Economics

Malthusianism, Resourceship, and Liberty

ABSTRACT

Conferees explored the intellectual versus real-world debate between the (pessimistic) "Malthusians" and the (optimistic) "Resourceship" theorists, discussing the ability of private property and market exchange to address, and even overcome, "the limits to nature."

READING LIST

Conference Readings

Department of Economic and Social Affairs. The Determinants and Consequences of Population Trends. New Summary Findings on Interaction of Demographic, Economic and Social Factors, Vol. I, Population Studies No. 50. New York: United Nations Publication, 1973.

Wynter, Andrew, et al. Good Words for 1876. Edited by Donald MacLeod. London: Daldy, Isbister & Co., 1876.

The Royal Society. People and the planet. London: The Royal Society Science Policy Centre, 2012.

Ausubel, Jesse H. “The Return of Nature: How Technology Liberates the Environment.” The Breakthrough Journal (Summer 2015): 1-13. http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/journal/past-issues/issue-5/the-return-of-nature (accessed October 14, 2016).

Bradley, Robert L. Jr. Capitalism at Work: Business, Government, and Energy. Salem: M & M Scrivener Press, 2009.

Cannan, Edwin. Wealth: A Brief Explanation of the Causes of Economic Wealth. London: P. S. King and Son, 1922. http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2063 (accessed October 13, 2016).

Diamond, Jared. “What’s Your Consumption Factor?.” The New York Times, January 2, 2008. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/02/opinion/02diamond.html?_r=0 (October 14, 2016).

Ehrlich, Paul R. and Anne H. Ehrlich. “Can a collapse of global civilization be avoided?.” The Royal Society Publishing. http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/royprsb/280/1754/20122845.full.pdf (October 14, 2016).

Ehrlich, Paul R. and Anne H. Ehrlich. “The Population Bomb Revisited.” The Electronic Journal of Sustainable Development. http://www.populationmedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/Population-Bomb-Revisited-Paul-Ehrlich-20096.pdf (October 3, 2016).

Engels, Frederick. “Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy.” Marxists Internet Archive. Translated by Martin Milligan. http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1844/df-jahrbucher/outlines.htm (October 13, 2016).

Goklany, Indur M. “The Pontifical Academies’ Broken Moral Compass.” The Global Warming Policy Foundation. http://www.thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2015/06/Vatican-compass.pdf (October 14, 2016).

Gordon, Peter and Harry W. Richardson. “Farmland Preservation and Ecological Footprints: A Critique.” Planning and Markets. http://www-pam.usc.edu/volume1/v1i1a2s1.html (October 14, 2016).

Gore, Al. Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit. New York: Penguin, 1993.

Hardin, Garrett. “The Tragedy of the Commons.” The Social Contract Press 12, no. 1 (Fall 2001): 26-35. http://www.thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/tsc1201/article_1027.shtml (accessed February 2, 2017).

Jacks, Graham Vernon and Robert Orr Whyte. The Rape of the Earth: A World Survey of Soil Erosion. London: Faber and Faber, Ltd., 1939.

Jevons, William Stanley. The Coal Question. London: Macmillan and Co., 1866. http://www.econlib.org/library/YPDBooks/Jevons/jvnCQ1.html (accessed October 13, 2016).

Kasanen, Heli. “Review of Matthew Connelly’s ‘Fatal misconception: the struggle to control world population’.” Electronic Journal of Sustainable Development 1, no. 3 (2009): 121-124.

Malthus, Thomas Robert. An Essay on the Principle of Population, 6th Edition. London: John Murray, 1826.

Osborn, Henry F., “Birth Selection versus Birth Control” In A Decade of Progress in Eugenics, Scientific Papers of the Third International Congress of Eugenics, edited by Harry F. Perkins, Charles B. Davenport, et al., 29-35. Baltimore: The Williams & Wilkins Company, 1934.

Perry, Mark J. “Julian Simon: Still more right than lucky in 2013.” AEIdeas. http://www.aei.org/publication/julian-simon-still-more-right-than-lucky-in-2013/ (October 14, 2016).

Proudhon, Pierre-Joseph. “The Malthusians [Benjamin Tucker translation] .” Contr’un. http://libertarian-labyrinth.blogspot.ca/2006/05/proudhons-malthusians-benjamin-tucker.html (October 13, 2016).

Ridley, Matt. “The Climate Wars’ Damage to Science.” Quadrant (June 19, 2015): 1-13.

Rose, Morgan. “In Defense of Malthus, September 16, 2002.” Library of Economics and Liberty. http://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/Teachers/defendmalthus.html (October 13, 2016).

Simon, Julian. The Ultimate Resource 2. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996.

Simon, Julian L. “The Art of Forecasting: A Wager.” Cato Journal 14, no. 1 (Spring/Summer 1994): 159-161.

Simon, Julian L. “Robinson Crusoe Was Not Mainly a Resource Allocator.” Social Science Quarterly 70, no. 2 (June 1989): 471-478.

Yandle, Bruce. “Environmental Turning Points, Institutions, and the Race to the Top.” Independent Review IX, no. 2 (Fall 2004): 211-226.

Zimmermann, Erich W. World Resources and Industries: A Functional Appraisal of the Availability of Agricultural and Industrial Resources. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1951.