The permissibility of population control and its promotion : under what conditions can rich countries promote population control in poor countries?

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Master Political Science – Universiteit van Amsterdam

The Permissibility of

Population Control and its

Promotion

Under what conditions can rich countries promote

population control in poor countries?

Abstract. This paper is structured around two parts. It starts off with a discussion of intergenerational justice and the many challenges that it poses, most notably the ‘Nonidentity Problem’, the ‘Repugnant Conclusion’, and the debate of whether or not future people can be ascribed rights. Through an application of the interest theory of rights I will argue that future people do qualify for right-ownership, after which special attention is given to the potential rights that are of relevance when discussing population control. The following part discusses the right to procreate, the problems this right causes and the obligations that are grounded in parenthood. I will conclude from this discussion that rich countries may promote population control in poor countries as long as they provide the funds necessary for a proviso that entails the provision of vital goods and services to children in poor countries as part of a principle that de facto limits poor parents’ right to procreate.

Jordi de Jong (10367195)

MASTER’S THESIS: GLOBAL JUSTICE, 2015-2016 Supervisor: E. Rossi

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In his famous work ''Famine, Affluence and Morality'' (1972) Peter Singer discusses a serious reason for why many people would not want to give money to famine relief funds, namely the belief that a lack of effective population control merely postpones starvation in famine-struck countries. This claim is supported by the apparent fact that food production (and the production of a great deal of other resources) cannot keep up with the population boom that several, mostly poor, countries are experiencing. The conclusion that should be drawn from this, according to Singer, is that population control is the best means of preventing a shortage of food (Singer, 1972: 241), the same of which could be said about other resources. From this follows that, in Singer's words, ''one should be doing all one can to promote population control'' (Ibid.).

Population control is the practice of artificially controlling the size of a population, most frequently used to refer to the management of animal populations. As the term is still in widespread use by the media and others I will continue to use it to refer to the practice of managing human populations, though movements that concern themselves with human population control officially banned this term around the first World Population Conference held in 1974 in favour of the friendlier ‘’population planning’’ or ‘’family planning’’, as developing countries smelt an air of neocolonialism in the original (Sinding, 2007: 11). Perhaps the most well-known example of population control is China’s recently transformed two-child policy, formerly the one-child policy (BBC, 2015), though many variations of population control have been implemented in different countries, some of which will be discussed later.

The aim of this thesis is to formulate a set of conditions that would justify Western interference into potential population control measures in the global poor countries. The relevance of this thesis rests on two assumptions that I would consider equally safe to make. The first assumption is that the population booms prevalent amongst global poor countries will continue, evoking more uncertainties about the production and distribution of our resources (‘’our’’ meaning the entire population of the Earth) and the sustainability of our planet with regards to these issues. The United Nations has predicted that the Earth’s population will reach 10 billion people somewhere between 2050 and 2060 (2015), underlining this assumption. The second one is that ‘’Western’’ or rich countries will seek to uphold their way of life as much as possible, the intervention in the population growth of poorer countries being one of the more obvious solutions to relieve themselves of the threat it may present. The main question of this

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thesis is thus: Under what conditions can rich countries promote population control in poor countries?

1.2 Actual Implementations of Population Control

In the remainder of this introduction I will discuss several population control measures that have been implemented in different countries across the world. Needless to say I will not be exploring those involving murder, famine, disease (most notably the AIDS epidemic) or any other case in which the limiting of the population size was the result of an undesirable cause, whether it originated from humans or nature. The cases I will discuss are the (emergence of) family planning policies in India and Ghana and are meant to give an idea of how population control can be and has been implemented in different time periods and regions across the world. The cases also demonstrate the relevance of this topic. Though the aim of this thesis is not to elaborate on or otherwise discuss the morality of existing implementations of population control, a discussion of these cases is warranted as a means to explore the thought-processes and considerations that go into the development of such measures.

1.2.1 Population Control in India

As the second-most populous country in the world, expected to take over China in the coming decades, population control in India is especially relevant. The East India College in England is also where Thomas Malthus developed his concern about the relation of population growth and food production, the latter of which, he hypothesised, could not keep up with the former (Harkavy and Roy, 2007: 301). Malthus was convinced that overpopulation was the main cause of the periodic famines that plagued the then-colony.

Many Indian politicians and scholars concurred, leading to the establishment of a range of committees and programs, most notably the first Five-Year Plan of 1952 which allocated a modest amount of resources towards research of population issues and family planning clinics (Ibid.). The program, the first official population control program of its kind, adopted a clinic-based approach with the aim of promoting the use of contraceptives amongst the Indian population. Three revised Five-Year Plan’s later, the 1961 census demonstrated the futility of this approach, uncovering unrelenting growth figures. This inspired harsher measures, ranging from the legalization of abortion in 1971, to the incentivisation of (still voluntary) vasectomies later in the seventies (Ibid.: 3014). In 1975, however, following the declaration of a state of emergency due to a financial crisis, coercive methods were introduced. Few of these coercive methods were actually implemented, though as part of this campaign over 8 million people

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were sterilized, many under questionable circumstances (Ibid.: 312). The sterilization programme was met with tremendous backlash in 1977, leading to the premature end of the government that had introduced it (Ibid.).

The following government transformed India’s population policy. ‘’Family Planning’’ became ‘’Family Welfare’’, sterilization targets were reduced and replaced with new policy designed to promote education, especially among females (Ibid.). Increased female education and participation on the labour market, along with a raised minimum age for marriage, turned out to be much more effective, as well as much less morally deplorable. ‘’Sterilization camps’’, however, still exist throughout India and are supported by local governments (Burke, 2014). These camps tend to target women, despite the analogous operation for males being less complicated (New York Times, 2003).

Two important lessons can be learned from India’s policies, the first one being that target-setting for fertility statistics worked adversely. Local family planners either ignored the targets completely, due to their unrealistic objectives, or did everything they could to achieve them, leading to a focus on incentivised (or even coerced) sterilization as the seemingly easiest solution (Harkavy and Roy, 2007: 321). The second important lesson is that the incentives turned sterilization into a viable option for those from marginalized communities to gain some income, limiting their contraceptive choices in the process (Burke, 2014).

