”

It is misleading to confuse the two issues. Whatever our disagreements with the idea that the solution to present starvation is population control, as Socialists we would strongly uphold the right of every woman to safe free contraception. But is is, however, a long step from agreeing that contraception is a basic human right, to also agreeing that it is through population control forced or voluntary that we would solve the problem of poverty and starvation. This is not to say, of course like the Russians at Bucharest, that the fears of the scientists and conservationists are merely ‘pill imperialism’, a massive plot to depopulate the colonial countries in favour of the capitalist West. These experts face with despair a hungry world, decimated by famine and recessions, they look for a solution, it seems apparent that there are too many mouths to feed.

Rather than dismissing their fears as mere imperialist propaganda it is more important to examine the question — why are people starving — is it ‘n fact that there are already REVIEW: WOMAN’S CONSCIOUSNESS, too many people for the world to support, is the population conference's decision the answer, or does the problem and hence the solution lie elsewhere.

Perhaps at this point, one should take an overall look at the world and its resources. It is indeed a ‘smal! planet’ with finite natural raw materials, not all of it, at present, is capable of producing crops and much space is covered by water. But the most startling factor to emerge in the picture, is the overwhelming reckless wastage of resources, human, mineral and vegetable.

Anyone who has lived in an industrialised country knows of the stretches of land destroyed by mining and other industrial use, left derelict as the bottom fell out of the market and another process or product became more profitable. The urban landscape is also littered with deserted commodities cars, bedsteads etc. by no means past their use, but no longer in fashion.

This is also true of agriculture, crops are not grown for their nutritional value, but because of the money they will fetch on the market. Also if a crop is in abundant supply it will bring the price down so we see the wholesale destruction of milk, wheat, corn etc. in years of plenty, in some cases the government will even step in buy and stockpile part of the supply or pay grants to the farmers for letting their land lie fallow (the U.S. land bank policy). The principle that prevented the English government from supplying free corn to the starving Irish peasants in the famine still operates, i.e. the profit principle. It is obviously going to come between the need for food and an adequate supply of that need.

The way that this drive has distorted agriculture is even more apparent in colonial and semi-colonial countries. Here natural resources have been plundered for the benefit of imperialism and the land given over to the culture of single crops — whatever ‘The Geography of Hunger’. continent.” back to the colonial ones. production. was in demand at the time, regardless of local need. As the issue was chiefly how much could be’fored out of the land, for how little the land often became exhausted, and what was rich agricultural land becomes uncultivatable. The demand for cane sugar and its plantation in Brazil leads to the of recession. situation described in De Castro’s book “The one crop cultivation of cane sugar in the Brazilian northeast is a good example. This rea once had one of the few really fertile tropical soils. It had a climate favourable to agriculture, and it was originally covered with a forest growth extremely rich in fruit trees. Today, the all-absorbing, self-destructive sugar industry has stripped all the available land and covered it completely with sugar cane; as a result this is one of the starvation areas of the In pre-revolutionary Cuba, as well, peasants were starving because the rich land was used for tobacco and sugar cultivation, and they no longer had access to grow food crops. Little of the wealth made by imperialist countries would find its way mans benefit.

Much energy and expertise is also wasted in rivalry between nation stdtes, the amount of resources squandered on military hardware is a product of this, and the effects of 2 major wars on the means of All of these factors tend to increase rather than diminish poverty and explain why that in spite of technological advances most of the world has a low standard of living. The whole raison D’Etre that dominates the world under capitalism is the fact that production agricultural and industrial is directed by the desire for profit under conditions of competition, not human need. However wealthy the capital owning class is, only mere crumbs will come the way of the majority of people in theeworld, and the drive will always be to see that these crumbs are proportionally a smaller and smaller share of the cake. Added to this is the need for a labour pool necessary in boom times, which increases the problem in times It seems obvious then, that the problem of poverty is at the least greatly increased, if not altogether caused by the capitalist mode of production. That the inability to feed the world’s population is a reflection of the fact that capitalism has well outlived its progressive'role. A social and economic system is required that takes need as its guiding principle for production and only ~ a socialist revolution is capable of producing that system. There is no ‘blueprint’ for how it could work, but the advantages of international co-operation, genuine workers democracy, pooling of resources and planning are obvious. Released from the straitjacket of profit and the vagaries of the market industry could develop new legs wasteful methods of production. Research could be used for It is possible that even then, with better use of resources and cooperative effort mankind will reach a stage when there are too many people for everyone to have a fulfilling life style. But there again, it would be much easier to combat that problem in a socialist economy, with freewill cooperation, no danger of genocide or the problem being used as a veiled attack by one class on another, and the greater possibility of widespread discussions and decision making, by the whole of the community. Rather than a solution imposed from above, not understood and hence unworkable except by force.

comparing it with processes of production under capitalism which destroy what