What is Anti-natalist Policies of Population?

Anti-natalist policies have been advocated from time to time by different groups of people with varying social and political ideologies. The Greeks believed that the ideal population was one that was good rather than large, and their aim was to ensure the survival of the fit as citizens.

When Plato proposed 5,040 as the ideal number of citizens for a city state with a total population of about 50,000, he wanted it to be large enough to ensure economic self-sufficiency and military defence, but small enough to permit a constitutional government with considerable contact among citizens.

Both Plato and Aristotle stressed the importance of the quality of the population. Aristotle even recommended abortion as a means of birth control and the abandonment of deformed infants as a eugenic measure.

In order to control the size of the city state, he proposed setting a limit to the number of children each couple might have.

Attention was once again focused on the population problem and the need for controlling it, when, in 1798, Malthus published ‘An Essay on the Principle of Population as It Affects the Future Improvement of Society.”

While the Malthusian theory was attacked on several grounds, the relevant point in the present context is that his religious beliefs prevented him from grasping the possibility of widespread use of contraceptives.

John Stuart Mill, while agreeing with Malthus on his main thesis, was one of the first propagandists of the family planning movement.

He declared in 1821: “The great problem is thus to find out how to limit the number of births.” His acceptance of birth control was mainly on grounds of social liberalism and individual rights.

In more recent times, Margaret Sanger championed the cause of birth control as one of the important rights of women. Today, of course, the need for having a demographic goal is once again considered to be paramount.

Anti-natalist policies can be both direct and indirect. Sometimes their classification is made on the basis of whether such policies are short-term or long-term; but since most policies have both short term and long-term implications, it is better to treat them on the basis of whether they affect fertility directly or indirectly.