1.2.2 Population Control in Ghana

Sub-Saharan Africa still knows the highest fertility rates in the world, Ghana being among the few nations where population control policies have been implemented (Caldwell and Sai, 2007: 379). As is the case in many Sub-Saharan countries, newly independent nations were eager to grow, economically and population-wise. Similarly, parents benefitted from creating large families, especially those in rural areas. Children were valuable production units on the farms, a solid insurance for old age, and thus even considered a form of wealth (Ibid.: 379-381). Ghana, however, proved to be the perfect setting for the introduction of population control to Sub-Saharan Africa. It was the first to gain independence (in 1957), relatively rich, politically stable, largely English-speaking, and modern attitudes were prevalent under its regimes (Ibid.).

Ghana’s Planned Parenthood Association was formed in 1967, its objective being the implementation of a nationwide, official family planning program (Ibid.: 384). They only needed two years to reach this objective, as in 1969 a policy paper was published that stated the government’s intentions to promote education for females, maximize anti-natalist effects of future policies, and provide families with information and contraceptives (Ibid.: 384-385).

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The program has remained unchallenged by succeeding governments, and has been subject to international acclaim for its comprehensiveness and boldness (Ibid.).

The program, however, has faced some considerable constraints. Early reports showed that not many Ghanaians actually practiced family planning, and the family planning clinics were perpetually running low on contraceptives (Ibid.: 388). Nonetheless, fertility rates have gone down from 7.0 when the program started to 4.4 in 2007, a greater drop than seen in, for example, India or late 19th_{century Europe (Ibid.). The decline in fertility rates, however, has}

stagnated in the last couple of years and is much less noticeable in poorer regions on the country. Effective population control in Sub-Saharan Africa thus proves to be a massive challenge, even in favourable circumstances like in Ghana.

1.3 Lessons Learned

From these two cases, as well as similar studies done in 21 other countries, Robinson and Ross conclude that overall, and for the most part, the population control ‘’experiment’’ has worked (Robinson and Ross, 2007: 421). The different program and policy implementations have contributed substantially to the rise in contraceptive use and the decline in fertility rates across different continents (Ibid.: 422). Traditional culture and the accompanying pro-natalist views did not prove to be the unsurmountable barriers they were expected beforehand to be (Ibid.). It should be noted, however, that socioeconomic modernization was almost as important in driving fertility rates down as the programs and policies that were specifically designed for that purpose (Ibid.).

Another important lesson is that there is no blueprint for population control policy that will be universally successful. Policies and programs that work in one country may not nearly be as successful in another; policies and programs that work now may not work in five years, either due to unforeseeable political developments (e.g. civil unrest, disturbance of refugee movements, and so forth) or due to the socioeconomic development of the target population (Ibid.: 445). Beyond that, the obvious applies: ‘’The best formula for program success is to make a full variety of methods available to the entire population through a wide variety of channels, with complete public information about all methods, and with the highest possible level of provider quality’’ (Ibid.).

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II. Challenges of Intergenerational Justice

In this part I will discuss the morality of population control or, more specifically, limiting births, mainly from a rights-based perspective. Before that, however, I must address some more general problems that come into play when discussing questions of intergenerational justice. I will argue in favour of a non-coercive form of population control, dismissing normative challenges like the nonidentity problem and the supposed lack of rights that future people have. In the ensuing chapters I will elaborate on the obligations that I would argue go hand in hand with parenthood and how these obligations could be fulfilled in a fair way.

Population control policy is obviously something that ought to be discussed thoroughly, as it has a profound impact on one how we will live our lives. The justifiability of implementing measures aimed specifically at limiting birth rates is not self-explanatory and, as has become clear from the case of family planning in India, prone to controversy. I will argue that population control is justifiable so long as the limiting of births improves the quality of life of those born before a given population limit is reached, assuming that future generations, those who live in some parts in the world in particular, are better off with a population count that is significantly lower than the one that is projected become reality in the coming decades. This argument implies that the rights of the will-be-born are more stringent than the rights of the would-have-been-born once a certain threshold has been reached. Before I elaborate on these rights, as well as whether or not future people can even possess rights, I will discuss two different obstacles, the nonidentity problem and the repugnant conclusion. The non-identity problem is not an obstacle to the justifiability of population control, but rather to the moral necessity of future-bettering measures in general. The repugnant conclusion is an obviously unwanted outcome that follows from the most popular response to the non-identity problem. To end this part I will also delve into this issue from the generational level, building upon Rawls’ notion of intergenerational justice. Although this notion is fairly limited, it does entail a discussion that is interesting to touch on anyway.

2.1 The Nonidentity Problem

The nonidentity problem is rooted in the fact that while we can reasonably assume future generations will come into existence, we do not know which particular identities will exist, as this is highly dependent on the choices we make and circumstances we live in (Kavka, 1982: 93). The introduction of an expansive population control programme would directly influence the conditions for conception, leading to the emergence of an entirely different set of identities.

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From this fact, one can deduce the argument that we have no moral obligation to implement population control measures in order to better the lives of future generations, for we are not harming any one person by remaining on our current course (Ibid.). Those born in the over-crowded world are not worse-off, for the implementation of population control measures by an earlier generation would have replaced their existence with a nonidentical one. This counterintuitive conclusion, based on seemingly logical premises concerning biology and personal identity is the nonidentity problem, referred to by some as the paradox of future individuals (Ibid.: 95).

Parfit’s analogy of depletion illustrates this problem and can relate to the question of population control. Suppose that a group must decide whether to deplete or conserve their resources. Depletion would, for the sake of the argument, slightly raise the quality of life for the coming two centuries before making it decrease to a point that lies well below what it would have been had they chosen to conserve their resources (Parfit, 1984: 362). Conservation would not raise the quality of life now, but would stabilise it for centuries to come. Although depletion would greatly lower the quality of lives of people in the future, anyone who argues that for an action to be bad it must be bad for someone would have to agree that depletion is not the morally bad choice (Ibid.: 363). Most, including Parfit, would agree that the great lowering of the quality of life must warrant some reason to choose conservation instead (Ibid.).

To refute the problem of nonidentity one must either dispute the underlying metaphysics, argue that the problem of nonidentity does not make a moral difference when discussing alternative futures. In this paragraph I will explore the latter option, therefore accepting the logic of the nonidentity problem but not what it would lead us to conclude.

