THE LIMITS TO GROWTH - A REAPPRAISAL

This article summarizes the current issues in the 'limits to growth' c ontroversy. It argues that the debate is meaningless unless participan ts define world growth, specify the non-substitutable natural resource s essential to world growth and the outlook for their availability, an d rigorously examine whether growth, as opposed to no growth, must ine vitably reduce the productivity of the environmental assets that make life possible. It also concludes that the timeframe for limits to grow th should be finite - no more than a century - since uncertainties wit h respect to technology and physical developments are so great as to m ake predictions to the indefinite future valueless.