Rethinking Our Relationship to Nature, 1920–1959 105
of continued growth, even more than the incur-
sions of past growth and two world wars, that
present us now with our long-range problems.
It is mainly our unwillingness to stand still, to
accept the status of a “mature economy,” that
challenges the adequacy of our resources.
Source: President’s Materials Policy Commission,
Resources for Freedom, Vol. 1: Foundations for Growth
and Security (Washington, D.C.: President’s Material’s
Policy Commission, June 1952), pp. 1, 2, 3, 5.and hence taking them for granted. In the United
States the supplies of the evident, the cheap, and
the accessible (chemically and geologically) are
running out. The plain fact seems to be that we
have skimmed the cream of our resources as we
now understand them; there must not be, at this
decisive point in history, too long a pause before
our understanding catches up with our needs....
Growth of demand is at the core of the
materials problem we face; it is the probability
Document 90: Samuel H. Ordway, Jr., on Limits to Growth (1953)
Samuel Ordway, a lawyer and proactive member of the boards of several conservation organizations, including
the Conservation Foundation, the Natural Resources Council of America, and the American Conservation
Association, was one of the first environmental analysts to discuss limits to industrial growth. In the 1970s,
Ordway’s ideas on growth limitation were expanded on by a number of economists such as Donella Meadows,
who asserted that, if civilization is to survive, limits must be placed on industrial investment as well as population
growth.^5 By the 1980s the concept of limits to industrial growth had become part of the basic philosophy of
such radical environmentalists as Mark Sagoff [see Document 125] and Arne Naess [see Document 129].The end of expansion, if unexpected and
involuntary, would mean the reversal of a major
facet of our faith; it would impose a forced revi-
sion of ideology; it would mean mass discour-
agement and unemployment—it could mean
revolution and dictatorship. It would not mean a
return to pioneering—for there is no new land to
pioneer. It would not mean a return from the city
to the farm. There are too many people, trained
in too many white and blue collar skills, to sup-
port themselves in the future by farming indi-
vidually our remaining productive land. It might
even force displaced segments of the American
people to set to work clearing needed land of
unused factories, roads, and airports and con-
centrate all our resources on restoring that land
to productivity. It is difficult to believe that any
such adjustment would be possible without con-
scription, work relief, and substantial loss of
freedom and independence.
The industrial pattern of today has brought
us health, wealth and leisure in unprecedented
degree. It has made us reliant on machines and
government—less reliant on ourselves. Success
has led us to believe that the earth is a cornu-
copia, and the machine a god. It has led us to a
false faith in man’s omnipotence.
Malthus [see Document 26], were he liv-
ing today, would have to modify his contention
that it is [the] increasing number of mouths to
feed that will exhaust the earth’s food supplies
and cause ultimate misery. He would probably
say now, in the light of experience, that if the
total of popular and industrial consumption
of the produce of the earth exceeds reproduc-
tion over a long enough period, misery will be
inevitable.
Our problem today is to be sure that in the
long run we limit consumption to continuing
supply. This can be done on a voluntary basis if
we begin soon enough to distinguish needs from
wants. Indeed, consumption can well continue
to increase as the margin of supply increases. It
is fundamental, however, that the continued bet-
terment of man’s level of living will depend on
adjusting supply and demand. That is the new