The view that the nonidentity problem does not make a moral difference when discussing alternative futures is referred to by Parfit as the ‘no-difference view’, he himself being a holder of this position (Ibid.: 367). To illustrate this position Parfit makes use of yet another analogy (Ibid.). Suppose this time that two medical programs are ready to be implemented, yet only one of them can be funded. The first program will, if implemented, cure 1000 foetuses (which have obviously been conceived already, meaning their identity has for the most part been set in stone) of a given handicap per year, while the second program would prevent 1000 future children (with no identity) per year from having the same handicap even before they are conceived. In both cases, 1000 children will be born healthy and the same number of children will be born handicapped, the difference being the specific group that benefits. Given the equality in numbers and effect, and the ensuing fact that neither group is better or worse off than the other group would have been had the decision been different, I

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consider the alternative futures equally beneficial. If either program would achieve greater numbers than the other, I would judge that one to be more desirable for the same reason that I would support conservation; it generates the outcome that is better for some and worse for no-one. We can conclude that, in Parfit’s words, ‘’if in either of two possible outcomes the same number of people would ever live, it will be worse if those who live are worse off, or have a lower quality of life, than those who would have lived’’ (Ibid.: 360).

This view, however, contains a caveat that is especially relevant in the case of population control, as the decision that is to be made leads to the existence of a different number of people. An examination into ‘solving’ this part of the problem requires the discussion of an additional problem put forward by Parfit, namely the ‘repugnant conclusion’. Before I go on, however, I would like to make a final point about the relevance of the nonidentity problem.

This point is that, according to some ideas of how we should compare and argue for alternative world futures, the problem of nonidentity is simply irrelevant. Gerald Cohen names three important questions that political philosophers must concern themselves with, the last one being ‘’which state of social affairs ought to be brought about?’’ (Cohen, 2011: 227). It would seem that, if taken to the extreme, those who concern themselves with this question and develop an unchallenged view of the optimal state of affairs are given a basis on which to judge any meaningful action by any agent. Any action that contributes to the achievement of the optimal state of affairs (which could include a calculation of the optimal number of people on Earth) is good, and anything that works against this achievement is morally wrong. In this way, undesirable behaviour (e.g. emitting greenhouse gases) could still be classified as harm despite the fact that the logic of nonidentity or many conception of intergenerational justice dictate harm is impossible in such a situation. Specific identities do not play a role in this view, nor does the logic of nonidentity regarding the harming of future people. I myself do not subscribe to this consequentialist view, as I believe that its implications will be too demanding.

2.2 The Repugnant Conclusion

The most important question within the scope of population ethics is, of course, what the size of the population of Earth should be. There are a number of factors and ideas that play a role in ‘calculating’ such a figure. The idea, for example, that the fulfilment of some basic conditions to ensure the well-being of a person determines whether his or her life is a life worth living is an important one, as is the notion that overpopulation could lead to challenges regarding the satisfaction of these basic conditions. The obvious problem here is the question

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of which is better: A world with a lower population and a higher quality of life or a world with a higher population and a lower quality of life. Additionally, can one compensate for the other? Parfit asks precisely these questions (1984: 386). According to him, the answer relies in part on the question of whether or not it could be said that a given couple has a moral reason to have a child if having it doesn’t make anyone better or worse off, assuming that this child is going to live a happy life (Ibid.: 381). A pure hedonist will argue that the couple does have a moral reason to conceive this child, as this would contribute to a higher total level of happiness. If having to choose between a less populous world in which the people are very happy (from now on World A) or a more populous world in which the people are less happy (World B), these hedonists may argue that World B is the better world, so long as the total amount of happiness in World B is greater than in World A, even if the ‘per-person happiness’ is lower. Proponents of this view refer to the principle that the world with the greatest total happiness is the best world, all else being equal (Ibid.: 387).

Someone who argues that the before mentioned couple does not have a moral reason to have the happy child (i.e. more people is not necessarily good or bad), however, would be inclined to favour the world with the higher quality of life (Ibid.: 386). What, though, is the relevant idea of the quality of life that we should be taking into account? The principle that promotes the average quality of life goes as follows: ‘’If other things are equal, the best outcome is the one in which people's lives go, on average, best.’’ (Ibid.). This principle, however, implies that the world would be better off if all but those with the highest quality of life would be killed, which is obviously unreasonable (Ibid.). Parfit refers to this as the absurd conclusion (Ibid.: 421) Combining the hedonistic principle with the idea that quality of life is what should be pursued results in the following principle: ‘’if other things are equal, the best outcome is the one in which there would be the greatest quantity of whatever makes life worth living.’’ (Ibid.: 387). This principle captures the most important elements of the previously mentioned no-difference view, in that it is both impersonal (does not take into account specific identities) and is concerned with the well-being of future people.

This principle does, however, lead to what Parfit calls the repugnant conclusion, for the principle implies that loss of quality of life can be compensated for by a larger population and vice versa. World B can in this case be considered a better world than A, given that the lives in World B are still worth living. Let us now introduce more alternative futures, from World C to World Z, with each iteration having a higher population but lower quality of life. World Z has an enormous population, whose members live a life only barely above the threshold to be considered worth living. World Z is now both the best world and the world we would least

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want to live in. Parfit formulates the repugnant conclusion as follows: “For any possible population of at least ten billion people, all with a very high quality of life, there must be some much larger imaginable population whose existence, if other things are equal, would be better even though its members have lives that are barely worth living.” (Ibid.: 388).

The repugnant conclusion relies on a certain idea of the quality of life and the things that affect this, namely that they can be quantified on an additive scale, given certain values, and thus compared (Arrhenius et al., 2014). Furthermore, it presumes that any small source of welfare can outweigh a bigger source of welfare if the former exists in higher quantities, in the same way that a large number of cups could contain more water than a swimming pool. One way of dealing with the repugnant conclusion is to argue that this way of comparing welfare is mistaken. One could claim that, going back to the example of the different worlds, the goods given up when going down one world are superior to the goods that remain. Parfit himself suggests that as we move down from World A to World B, Mozart’s music is lost, then Haydn’s, then Venice is destroyed, until World Z only has muzak and potatoes left (Parfit, 1986: 19). Parfit’s point is that in the beginning of the chain the most worthwhile things are lost, which cannot be compensated for by any amount of muzak and potatoes. In this case, the people in World A might possess a higher total well-being than the people in World Z. I disagree with this claim, not because I especially value muzak and potatoes, but because I believe the order of worthwhileness to be reversed. Would the hypothetical step from World T to World U not be a greater loss than the step from World A to World B, given that World U has been stripped of so many goods already? Although the absolute value of the goods given up first is greater than the goods given up later down the chain, the relative value of the goods given up in the later part could be higher, simply because there are not many sources of welfare left. A football is worth more to a barely nourished child than Mozart’s music is to someone living in complete comfort. In other words, the step from a live that is barely worth living to a comfortable live is far greater than the step from a comfortable life to a luxurious one, as far as quality of life is concerned. This modified version of Parfit’s argument could still serve as a potential way to reject the repugnant conclusion, although the outcome is somewhat different. Using the modified claim we could argue that as the steps become increasingly demanding, it would eventually cease to be better to go down them. Reversely, the modified claim also implies that, once a certain level of quality of life has been reached, each step up becomes more insignificant for the same reason that the marginal utility of a good (in this case, quality of life) decreases as the quantity of the good one already possesses increases.

