The Limits to Growth; A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind [Hardcover]

Donella H. Meadows (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Universe Pub; 2 edition (March 1972)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0876632223
• ISBN-13: 978-0876632222
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,609,538 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Donella H. Meadows was a pioneering environmental scientist, author, teacher, and farmer widely considered ahead of her time. She was one of the world's foremost systems analysts and lead author of the influential Limits to Growth. She was Adjunct Professor of Environmental Studies at Dartmouth College, the founder of the Sustainability Institute and co-founder of the International Network of Resource Information Centers.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Limits to Growth, June 6, 2001

By 

Smitu Kothari (Hightstown, NJ United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Limits to Growth; A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind (Hardcover)

"Limits to Growth," was the pathbreaking report to the Club of Rome. It caused outrage worldwide. Released just before the first oil crisis in 1973, the Report drew on the growing awareness of environmental impacts of human activity and predicted dire consequences if the then present rate and scale of natural resource consumption was not tempered.

The Report was also pathbreaking because it used a sophisticated simulation model that showed that intervention in one part of the ecological system has unexpected impacts on other pasrts of that system.

The Report should be required reading for all those interested in the human footprint. Justifiably, it generated heated controversy, with many labeling the Club of Rome as neo-Malthusian doomsayers. The fact that the analysis of the Report is still relevant today is an indication of its historic significance.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fundamental Reference from 1970's When Government Betrayal of the Public Trust Began, October 11, 2008

By 

Robert D. Steele (Oakton, VA United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind (Paperback)

Although there are those who remain in denial about the foresight and wisdom of this book, today we are left in no doubt: there *are* limits to growth, and those who refuse to accept such realities accelerate the demise of our planet while also ignoring the depradations upon the public of corporations, religions, crime families and networks, and the "states" whose officials they all bribe and subvert.

The good news is that an entire literature has developed from this one little book, and there is a growing public awareness--as well as growing financial and corporate awareness--of the urgency of harmonizing our human behavior with the larger Earth system of which we are a part.

On the dark side:
Pandora's Poison: Chlorine, Health, and a New Environmental Strategy
The Blue Death: Disease, Disaster, and the Water We Drink
High Tech Trash: Digital Devices, Hidden Toxics, and Human Health
High Noon 20 Global Problems, 20 Years to Solve Them

A handful of current references that can trace their heritage back to this book, which is still worth reading today:
Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications
Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature
Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution
Green to Gold: How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage
Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Interest stimulating, yes; Accurate, no, January 12, 2010

By 

mcl181 "Mike" (Colorado) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Limits to Growth: A Report for the Club of Rome's Project on the Predicament of Mankind (Paperback)

This Book was required reading and regurgitation for a university Geology course taken in 1974. Most of its doomsday like predictions have proven to be false. Part of the Scientific Method requires either discarding or seriously modifying a hypothesis in the face of contrary facts. There are the glaring facts that natural resources such as copper, gold, nickel, oil, zinc, etc., etc., were supposed to have been depleted by the year 2000 -- according to the authors and their "world model." These commodities, as of 2010 reports are not depleted. New sources are continuing to be discovered as have happened through-out human history.

Thus, the hypothesis model is wrong, the input data is wildly inaccurate, and/or serious computer programing glitches/bugs are lurking about. There is a valid under-current or basic message, associated with the title however.

That message is that business as usual - disregard for various side effects, including enviornmental, can not continue. There is a balance between shrub hugging, tree cuddling, bunny sniffers and myopic, bottom-line-profit, corporate morons. The mentality and methods of these extremes do more harm than good; there is ample historical evidence to illustrate the reality.

A better use of time and resources, that went into this book, would have been addressing and hypothesizing towards a very important goal:
Providing clean adequate drinking water and apt waste removal to EVERYONE on the planet. It would be a mighty first step to raising and equalizing living conditions...