The Social-Conflict Theory: The Dangers Of Overpopulation

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It’s a frightening thought to think that the day will come when all the food, water, and oil in the world isn’t enough for the population to survive on. Of course, that’s already a reality in several overpopulated countries like China and India. Similarly, there are numerous opinions on overpopulation, some say that it can be hindered, while others think that the human species will come extinct due to deprivation of resources. According to Gilland (2008), overpopulation is every so often defined as the lands inability to feed its population. This lack of resources can be explained by the social-conflict theory which views overpopulation as not a crisis of the number of people, but of the way resources are distributed around the world. The …show more content…

Japan, for example, became overpopulated in the 1960’s, but they solved this with economic growth (Gilland, 2008). Accordingly, Japan increased its production of grain, thus developing a way to feed its people and help its economy. Those countries that found a way to the industrial revolution have left the others behind and the poorer nations were made worse because of this. There are still countries that have cultural traditions where families have more than three children. This used to be a necessity because children would succumb to diseases and malnourishment. But due to the industrial revolution, vaccines have been developed and this has declined the overall death …show more content…

Undeniably, Planet Earth will perceive countless deaths due to starvation, lack of shelter due to the cost of living rising and dehydration due to the pollution caused by multinational corporations. There are already countries that have implemented a plan in order to reduce the rate of growth. For example, China and India are the greatest overpopulated places in the world and they have tried to deal with overpopulation in different ways. China placed a “one- child policy” law for several years in order to control population growth. Anyone who had more than one child was then fined and heavily taxed. If mother’s found out that their child was to be a girl, they would try to abort because men held more value. This method of population control is incredibly controversial because it limits people’s free will over how many children to have. India on the other hand, tried to encourage sterilization in its citizens. But the population did not support this radical method and it failed

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