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There are a number of ways to make this modified claim work. One is to expand the criteria for what we believe is a life worth living. To put it strangely, if World M becomes the new World Z, the repugnant conclusion might turn into an acceptable one, provided that World M provides a life that is much more acceptable than ‘barely worth living’ to a greater number than World A. This solution resembles the critical level utilitarianism principle suggested by Blackorby et al. (1997). Blackorby et al. propose the instalment of a critical level of welfare, after which the total welfare can be calculated by subtracting the critical level value (which is positive) from the net welfare for each individual and summing the results (Ibid.: 202). This way, even lives with a positive welfare (a life worth living) can become an undesirable life. For populations with the same sizes, this principle is no different than ordinary utilitarianism, which is also the case of the critical value is equal to zero (Ibid.). The problem with critical level utilitarianism is that it implies what Arrhenius refers to as the sadistic conclusion: ‘When adding people without affecting the original people's welfare, it can be better to add people with negative welfare rather than positive welfare’ (Arrhenius, 2000: 251). If the critical value is 10, it is better to add one person with a welfare value of -5 (the end result being -15 total welfare) than it is to add five people with a welfare value of 5 (the end result being -25 total welfare). Note, however, that in both cases it would be better to not add any people at all; if either increase in population can be avoided, it should be (Blackorby et al., 1997: 211). When the average welfare is below the critical level, critical level utilitarianism makes a trade-off between population size and average well-being. In this range, increases in population size are undesirable, as critical level utilitarianism sees the world as overpopulated (Ibid.). In these cases, the principle thus deems a lower average level of welfare ‘better than’ further increase in population size.

A more radical view rejects the transitive notion of ‘better than’ (Arrhenius et al.: 2014). The conclusion that World Z is better than World A is reached by the iterated application of the line of reasoning that every world is better than the one that precedes it as we get further along the alphabet (Ibid.). Rejecting this view would entail replacing the idea that alternative outcomes have a numerical value that is greater or smaller than other outcomes with a sort of rock-paper-scissors approach to comparing outcomes, in which rock (World A) beats scissors (World B) which in turn beats paper (World C), even though paper beats rock. Developing this idea would, however, be very challenging. For one, transitivity seems to be imbedded into the notion of ‘better than’ (Ibid.). Furthermore, we would need to revise the way in which we conduct in practical reasoning (Ibid.). Rejecting transitivity would lead to more questions than it can answer.

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A final, more pessimistic way of dealing with the repugnant conclusion is by accepting the impossibility of satisfactory population ethics (Ibid.). Parfit himself set out to find what he calls ‘Theory X’, a theory that solves the non-identity problem without implying the repugnant conclusion or similarly unacceptable and/or counterintuitive outcomes. Despite being unsuccessful himself, he remains hopeful that such a theory can be found (Parfit, 1984: 451). Others do not share this optimism. Arrhenius holds that there is no population ethics that satisfies the set of conditions for ‘theory X’ and introduces the impossibility theorem (2000). He suggests such a theorem leaves us with three options; we could abandon some of the conditions on which ‘theory X’ should be based, we could become moral sceptics, or we could try to explain away the significance of unwanted conclusions (Arrhenius et al., 2014). In my discussion of the critical level utilitarian principle I have chosen the last option.

2.3 Future Generations and Rights

Another problem regarding future people is the uncertainty of whether or not they can be thought to have rights that are correlative to duties in the present. The literature on this debate is mainly concerned with the (non-)possession of the rights of future people with regard to the preservation of the environment, though it can also be applied to other issues. I will argue that future people do possess rights, and have a just claim for the pursuit of their interest, despite their non-existence. This non-existence is the main challenge to this position.

Before delving into the discussion I will elaborate on the most popular conceptions of ‘’having a right’’ that can be found in academic literature, namely the will theory of rights and the interest theory of rights. Both theories entail an account of what rights and their functions are or should be (Gosseries, 2008: 449). Interest theorists view rights as necessary tools to defend one’s significant interests, which must then of course be possessed by every being that is capable of having such interests (Ibid.). In the eyes of will theorists is too broad, proposing instead that only those who are capable of claiming or enforcing their rights should be said to possess them (Ibid.). With regard with the question of whether or not future people can possess rights, an affirmative answer requires some challenges to be met first. This is referred to as the ‘non-existence challenge’, that is slightly different for each theory of rights.

2.3.1 The Non-Existence Challenge

For will theorists, the problem with future people is obviously that they are not (yet) here to claim their rights. The idea that future people have an interest seems more plausible, given that it is quite clear that current generations have the power to influence their lives, good or bad,

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but for some this is not enough. Before delving into the challenge, let us first examine a view that avoids it in a different way, namely by arguing that the possession of rights is irrelevant or unnecessary of when considering policy options that may affect future generations. An example of such a position is provided by Beckerman and Pasek.

Beckerman and Pasek argue that future people don’t need to have rights for us to have a moral obligation to take into account their interests when creating policies (2001). This position does seem to be contradictory, however. If future people cannot have rights due to their non-existence, how can they be said to have an interest? Also, if interests are so important when considering different policy options, can they not be said to effectively form the basis of a right? If we do argue that an interest grounds an obligation, disregarding the possession of rights, what is the value of having a right in the first place (Gosseries, 2008: 452)? Gosseries argues that upgrading these interests to rights has two added benefits. Firstly, rights are a sign of special importance, indicating the significance of our duties towards them (Ibid.: 453). Additionally, it tells us something about the purpose of these duties (Ibid.). The right to freedom of speech indicates the significance of our duty to allow, for example, free and open discussion, while at the same time giving us a reason to uphold this duty.

