In November 2022, the world’s population surpassed 8 billion people. Our human family is now larger than ever before. Collectively, we live longer and enjoy healthier lives than at any other point in human history. Yet ours is also a world of anxiety and uncertainty. Challenges like climate change, economic upheaval, conflict, and COVID-19 have brought us to a crossroads, where the threat of a worse future for humanity feels just as possible as the promise of a better one. How do we make sense of these contradictions, and begin solving the pressing problems of our day?

This report explores the mix of fears and anxieties arising from these trends.

Chapter 2 considers the view that there are simply “too many” people, leading to climate change and environmental destruction. 

Chapter 3 addresses anxiety over shrinking populations, fears that are increasingly common in places where fertility is low and where concerns either about nations disappearing or being “taken over” by minority or migrant groups have risen.

Chapter 4 illustrates why women’s empowerment and bodily autonomy belong at the centre of population conversations.

Chapter 5 offers solutions aimed at using family planning and gender-equality programmes not as tools to achieve population goals but as goals in themselves.

This moment requires us to recognize the potential of all people, regardless of their gender, ethnicity, nationality or ability, so that each person is enabled to contribute positively to our collective future – a future for all 8 billion of us, a future of infinite possibilities.