While millions face hunger, malnutrition, and starvation, the world'spopulation is increasing by over 225,000 people per day, 80 million peryear. In many countries, supplies of food and water
are inadequate tosupport the population, so the world falls deeper and deeper into whateconomists call the ��althusian trap,��named for the writer whose work,more than any other, brought
attention to the population dilemma.Philip Appleman's comprehensive introduction to Thomas Robert Malthus'seminal 1798 work traces the evolution of Malthus' idea and itsvalidity through
following generations.
The text is accompanied by explanatory annotations and excerpts fromthe revised edition (1803). Key eighteenth-century influences onMalthus are reprinted, including one by Benjamin
Franklin.
Nine major assessments from the nineteenth century are reprinted,including--new to the Second Edition--those of Frances Pace and HarrietMartineau.
Contemporary commentary ranges widely through many schools of thought,from Lester R. Brown, Paul and Anne Ehrlich, and Garrett Hardin toJulian Simon and Pope Paul VI. All but one of the
twenty-fourselections are new to the Second Edition.
A Selected Readings list and Index are included.
