A
NON-WESTERN
57
WORLD?
Without new technologies and techniques, Asia fell prey to the classic Malthusian problem. Thomas Malthus' famous 1798 treatise, An Essay on the Principle
of Population,
is
remembered today for its erroneous pessimism, but, in fact, many of Malthus' insights were highly intelligent. He observed that food production in England rose at an arith metic rate ( 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , . . . ) but population grew at a geomet ric rate (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, . . . ) . This mismatch, unless altered, would ensure that the country would be hungry and impov erished, and that only catastrophes like famine and disease could raise living standards (by shrinking the population).* Malthus' dilemma was quite real, but he failed to appreciate the power of technology. He did not recognize that these very pressures
would
generate
a human
response
in
Europe—the agricultural revolution, which vastly expanded the production of food. (The continent also eased popula tion pressures by exporting tens of millions of people to var ious colonies, mostly in the Americas.) So Malthus was wrong about Europe. His analysis, however, well described Asia and Africa.
Strength Is Weakness And yet, how to make sense of those extraordinary Chinese voyages? Zheng He's dazzling fleet is just one part of a larger picture of remarkable achievements in China and India— * Disasters raised living standards by killing off large numbers of people, leaving fewer people to share the fixed pool of income. Growing wealth, on the other hand, caused people to have more babies and live longer, so incomes fell, as, over time, did popula tion. This is called the "Malthusian trap." You can see why he's considered a pessimist.