Granting rights to future people that correlate to present duties thus seems to be the way to go if we want to conceptualize a way in which to reveal present obligations to future people1. Some argue that there can be rights in the present that do not have present bearers, although it may be inconsistent to maintain that the rights exists now even though its existence of the right relies on the existence of a future person (Ibid.: 453). Both conceptions of rights have similar reasons to reject this position. For will-theorists, non-existence and the resulting lack of power are enough to disqualify future people (Ibid.: 454). For interest-theorists it is the inability to be harmed (in the present) that disqualifies future people from having an interest, and thus a right (Ibid.).

Gosseries proposes two ways one can do this. Firstly, we could grant rights to other generations, most likely the youngest, that are actually designed to benefit future generations as well (Ibid.). One could argue, for example, that we ought to minimize our contribution to the greenhouse effect to improve the future lives of children that are already born, which would in turn benefit the unborn as well. This is not a satisfactory solution to me, as it appears to

1_{This view has strong implications regarding the ethics of abortion, which have been discussed extensively}

elsewhere (e.g. Roberts, 2010 and McMahan, 2006), but will not be discussed here. In short, my view is that the permissibility of abortion relies on a weighing of the interests of the ‘’merely possible human’’ and the parents (especially the mother). There are a great many situations imaginable in which either’s interests outweigh the other.

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circumvent the problem rather than address it or argue against its validity. Also, the obligations it generates are likely to be far less stringent (and insufficient) than would be the case if future generations were also taken into account, given that there are far less children or young adults than there are going to be future people. The second solution is to grant future people so-called ‘’future rights’’, which is to say that future people have a just claim now that they can enforce later when they do exist (Ibid.). This, too, is not an adequate solution. Let’s say that future people have a right to be born in a clean (by some unspecified standard) environment. This right would then be created as soon as the child is born, or when it is able to claim the right, that it had in what is now the past. If it turns out that he was not born under acceptable conditions, due to right violations that happened before he was born, it can be said that his ‘’future right’’ has been violated. As far as justice is concerned, such an arrangement could be a legitimate way for future people to be compensated for the behaviour of previous generations (assuming the wrong-doers are still alive). From my understanding, however, the entire point of intergenerational justice and the granting of rights to future people is to prevent violations of these rights, rather than give future people a legal basis by which to determine that they have been wronged by their predecessors. A ‘’future right’’ does not appear to generate the same sort of obligations towards future people as does an actual right. Arguing that it does would alleviate the necessity for a distinction between the two.

As I find the aforementioned workarounds both unacceptable I will explain an alternative position which does entail that future generations have rights (and valid interests) in the present.

2.3.2 Rights for Future Generations Grounded in Interests

I will first make the very safe assumption that new generations will continue to come into existence in the future and acknowledge that how we as a generation behave can have a very big impact on the quality of their lives. It is therefore within our power to determine for a large part what the future world is going to be like for its inhabitants, for better or for worse (Feinberg, 1974: 43). As far as I am concerned, this power generates a responsibility to respect the rights of future generations, as these rights can only be effectively respected so long as they are correlative to present duties. To deny that our (referring to our generation as a whole) actions influence future generations is to deny the chronology of time; to refute the idea that we can change the course for the better of our descendants is to refute the virtue of planning. One important argument for interest theorists against granting future individuals rights, as mentioned earlier, is the inability of future individuals to be harmed in the present. This is, of

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course, completely true, but it neglects the fact that present actions can indeed harm future people in the future. Suppose that someone were to bury a time-bomb in a populated area, set to go off in two centuries. If it does go off, and people two centuries from now live or work in the area affected by the explosion, would they not have been harmed by the burier of that bomb? If so, and I believe they have, than it can be said that those harmed had a valid interest against the burier installing the bomb, which can be determined in the present. A more straight-forward and less spectacular example of how present actions could harm future people is the emitting of greenhouse gases and the resulting climate change, also metaphorically referred to as a ticking time-bomb. Obviously the cases are not equal, given that the bomb-burier does not affect conception to the same degree as mitigating our contribution to climate change, but the point remains the same: we affect the lives of future people, identical or not. Besides, even though the identities of future people will be different depending on our behaviour, their interests as a group will largely stay the same.

Accepting the interest theory of rights means rejecting the will theory. This is not the challenging part. The will theory disqualifies not only future generations, but also groups like the children, the mentally handicapped and the dead from having a right, as they lack the cognitive skills to identify a breach of their rights and/or the ability to file an official complaint. Most would agree that at least some of those groups are worthy of the possession of rights, especially children and animals. That is not to say that the will theory has nothing to offer; on the contrary, the ability to follow procedures to enforce one’s rights is very important. However, it is not entirely logical that the bearer of the right must necessarily be the one that possesses the ability to lay claims. In pretty much any political community there is a precedent for people representing other people for a variety of reasons, even if this representation cannot be authorized by the represented. In the case of children, the mentally handicapped and future generations alike, the problem of representation can and has been solved by the establishment of institutions which are authorized by higher institutions. One could think of specialized administrative bodies, such as a guardian, ombudsman or a specific agency (Ibid.: 446). The fact that these groups do not (and cannot) authorize those who represent them is not as much as an issue as it would be when it comes to democratic representation in government, as this representation does not take place on an ideological level. In comparison to the average electorate, the interests of children, animals and future people are rather straight-forward. Will theorists themselves argue that the rights of, e.g. children, could be protecting by granting additional rights to parents with regards to their children, though this seems like a band aid solution that raises more questions than it answers. Are children, then, a property of their

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parents? Also, with special relevance to teenagers or mentally handicapped people, when exactly is one able to claim his or her right themselves and how should this be determined? It seems easier, and more logical, to accept the possibility that the rights of the bearer can be defended by a chosen representative. In fact, many countries have legal rules that even require a defendant to be represented by an attorney should he stand for trial (Feinberg, 1974: 48).

