IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/ctwqxx/v35y2014i7p1195-1215.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Barbarian hordes: the overpopulation scapegoat in international development discourse

Author

Listed:
  • Robert Fletcher
  • Jan Breitling
  • Valerie Puleo

Abstract

Despite sustained critique of a neo-Malthusian focus on ‘overpopulation’, the issue continues to resurface regularly within international development discourse, particularly with respect to ‘sustainable’ development in relation to growing environmental security concerns. This suggests that the issue defies purely rational evaluation, operating on a deeper psychodynamic register. In this paper we therefore analyse the population question as a ‘scapegoat’, in the psychoanalytic sense of a fantasmatic construction concealing the gap between the symbolic order of international development and its persistent failure in practice. By conjuring the age-old image of animalistic barbarian hordes breeding inexorably and therefore overflowing their Third World confines to threaten the security – and enjoyment – of wealthier nations, the overpopulation bogeyman helps to displace attention from systemic issues within the political economy of development, namely, the futility of pursuing sustainable development within the context of a neoliberal capitalism that characteristically exacerbates both economic inequality and environmental degradation.

Suggested Citation

  • Robert Fletcher & Jan Breitling & Valerie Puleo, 2014. "Barbarian hordes: the overpopulation scapegoat in international development discourse," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 35(7), pages 1195-1215, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:ctwqxx:v:35:y:2014:i:7:p:1195-1215
    DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2014.926110
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01436597.2014.926110
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/01436597.2014.926110?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lucia Tamburino & Philip Cafaro & Giangiacomo Bravo, 2023. "An Analysis of Three Decades of Increasing Carbon Emissions: The Weight of the P Factor," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-11, February.
    2. David McCollum & Hebe Nicholson & Paula Duffy, 2021. "A place-based approach to population sustainability: Demographic and economic change at the local level in Fife, Scotland," Local Economy, London South Bank University, vol. 36(6), pages 505-523, September.
    3. Haydn Washington & Helen Kopnina, 2022. "Discussing the Silence and Denial around Population Growth and Its Environmental Impact. How Do We Find Ways Forward?," World, MDPI, vol. 3(4), pages 1-19, December.
    4. Hafiz Syed Mohsin Abbas & Samreen Gillani & Saif Ullah & Muhammad Ahsan Ali Raza & Atta Ullah, 2020. "Nexus Between Governance and Socioeconomic Factors on Public Service Fragility in Asian Economies," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 101(5), pages 1850-1868, September.
    5. Helen Kopnina, 2017. "Sustainability: new strategic thinking for business," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 27-43, February.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:ctwqxx:v:35:y:2014:i:7:p:1195-1215. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/ctwq .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.