ABSTRACT

This paper investigates to what extent the theories of Thomas Robert Malthus and Ester Boserup are still useful to analyse population and land-use trajectories in an industrial society at a regional scale. Following a model-based approach toward long-term socio-ecological research, we built two system dynamic models, each representing one theory, and calculated socio-ecological trajectories from 1961 to 2011 for a study region located within the Eisenwurzen region in Austria. Comparing the model trajectories with empirical data reveals opposing results for the fit of the dynamics of ‘population and technology’ compared to ‘land use and technology’. Technology strongly influenced population development, whereas its impact on land-use intensity faded over time. Although these theories are usually seen as opposing, both models identify population development as a main driver for land-use changes, mainly population decreases that contributed to farmland abandonment. We find out-migration to be essential when applying the investigated theories to contemporary societies.

摘要

本文研究了托马斯·罗伯特·马尔萨斯（Thomas Robert Malthus）和埃斯特·博塞鲁普（Ester Boserup）的理论在多大程度上仍可用于分析区域规模工业社会中的人口和土地使用轨迹。遵循基于模型的长期社会生态研究方法，我们建立了两个系统动力学模型，每个模型代表一种理论，并计算了1961年至2011年奥地利艾森维森（Eisenwurzen）地区的研究区域的社会生态轨迹。将模型轨迹与经验数据进行比较，发现与“土地利用和技术”相比，“人口与技术”的动力学拟合的相反结果。技术极大地影响了人口发展，但其对土地利用强度的影响却随着时间而逐渐消失。尽管这些理论通常被认为是相反的，两种模型都将人口发展作为土地利用变化的主要驱动力，主要是人口减少导致了农田的放弃。我们发现，在将调查的理论应用于当代社会时，外来移民至关重要。