Points similar to the ones made here inspired Feinberg to develop the interest principle: in order to qualify as a right-holder one must be capable of being represented, for which one needs interests (Ibid.: 51). I believe to have shown that future people have an interest and can therefore be predicated rights. Secondly, Feinberg argues that right-holders must be capable of being beneficiaries in their own person, also reliant on their possession of interests. He notes that a prime reason for denying future generations rights in the present is the fear of falling into obscure metaphysics (Ibid.: 65). The problem is not so much that the existence of future generations is, in theory, a mere potentiality, but more that we simply don’t know who exactly our descendants will be (Ibid.). This is where the non-identity problem comes back into play, albeit a slightly different version. Five hundred years from now there will be people living where we are living today, and we do not know their names, or even their parents’ or grandparents’ names. We cannot reasonable predict who these people turn out to be, whether or not they are even related to us, or what they like and don’t like. Interestingly enough, however, the only thing that we can reasonably predict about their lives are the interests they have (Ibid.). They are going to want to have fertile soil, clean water, enough food to sustain themselves, and so forth. Their interest-ownership is as clear as their identity is uncertain. As Feinberg says, ‘’the vagueness of the human future does not weaken its claim on us in light of the nearly certain

knowledge that it will, after all, be human.’’ (Ibid.: 66). The apparent fact that future people have knowable (and thus, representable) and valid interests leads me to accept P1, ‘’Future people possess representable interests’’. The earlier assumption that valid interests are a sufficient basis on which to base a right leads me to accept P2, ‘’ Interest-ownership precedes the meaningful predication of rights’’. My conclusion regarding the status of future people as right-holders is thus reached as follows:

P1: Future people possess representable interests.

P2: Interest-ownership precedes the meaningful predication of rights. C: Future people are right-holders.

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2.4 The Rights of Future People

Now that it has been established that future people can possess rights, I will discuss some important examples of specific rights. Luckily, much of this work has already been done. International treaties, perhaps most importantly the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), as well as national constitutions already provide a framework of relevant rights any individual human should possess. These rights protect the most basic of desirable conditions, and a breach of one’s universal rights are understood to significantly devalue a human life. It seems quite clear, then, that future people have a right to be born into an existence in which the fulfilment of these rights is a reasonable expectation, if not a guarantee. It thus seems that, as parents, we are owed our children the conditions for a certain quality of life. This generates two questions, each of which will be discussed in this part. Firstly, there is the question of how far parents must go to for their children: ought they to bring their children into the best possible existence? On the other side of the spectrum, assuming that some parents may not be able to guarantee their children a life above a certain standard, do children have a right against being brought into a flawed existence and/or to non-existence?

The first question can be posed in a different way, namely as follows: If a possible person were to have a sufficiently good life, but a different person could instead be brought into existence who would have an even better life, is there an obligation to bring the latter into existence? (Meyer, 2016). To illustrate the problem, consider a case similar to the case of the two medical programs previously mentioned in the part on the nonidentity problem. Say a woman has been infected with some sort of virus that will result in any child that she conceives to be handicapped, although it will still be able to live a life that is worth living. However, a cure will be available to her three months from now. Does the woman have an obligation to wait three months to in order to conceive a healthy child, knowing that any particular child that she could conceive now will have the handicap? Although the woman cannot be said to harm the handicapped child if she decides to not wait (following the logic of the nonidentity problem), she has very good reasons to wait anyway (Ibid.). These reasons involve the interests of herself, her partner, and perhaps most importantly, her future children (Ibid.).

To support the position that parents do owe it to their possible children to bring into existence the child that can be expected to enjoy the highest level of well-being, Meyer proposes the subjunctive-different-persons notion of harm. This notion of harm is based upon the comparison of a child to the children that could have been born instead (Ibid.). The idea is (in Meyer’s words) that, having brought about a person’s existence at a time t1, the agent thereby harms someone only if the agent causes this person to be worse off at some later time

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t2 than other persons—whose existence the agent could have brought about instead—would have been at had the agent acted differently (Ibid.). Since Meyer distinguishes between different identities, the non-identity problem invalidates this notion. To remedy this I will propose that instead of referring to persons we refer to ‘Child X’ instead, maintaining the defining feature of the no-difference view. Also, the variable ‘time’ is replaced by the variable ‘condition’, in order to cover more scenarios than the one offered earlier concerning the infected woman. The notion of harm then becomes ‘’having brought about Child X under conditions A, the agent thereby harms Child X only if the agent causes her to be worse off than she would have been if she had been born under conditions B’’. It should be noted that no harm is done if ‘conditions B’ are a set of conditions that would have been entirely unrealistic for the prospective parents to aim for. That said, there are additional problems with this modified notion. For example, it invokes questions about how far parents must go to ensure the best possible conditions. It also implies that even if Child X is born in complete luxury, it could still be harmed so long as its conditions could be improved ever so slightly. The latter problem is not so much a challenge. Earlier I argued that an increase in quality of life becomes increasingly insignificant once certain levels are reached, similar to how the marginal utility of a good decreases as the quantity in which it is attained increases. This implies that the obligation to keep improving the conditions for Child X become less and less stringent the better its conditions are already. As far as the question of how far parents should go to ensure the best possible conditions is concerned, a similar principle could apply. As far as the questions of how far parents must go to ensure the best conditions for their children, the simplest answer is inspired by Singer’s concept of marginal utility. Singer argues that, as far as donations to the global poor (e.g. famine relief funds) are concerned, it follows from some factors that are not relevant here that one ought to give ‘’at least up to the point at which by giving more one would begin to cause serious suffering for oneself and one's dependents - perhaps even beyond this point to the point of marginal utility’’ (Singer, 1972: 234). In more practical and case-specific words, parents ought to generate the highest level of well-being that they can achieve while providing the same level of well-being for each family member.

But how should this duty be specified? Two popular modes of reasoning exist with regards to this, namely the sufficientarian view and the prioritarian view, both of which have their shortcomings. A sufficientarian standard imposes no obligation to better the lives of those above a sufficient level of well-being, while it validates the priority view when below a given level, the priority view entailing the notion that we have the most reason to promote the well-being of the worst off (Meyer, 2016). With regard to future generations, prioritarianism dictates

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that future people are in a harmed state unless they are as well off as such a prioritarian view requires (Ibid.). The problem with the sufficientarian standard is thus that it is not concerned with those only just above the threshold, whereas the problem with the prioritarian view is that it is likely to define just one optimal and possibly unrealistic outcome, rendering failure to reach this outcome as harm (Ibid.). Moreover, its logic is conducive to the repugnant conclusion (Ibid.). Combining the sufficientarian threshold with the prioritarian view is much like combining the logic of the repugnant conclusion with critical level utilitarianism. Sufficientarianism provides as with a minimum level of well-being, while prioritarianism continues to specify what we ought to do once the minimum level has been reached. As far as individual parents are concerned, the ‘Singerian’ notion of marginal utility could provide a maximum of what parents should provide regarding the level of well-being for their kids. The emotional bond between the parents and their children makes the application of this principle in this case far more straight-forward than in the original case of Singer had in mind when discussing marginal utility. Most would consider the obligation to treat one’s kids to the same standard of well-being as oneself completely self-evident.

