Emily Klancher Merchant is Assistant Professor of Science and Technology Studies at the University of California, Davis. She has published work on historical demography and environmental history in the Journal of Interdisciplinary History, Social Science History, International Migration Review, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Co-winner, 2022 Otis Dudley Duncan Award, American Sociological Association (Population Section)
Winner, 2022 Merle Curti Intellectual History, Organization of American Historians

"By carefully tracing the idea of the population bomb from the 1927 World Population Conference to the 1974 World Population Conference in Bucharest, Klancher Merchant succeeds in what she sets out to do...Building the Population Bomb is an illuminating read, especially considering how the concept has gained renewed traction due to climate change...Klancher Merchant shows how racism, sexism, and xenophobia is often the real motivation behind ideas associated with the population bomb. This is perhaps part of why it keeps emerging." -- Henrick Andersson, Population and Development Review

"[T]his monograph provides us with a compelling account of the conferences, institutions, theories and experts that laid the foundations for the professionalization of the study of populations, as well as the idea that their uncontrolled growth represented a threat to the West." -- Martha Liliana Espinosa, Cold War History

"a well-researched history" -- Big Yew, Slingshot

"Merchant here tells the fascinating story of how overpopulation became the scapegoat for all humanity's ills, blamed particularly for the problems of poverty and environmental degradation." -- M. Morgan-Davie, CHOICE

"In this brilliant and important book, Merchant shows how population growth came to be seen as one of the modern world's most pressing problems. The population problem took shape in tandem with the development of a fledgling scientific discipline: demography. Foundations funded its studies, governments embraced its expertise, and business leaders amplified its most startling pronouncements. At the heart of this nexus of activity was eugenics, which not only survived in the postwar era, but thrived. Merchant's story is masterful—a precise, compelling recounting of the rise of a scientific problem at the center of global politics. This is a must read in the history of science, intellectual history, the history of sexuality, diplomatic history, and for anyone who wants to understand the twentieth century." -- Dan Bouk, Colgate University

"Emily Klancher Merchant employs historical knowledge, deep understanding of the role of science and technology in social change, and demographic technical expertise to elucidate the contentious story of panic versus calm in the debate about population growth. Building the Population Bomb provides important lessons for understanding the past and viewing the future." -- Barbara A. Anderson, Ronald Freedman Collegiate Professor of Sociology and Population Studies, University of Michigan