economy? The primary object of American national policynis the good of the American people and the health of thencivilization we have imported from Europe. Obviously, annEarth on which human life is extinct would not be andesirable situation, but the immediate problems facing thenUnited States are of a more specific kind. We, along withnour European cousins, are in a competition for the world’snresources, and the survival of our cultural characteristicsndepends upon the outcome of that competition. In this light,nwe need to examine the relationship between populationngrowth and political change. We also need to decide, beforenit is too late, whose side our government is on in thisnquestion.nLet us begin at the beginning, by looking at the influencenof population growth upon the development of politicalninstitutions in general, the state in particular. In politicalnanthropology, the origin of the state has been the subject ofnlively controversy and the object of many theories. There arenaggression and conflict theories (Oppenheim), irrigationnand bureaucracy theories (Wittfogel), and growth andnevolution theories (Aristotle, Elman Service). Increasingly itnhas been recognized that no one approach is suflBcient tonaccount for all the varied state-formations that have takennplace in human history, and the nearest thing to a consensusnis represented by Ronald Cohen at Northwestern.nFor Cohen, population growth per se is a necessary butnnot sufficient cause of that concentration of power wenmoderns call the state. Ecological circumstances and externalnthreats also play a part, but there is no denying thenimportance of population increase. Robert Carneiro hasnprobably put forward the most elegant paradigm for thenprocess. For Carneiro, the secret lies in the principle knownnas Cause’s law of competitive exclusion, which has beennstated by Garrett Hardin in just four words: “Completencompetitions cannot exist,” which is to say that no twonspecies or human groups can occupy the same ecologicalnniche. One competitor will always exterminate (or expel)nthe other. Population growth puts pressure on inter-groupnrivalries as different societies attempt to make use of essentialnresources. In this competition, a society is driven to organizenits powers for victory, hence the genesis of the state.nCompetitors may imitate the example and form their ownnrival state, but through the millennia the effect of competitionnhas been to increase the size of political entities and tondecrease their numbers.nPopulation pressures do not cease to operate, once a statenhas been formed. On the contrary, these pressures are anfundamental part of all social organization. Chimpanzeesnhave a generally loose social organization, but when largerngroups are formed, the structure becomes more authoritariannand more hierarchical. Colin Turnbull has observed ansimilar process at work among the Mbuti pygmies. ThenMbuti ordinarily travel about in small groups of kith and kinnand rely upon only the most informal types of socialnpressure to maintain order. However, when larger groupsncollect to gather honey, even the pygmies begin to employnmore formal methods of social control.nTo understand what goes on, imagine an unspoilednbeach, visited occasionally by picnickers, swimmers, surfers,nand fishermen. At first, hardly anyone goes there, and therenis no need to squabble over rights, but as the place catchesnon and more and more people are going to the beach on thensame day, an inevitable tension develops among surfers,nswimmers, and fishermen. Litter left by thoughtless picnickersnbecomes a problem. The cry goes up that the beach isngetting crowded and polluted, and decent families arenmenaced by irresponsible hooligans on surfboards. The statenbegins passing ordinances: no fires on the beach, no nudensunbathing, swimming only in designated areas, no food ornbeverages. Despite the ordinances, the numbers increase,nand the state has recourse to parking fees and charges morenfor nonresidents. And so it goes.nThe response of the Pollyannas to this scenario is to shoutnhooray. More people means a higher total index of pleasure.nMore people get to enjoy the beach in different ways. Somenget to fish or collect shells, while others get to listen tonWalkman stereos. (Growth buffs refuse to admit that somenpleasures are higher than others or even that my desire fornpeaceful solitude conflicts with your addiction to noise.) Inrecently attended a conference on environmentalism thatnpitted mostly liberal journalists against the disciples of JuliannSimon. Whenever a liberal pointed out that increasednpopulations were degrading the environment and putting anstrain on the world’s resources, one “conservative” journalistninvariably responded with the great success story of HongnKong. Look at how so many people are making so muchnmoney. But, as the liberals always insisted, that does notnanswer the question of Hong Kong’s environment or itsndependence on the rest of the world for food and rawnmaterials. Privately, one of the liberals asked me if anyone innhis right mind would be willing to live in Hong Kong, ifnthere were any alternative but Communist China.nIncreased numbers seem to lead inevitably to increasedncomplexity and organization. That, at any rate, is thengeneral opinion among sociologists who study the phenomenonnof growth. In modern times, more people leads tonmore “subsystems” — organizations and associations thatnhandle tasks that might have been handled, in former days,nby family and church. On the frontier, a family raised itsnown food, reared its own children, made its own clothes.nToday, it is likely to turn over all these functions to a varietynof commercial and governmental organizations, which continuento grow, fission, and proliferate in response toncontinued population growth.nWhile population growth does lead, at least in modernntimes, to greater productivity, growing organizations do notninvariably become more productive and more efficient.nGreater size and complexity in a society’s systems rendernthem more unwieldy, more bureaucratic, less sensitive tonchange, less able to communicate between the various parts.nTo counter this tendency, modern management techniquesnwere devised, separating off the function of managementnfrom that of production.nDartmouth sociologist Stanley Uddy in his contributionnto a collection of essays on Societal Growth endorses thencurrent complaint that nothing works anymore and arguesnthat increased complexity leads inevitably to decreasednperformance. Unfortunately, the managerial remedies inventednto combat the problem no longer work as well, andnfurther growth will make systems more interdependent andnorganizations harder to manage.nnnOCTOBER 1991/15n