What, however, if parents are unable to generate the sufficient conditions for what we would consider a life worth living? Do prospective children, in that case, have a right to non-existence? John Stuart Mill refers to bringing a child into an existence without the fair prospects of ‘being able’, food and education is a moral crime (Mill, 1859: 97). The intuitive answer to the question exposes an asymmetry in procreational duties. If, as held before, a couple cannot be said to have an obligation to bring a child into a good existence, how can it be said that other couples do have an obligation against bringing a child into a miserable existence (Meyer, 2016)? In a person-affecting view, one could argue that a particular child does not have a right against her parents to being brought into existence, as the parent’s decision not to disqualifies her for the status of ‘future person’ and therefore also her status of right-holder (note here the difference between ‘possible person’ and ‘future person’, whereby the former’s existence is thought of as the result of specific choices whereas the latter’s future existence is already given). When parents do decide to have a child, however, this child becomes a future person and can therefore be described rights, among those the right against being harmed, which implies non-existence when the conditions for a live worth living are not within reach. The impersonal view once again offers the simpler solution. For example, from an impersonal account one could argue that the world would be better if the prevention of suffering is prioritized over the creation of happiness (Meyer, 2016). In practice, a strictly enforced right

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to non-existence would disqualify many would-be parents among the global poor from having children. The rights and obligations of these parents will be discussed later.

2.5 The Just Savings Principle and Previous Generations

So far, I have argued that we must consider the well-being of future generations (and thus policies such as population control) from the point of view based on the idea that the right-ownership of future generations invokes duties on the part of present generations. A slightly different way to argue for population control is to argue that, on a generational scale, justice requires that one generation preserves the conditions needed for a just basic structure over time (Rawls, 2001: 159). Meyer notes that Rawls’ idea of the ‘just basic structure’ could be seen as the minimum amount of what Parfit and others refer to as ‘whatever makes life worth living’ (2016). Although Rawls’ makes this argument mostly in economical and intellectual terms, problems like overpopulation or pollution could just as well threaten a just basic structure. Since population control is the most straight-forward solution to the problem of overpopulation, it is in this case the de facto subject of the argument.

Rawls distinguishes two stages in social development with regard to the principle of just savings, namely the accumulation stage and the preservation stage, which are the stages in which the institutions necessary for a just basic structure are established and preserved respectively (Ibid.). He further holds that, in the latter stage, parents ought to leave their children at least the equivalent of what they were given by their own parents (Ibid.). It would follow that the same would apply to the conditions in which they were born, e.g. environmental circumstances, which could serve to ground a duty to minimize our contribution to climate change despite the improbability of being able to nullify or reverse it. The just savings principle is agreed to because the veil of ignorance extends to the knowledge of the generation to which agents belong (Hubin, 1976: 72).

Of course there are a number of problems with the just savings principle, and especially with the adjustments to the original position that should lead to its acceptance2. Because of these problems, and also because of the strength of the rights-based approach, I favour the latter when it comes to arguing for population control. I will, however, discuss what I consider to be the most interesting problem of the just savings principle, namely the possibility that in a non-ideal world the previous generations have not saved at a just rate. Not only is such a situation

2_{For a more extensive account of the shortcomings in Rawls’ adjustments to the original position, and}

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the one in which developing a principle of just savings becomes relevant (seeing as in a world where a principle of just savings is actually applied, it is probably seen as self-evident), it is also the one in which we find ourselves. Besides, non-compliance to population control policies could be expected to be a problem no matter what principles or theories justify it. Non-compliance to just savings obviously generates problems for later generations, but in Rawls’ thought experiment the possibility of non-compliance also invoked doubts as to whether or not a just savings rate would be agreed upon if it was unclear to agents in the original position if previous generations had saved for their generation (Meyer, 2016). Rawls’ response to this problem was first to alter the motivations of agents in the original position, who were now to be seen as representing successive generations in their family line (Ibid.: 75), thus giving everyone an emotional incentive for just savings. He later abandoned this adjustment and moved back into ideal theory (Gosseries, 2001: 312).

I fail to see how non-compliance of previous generations to a principle of just savings has any impact on the obligation of present generations to uphold it. No reasonable notion of harm could maintain the position that harm inflicted by a group A on a group B could be justified by group A’s status of victims of comparable harm inflicted upon them by a group C. The power asymmetries that exist between different generations might be hard to accept, but to exploit them as a basis on which to relieve oneself of duties towards future generations is childish at best. If future generations have the same rights against the present generation as the present generation had against the generation that preceded them, then justice would require the present generation to pass on the suboptimal world their preceding generation had provided them with. Note, at last, that the present generation cannot be said to have a duty to reverse the bad influences their preceding generation had on the world.

Finally, ways to ground obligations to future people irrespective of their status of right-holders have also been suggested. Meyer formulates this obligation as follows: ‘’those currently alive owe respect to highly valuable goods that their predecessors bequeathed to them as well as to more remote future people, and they also owe respect to the highly valuable future-oriented projects of their contemporaries’’ (2016). The respect Meyer refers to generates a more general obligation to not willingly engage in the activities that are widely considered to be ‘bad’ (e.g. polluting) even though certain interpretations of metaphysics fail to classify such behaviour as harmful. Future people are among the beneficiaries of this obligation, as well as present and past people (Ibid.).

