Abstract

Was Malthus a ‘Utilitarian’? This apparently simple-minded question is justified by on-going debate in the secondary literature. For example, in his study, The Classical Economists, D. P. O'Brien maintains that ‘only the two Mills, apart from Bentham himself, were really Utilitarians’. Against this we have the view of Lord Robbins that ‘We get the picture badly out of focus if we conceive that reliance on the principle of utility was confined to Bentham and his immediate circle.’ In this paper we shall demonstrate the justice of the Robbins perspective with specific reference to the population issue