Page 71 - Mocarelli, Luca, and Aleksander Panjek. Eds. 2020. Maize to the People! Cultivation, Consumption and Trade in the North-Eastern Mediterranean (Sixteenth-Nineteenth Century). Koper: University of Primorska Press
P. 71
ovations in agriculture
and population growth in Friuli
(north-eastern Italy, seventeenth century)
Alessio Fornasin
University of Udine, Department of Economics and Statistics
Introduction
More than two centuries after the publication of Thomas Malthus’ Essay
on the Principle of Population (1798), the debate about the relations between
population and resources continues. According to Malthus, population
grows as long as there are sufficient food resources for its livelihood. If the
number of inhabitants in a given territory exceeds the land capacity to pro-
duce enough food for its maintenance, then repressive checks restore the
equilibrium. This return to balance is achieved by famines, by epidemics,
and by wars. Alternatively, populations may put in place preventive checks
that leverage their ability to contain their growth by postponing the age at
marriage, increasing celibacy, and abstaining from sexual relations.
In more recent times, Malthus’ vision was overturned by Ester Boserup
(1981). According to this scholar, a population increase would push innova-
tions in agriculture that would allow an increasing number of people to be
sustained by the same land surface. The conflict between the two perspec-
tives, though it has generated a vast literature, is still unresolved, and there
is no lack of attempts at conciliation1.
Even within the framework proposed by Malthus, technical advance-
ments may occur that allow an increase in production. In this case, the
population can grow to higher numbers, but always without exceeding the
1 I have given here a brief summary of much larger debates. For a broad overview see
Livi Bacci 2017.
doi: https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-6963-09-1.69-86 69
and population growth in Friuli
(north-eastern Italy, seventeenth century)
Alessio Fornasin
University of Udine, Department of Economics and Statistics
Introduction
More than two centuries after the publication of Thomas Malthus’ Essay
on the Principle of Population (1798), the debate about the relations between
population and resources continues. According to Malthus, population
grows as long as there are sufficient food resources for its livelihood. If the
number of inhabitants in a given territory exceeds the land capacity to pro-
duce enough food for its maintenance, then repressive checks restore the
equilibrium. This return to balance is achieved by famines, by epidemics,
and by wars. Alternatively, populations may put in place preventive checks
that leverage their ability to contain their growth by postponing the age at
marriage, increasing celibacy, and abstaining from sexual relations.
In more recent times, Malthus’ vision was overturned by Ester Boserup
(1981). According to this scholar, a population increase would push innova-
tions in agriculture that would allow an increasing number of people to be
sustained by the same land surface. The conflict between the two perspec-
tives, though it has generated a vast literature, is still unresolved, and there
is no lack of attempts at conciliation1.
Even within the framework proposed by Malthus, technical advance-
ments may occur that allow an increase in production. In this case, the
population can grow to higher numbers, but always without exceeding the
1 I have given here a brief summary of much larger debates. For a broad overview see
Livi Bacci 2017.
doi: https://doi.org/10.26493/978-961-6963-09-1.69-86 69
