Is the Planet Full?

This multi-author volume examines the impacts of population growth through many disciplinary lenses from departments within Oxford University. The flyleaf refers to the Julian Simon argument about the potential benefits of increased numbers of people in the world in terms of more scientists and inventors to understand and respond to global challenges, an argument that I find frankly specious, as if we do not already have sufficient numbers of people to address our problems. 1 billion people currently live in slums, and it is estimated that, by 2040, this number will have risen to 2 billion. However, it is noteworthy that fertility rates are falling in two thirds of countries, so that the increase in population will occur principally in the least developed countries that are already crowded and where quality of life is compromised. This is also reflection of persisting inequality and lack of access to reproductive health. Although many authors speak about inclusive globalisation, it is not at all clear how this will come about.

The book contains perspectives from welfare economics, zoology, gerontology, Earth sciences, ecosystem sciences and public health. Sarah Harper addresses demographic and environmental transitions while Charles Godfray considers how over 9 billion people can be fed sustainability and equitably by 2050. There are also discussions of the metabolism of human dominated planet, water scarcity, healthcare and mineral resources. Perhaps the key relationship is between population, consumption and the environment, a theme addressed by Ian Johnson in his consideration of the arguments from The Limits to Growth. The final chapter, written by the editor, recaps the thesis of his book Divided Nations, reviewed above, namely that we need new governance structures to minimise the overexploitation and degradation of the global commons and to address the systemic crises likely to arise from environmental pressures and hyper-connectivity in our Anthropocene era. It is also important to recognise the fall in poverty due to globalisation, but this in turn drives higher consumption and brings us up against the well-known equation that for the whole world to have a European standard of living, we would need three planets. We should all be pressing for radical reform of our global institutions so as to make them fit for purpose for the challenges of the 21st century.