The Club of Rome was founded in 1968 by Italian industrialist Aurelio Peccei and Scottish scientist Alexander King. It serves as an international think tank on global issues run by an executive committee and president. Central to its formation was Peccei's view that problems like environmental deterioration and poverty are interrelated, not isolated issues. In 1970, this "problematic" vision was outlined in a document that served as the roadmap for the influential 1972 book The Limits to Growth, which used computer modeling to simulate the consequences of population and economic growth within finite resource limits. While initially criticized, subsequent analyses have found the book's forecasts to be accurate.

1. REPORTS OF CLUB OF
ROME-ISSUES
&CHALLENGES
Presentation by Chaitanaya Kusumakar MBA Tech (CE)

2. About the Club of Rome
The Club of Rome was founded in April 1968 by Aurelio Peccei,
an Italian industrialist, and Alexander King, a Scottish scientist.
It was formed when a small international group of people from
the fields of academia, civil society, diplomacy, and industry
met at Villa Farnesina in Rome, hence the name.
The Club of Rome is a non-profit nongovernmental
organization (NGO) that serves as an international think tank
on global issues. The Club of Rome is run by an Executive
Committee of eleven members that appoints a president, vice
presidents, a secretary-general, and a treasurer. The president
of the club represents the organization to the outside world;
HRH Prince El Hassan bin Talal of Jordan became president of
the Club of Rome in 1999.

3. The Problématique
◦ Central to the formation of the club was Peccei's concept of the problematic. It was his opinion
that viewing the problems of humankind—environmental deterioration, poverty, endemic ill-
health, urban blight, criminality—individually, in isolation or as "problems capable of being
solved in their own terms", was doomed to failure. All are interrelated. "It is this generalized
meta-problem (or meta-system of problems) which we have called and shall continue to call the
"problematic" that inheres in our situation."
◦ In 1970, Peccei's vision was laid out in a document written by Hasan Özbekhan, Erich Jantsch,
and Alexander Christakis. Entitled, The Predicament of Mankind; Quest for Structured Responses
to Growing Worldwide Complexities and Uncertainties: A PROPOSAL. The document served as
the roadmap for the LTG (Limits To Growth) project.

4. Strategy: Implementation through
Impact
The Club of Rome impact hubs serve as a creative space where Club of Rome members, associations
and partners share transformational thought leadership and co-design solutions for impact. In addition
the Club of Rome aims to:
◦ Enhance intergenerational thought leadership by fostering greater dialogue and thought
leadership between generations and promoting thought leadership from new young leaders
◦ Provide the space for difficult conversations and conflict resolution
◦ Promote greater gender, ethnic, geographic and age diversity across government and business in
order to enhance the capacity for complex decision making
◦ Continue to promote a culture of deep thinking related to core global tipping points whilst
offering spaces for co-creation of solutions and hope
◦ Translate the Club of Rome’s thought leadership to touch the minds and hearts of leaders and
citizens across the globe through education, knowledge exchange and publications
◦ Develop partnerships between our members, associations and with enlightened leaders from the
business, policy and NGO communities to ensure more impact on the ground

5. The Limits To Growth
◦ LTG is the first report/book and a bestseller published by
the Club of Rome
◦ The Limits to Growth (LTG) is a 1972 report on
the exponential economic and population growth with a
finite supply of resources, studied by computer
simulation. The study used the World3 computer model to
simulate the consequence of interactions between
the earth and human systems. The model was based on
the work of Jay Forrester of MIT, as described in his
book World Dynamics.

6. ◦ Since the 1972 publication of the Club of Rome study Limits
to Growth, the term has come to refer to both population
and economic growth–that is, growth in population and growth
in per capita resource use, the product of which gives the
growth rate of total resource use.
◦ The report concludes that, without substantial changes in
resource consumption, "the most probable result will be a rather
sudden and uncontrollable decline in both population and
industrial capacity". Although its methods and premises were
heavily challenged on its publication, subsequent work to validate
its forecasts continue to confirm that insufficient changes have
been made since 1972 to significantly alter their nature.
◦ Since its publication, some 30 million copies of the book in 30
languages have been purchased. It continues to generate debate
and has been the subject of several subsequent publications.
◦ Beyond the Limits and The Limits to Growth: The 30-Year
Update were published in 1992 and 2004 respectively, and in
2012, a 40-year forecast from Jørgen Randers, one of the book's
original authors, was published as 2052: A Global Forecast for the
Next Forty Years.

7. Criticism
◦ In 1973, a group of researchers at the Science Policy Research Unit at the University of Sussex,
published Thinking about the Future; A Critique of The Limits to Growth, published in the United
States as Models of Doom. The Sussex group examined the structure and assumptions of the
MIT models. They concluded that the simulations were very sensitive to a few key assumptions
and suggest that the MIT assumptions were unduly pessimistic. The Sussex scientists expressed
their opinion that the MIT methodology, data, and projections were faulty and do not accurately
reflect reality. Some of the criticism was however recognized as valid and improving overall
understanding of dynamic models, for example actual issue of "backcasting" the World3 model,
which retrospectively "predicted" a huge drop in industrial production in 1880, which obviously
did not happen. In the Acknowledgements section, the Sussex Group thanked their sponsors,
which included BP, Imperial Chemical Industries and the UKAEA.

8. Positive Reviews
◦ In a 2008 blog post, Ugo Bardi commented that "Although, by the 1990s LTG had become
everyone's laughing stock, among some the LTG ideas are becoming again
popular". Reading LTG for the first time in 2000, Matthew Simmons concluded his views on the
report by saying, "In hindsight, The Club of Rome turned out to be right. We simply wasted 30
important years ignoring this work." Research from the University of Melbourne has found the
book's forecasts are accurate, 40 years on.