The tragedy of global population control policies is that too often people have tried to control the lives of others without being responsible for the misery they inflict, New York-based historian Professor Matthew Connelly says.
''The history of these policies is replete with examples of really grotesque human rights violations,'' the Columbia University history professor said.
These have included sterilisation camps, forced abortions, experimental contraceptive devices and withholding food aid to force poor nations to adopt ''ruthlessly coercive'' family planning polices.
''Reproductive rights are the most basic human rights and too often family planning that artful phrase has meant planning other people's families, particularly by aid foundations from wealthier nations in poorer countries.''
It was becoming fashionable for rich people in the United States (''the investment bankers and hedge fund providers'') to have big families as a way of flaunting their wealth and social status as family providers, Professor Connelly said.
The professor, who is visiting Canberra this week, stirred controversy earlier this year among Christian pro-life conservatives, feminists and family planning organisations with the publication of his second book, Fatal Misconception: The Struggle to Control World Population.
He described the tome as a history of ''a movement that sought to remake humanity, seemingly with the best intentions, but succeeded in causing untold suffering''.
All too often, family planning policies had been a classic case of projecting social and economic problems on to ''the other'', he said.
''It's too easy to look at other people and say they're the cause of the problems. In the case of poorer countries, there's a tendency to think there's too many of them and if only they would go away, our environmental problems will also go away.'' Professor Connelly is speaking today at an Australian National University forum which questions whether non-government organisations from rich countries have ''reinvented imperialism'' through family planning programs.
Research shows declines in population growth are linked to declining illiteracy rates among women, and more informed reproductive health choices.
''If you care about population and you want to do something about it, get more girls into school,'' Professor Connelly said.
''People say we're pressing up against a Malthusian crisis, and we've got to do something about world population growth before we run out of resources like food or oil. But if you look at how resources are consumed on a per capita basis, it's not a population crisis. The problem is people in affluent nations are consuming 10 times as many resources.
''If the populations of India and China achieve the same level of resource consumption as an American lifestyle, then we're all in trouble, but does the trouble begin in those countries? Doesn't the solution lie here at home?''
Professor Connelly is a speaker at today's free ANU forum, NGOs: The work of Empire? Old Canberra House theatrette, 1pm.
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