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2.6 Conclusion of Part 2

This part opened with two important theoretical debates concerning intergenerational justice, namely the debate about the implications of nonidentity and the repugnant conclusion that follows perhaps the most popular response to the nonidentity problem. As far as the nonidentity problem is concerned, the no-difference view is held here. This view entails that nonidentity does not make a moral difference so long as the alternative futures share equally beneficiary outcomes. The gap in this view is that it cannot be applied directly to cases in which different numbers of people exist in the various alternative futures, as would be the case when discussing population control. This obstacle has yet to be overcome. Another seemingly troubling aspect of the no-difference view is that it leads to the repugnant conclusion, the idea that a world in which quality of life is sacrificed for the existence of more lives that have a (far) lower quality can be a good thing. Critical level utilitarianism does not avoid the logic of the repugnant conclusion entirely, though it certainly mitigates its repugnancy by installing a lower limit to which lives could be considered good. The instalment of such a threshold can be rationalized by arguing that the relative value of the sources for a good quality of life increases as other sources for a good quality of life are taken away, which eventually means that somewhere along the way the existence of more people can no longer make up for the loss of such a source. The extreme cases in which critical level utilitarianism leads to counterintuitive conclusions only arise in scenarios in which both outcomes are undesirable, namely the ones in which people are added to a hypothetical world that is already in a state of overpopulation. Population control could be justified by arguing that in an overpopulated state, the rights of the living weigh heavier than the rights of those whose live depends on the non-implementation of population control policies.

The next step is determining whether or not future people qualify as right-holders. The argument presented here starts with the recognition of the fact that it is fairly obvious that present generations can greatly affect the conditions under which future generations live. Future people thus have relevant interests when it comes to the behaviour of the people living in the present. These interests are perfectly representable, due to the fact that it is very easy to imagine what they entail. Interest-ownership qualifies these future people for the status of right-holder, with their rights defensible by proxies in the present. Some rights that are especially relevant for future people are the right to a good life and, if this cannot be guaranteed, the right to non-existence. With regard to the first question I have argued that parents must provide their children with the best possible conditions without making themselves worse off than their

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children. If parents can have no reasonable expectation to provide a level of care above a certain minimum then a possible child has a right to non-existence.

The rights-based approach is not the only (conceivable) way to ground obligations to future generations, though I find that alternatives do not possess the same theoretical strength. Nonetheless, some of them provide us with additional insights to intergenerational justice. A discussion of the just savings principle has been included to dismiss the idea that actions in the past that we can now suggest are harmful to us in the present somehow relieves us from some of our duties with regard to future generations.

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III. Obligations and Solutions

In this part I will discuss the rights and obligations of parents with regard to their children and future generations in general. The most important right of parents is their right to procreate, a seemingly irrevocable right (that is, if we can agree human life has a net positive value) that works not only against population control but in some cases also against the right of some to non-existence. I will argue that limits on reproductive rights must not be coercive, ruling out the most morally dubious applications of population control and leaving options like the incentivisation of smaller families open. The obligations of parents on the other hand are partly the counterpart of the rights of possible children that were discussed before, coupled with considerations of how having a child influences other people as well. The obligations that go along with having a child with regard to other members of society are heavily influenced by where in the world the parents find themselves, as well as by their socioeconomic status. Simplifying greatly, it could be said that parents in poorer parts of the world contribute to a production problem whereas parents in richer parts of the world contribute to a sustainability problem. Negative contributions to either problem could be said to generate obligations.

3.1 The Right to Procreate

The importance of procreation is entirely self-evident. The survival of our species depends on it, and many people on Earth either see it as their natural duty (e.g. due to cultural background) or harbour the desire for parenthood anyway, much like any other sentient being. The freedom to procreate is one of the most basic, as well as one of the most life-altering freedoms there is. For these reasons I will assume that everyone has a right to procreation. For most the idea that family planning should be the concern of parents is not just obvious, but also completely natural. In fact, the UDHR contains the following passage: ‘’Men and women of full age […] have the right to marry and to found a family’’ (UDHR, Article 16). It follows that all decisions regarding family size, too, are therefore the concern of parents alone (Conly, 2005: 105).

However, as mentioned before, the effect of additional humans has an impact on the world far beyond the family. Many have pointed to population growth as a potentially very dangerous development, perhaps most famously by Malthus, who specifically voiced concerns regarding the enlarging strain on food supply (Harkavy and Roy, 2007: 301). John Stuart Mill echoed these concerns in his own work, noting that to bring a child into existence can be a curse or a blessing, depending on the position the parents finds themselves in (Mill, 1859: 99). He adds to this that, in the same way that bringing a child into the cursed existence is a crime

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against that child, reducing the ‘reward of labour’ by creating more competition (noting that population growth would increase the supply of labourers and therefore drive down wages) in an overpopulated country is an offence to all who live off their labour (Ibid.). Building upon this logic, Mill justifies state intervention in population matters. Hardin arrives at a similar conclusion from his notion of the commons. Given that we live in a finite world that can only support a finite population (as common land can only feed so many cattle, etc.), population growth must eventually equal zero (Hardin, 1968: 1243). Treating procreation as another problem of the commons, he argues that the freedom to breed is intolerable, for ‘’to couple the concept of freedom to breed with the belief that everyone born has an equal right to the commons is to lock the world into a tragic course of action’’ (Ibid.: 1246). On these grounds Hardin reluctantly denies the validity of the UDHR article cited earlier (Ibid.).

More contemporary critiques of the freedom to procreate exist as well. Conly, too, starts out with the assumption that all have a right to procreation, though immediately adding that a right to something does not mean one can use this right as much as one desires (2005: 105). The creation of one child, then, seems to be an irrevocable right of the parents, but like many other rights, for example, the right to marry (only one at a time) or the right to employment (which doesn’t entail the right to the best job), it should be limited (Ibid.). Firstly, Conly argues that the valuable things that are attained through procreation, including but not limited to things like an expression of love, unity, or a legacy in the form of another person, do not depend on the number of children one decides to have (Ibid.: 106). A parent of one is no less of a parent than a parent of three; the idea that a mother of many is somehow better than a mother of few is clearly outdated. This is already (subconsciously) supported by a majority of couples in the richer parts of the world who often limit themselves to a family of three or four, though other cultural and familial conventions still apply in other parts of the world. Conly then enters the debate about rights for future people, most aspects of which have been thoroughly discussed in this work already. In short, her position is that none of the rights involved, including the right to procreate, justify a claim to the freedom to have as many children as one desires, questioning once again the validity of the parents’ interest in having many children (Ibid.: 109). If the value (or ‘marginal utility’) of additional children to the parents decreases and the parents’ have no right to unlimited procreation we can conclude that the size of families should be kept small(er) if circumstances require it.

The same position is reached by Munalula, albeit from a different, Afrocentric perspective. She argues that the now familiar fact that a child may be born into an inevitably miserable existence gives us enough reason to make the interests of the child the primary

The permissibility of population control and its promotion : under what conditions can rich countries promote population control in poor countries?