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+4 votes
Is the earth overpopulated as it stands now? Does overpopulation present itself as an obstacle towards creating situations of anarchy? Is the point at which we are considered overpopulated relative to an individual's desires and goals? Does population number have other/any implications in relationship to anarchy?
by
I'd definitely like to see some answers to this question. I have a feeling it is the idea that women are viewed as "baby making machines" by dominant societies around the world (organized religion, patriarchy, family structures, natalism, agriculture, and other authoritarian, civilized ideas don't help...)

1 Answer

+3 votes
Based on my very lay understanding if ecology, carrying capacity, and so forth, the earth is overpopulated. There are too many people for it to support sustainably, hence people in the know talking about the need for more and more techno-fixes (floating or underwater cities! nanotechnology! biotechnology! alternative energy! moon/mars colonization!) that basically further the reach of capitalist civilization into our lives. These solutions are often offered by people who acknowledge that there are too many people, but can't conceive of life without industrial capitalist civilization (or industrial anti-capitalist civilization), so the only solution they see is to hopefully raise standards of living, rely on expanding technology and hope people stop reproducing at some point. I quite disrespectfully disagree with all of that nonsense. I am uninterested in handing over my world to engineers and technocrats, and I don't think that more of what got us to the place we are now is a viable path to an anarchic future.

Does overpopulation present itself as an obstacle to creating anarchy? I think that depends on what you mean by creating anarchy. I don't think that anarchic living is compatible with mass society, so I would personally lean towards "yes" if we are talking about on going, sustainable anarchic projects (if there is such a thing).

On the other hand, more people allows for more co-conspirators and greater concentration of populace equals more chance for wildly out of control chaos. So in some senses, perhaps not. If you want a world with industrial civilization, and believe that that can work with anarchy, then you are probably inclined to want enough people to monitor and repair the automated factories that those weird green-tinged syndicalists talk about, though perhaps the number of people we have now is too many (but we definitely need enough that we maintain urban centers that are the loci of all the /good things/:art, learning, culture...)

So yeah, I guess that would depend on perspective.
by (22.1k points)
i'm glad you answered this ingrate, and i think that probably there are too many people. also i disagree strongly with the addition that you use in your last paragraph (more people i think doesn't mean that there are more possible conspirators, it means more likely that everyone is overwhelmed and anti-social and doesn't want to or know how to engage with other people).
but all that aside, i have to say that the over population argument is so heavily connected to eugenics arguments that i have stopped thinking that i know what is going on.

i hate that! ;)
Can you explain how "techno-fixes" like ocean and space colonization further the reach of capitalist civilization into our lives? Could not such settlements be created without capitalism and state institutions? Other than either hoping people stop reproducing or killing off a bunch of folks, settling somewhere else to decrease population number seems like the only viable option to sustainable living on this planet.I hope I'm wrong, but shit.
dot- i agree with you about the likelihood that more people doesn't /really/ actually equal more potential friends, but I thought I should address that maybe that is something someone would argue? Perhaps not. I think increased population pressures could possibly lead to potentially explosive situations we can't predict before they happen, and those might be things anarchists could be part of, but who knows.

And yeah, the eugenics thing weighs on me as far as this stuff goes. I tend to think that this sort of stuff is well beyond anarchists' ability to directly influence on a large scale.
vindico vaco- I don't think it necessarily does equal furthering the reach of industrial capitalist civilization, that is why I put the parenthetical about "industrial anti-capitalist civilization." Either way, it is civilization, which is something I find undesirable, and which I don't believe is actually compatible with anarchy, due to the level of systemic organization required, the need for extractive and productive industry (aka work), and so forth.

I could be wrong about that, and many syndicalists, anarcho-communists and social ecology-types would tell me I am, but I don't think I am, and arguing about the potentials of technology doesn't mitigate the realities of the damage they most often do.
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