A prominent environmental campaigner has issued a robust rebuttal to columnist George Monbiot, arguing that ignoring the impact of global population growth on the climate crisis is a profound mistake.
A Controversial Dismissal of Population Concerns
In a recent article, George Monbiot reportedly labelled those concerned with ongoing global population growth as "obsessives". The world's population is currently increasing by an estimated 70 million people each year. Robin Maynard, former executive director of the organisation Population Matters, has taken issue with this characterisation.
Maynard accuses Monbiot of deploying loaded language, such as "population control", a term not used by mainstream groups working on the issue. He argues this unfairly insinuates that raising demographic concerns is inherently hypocritical or racist, shifting blame onto "poorer Black and Brown people in the global south" while overlooking excessive consumption in wealthy nations like the UK.
The Scientific Backing: IPCC Evidence
Central to Maynard's argument is the science of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). He emphasises that the IPCC identifies economic and population growth as the two key drivers of climate change.
The IPCC's assessment states clearly: "Globally, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita and population growth remained the strongest drivers of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion in the last decade." This, Maynard contends, frames the issue as one of both scale and consumption.
Rights, Not Coercion: The Path Forward
Maynard strongly rejects Monbiot's alleged claim that only "mass murder on an unprecedented scale" could stabilise population numbers. He counters that the solution lies in empowerment, not coercion.
The focus, he states, should be on providing safe family planning and reproductive rights to the hundreds of millions of women worldwide who currently lack agency over their bodies. This is about enabling choice and addressing gender injustice, not about punitive measures.
By dismissing the ecological facts presented by the IPCC and these gender injustices, Maynard concludes that Monbiot risks aligning with the very xenophobic and extractive capitalist forces he claims to oppose.
