SOURCE: Ross, Eric B. “Politics and Paradigms: The Origins of Malthusian Theory.” In The Malthus Factor: Population, Poverty and Politics in Capitalist Development, pp. 8-30. London: Zed Books, 1998.

In the following essay, Ross discusses the historical, political, and economic factors behind Malthus's theory of population which, Ross claims, provide justification for the system of private property as it existed in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

It is clearly the duty of each individual not to marry till he has a prospect of supporting his children; but it is at the same time to be wished that he should retain undiminished his desire of marriage in order that he may exert himself to realize this prospect, and be stimulated to make provisions for the support of greater numbers.

Thomas Malthus

When Malthus's first Essay was published, England was in the midst of an agricultural revolution which was...