The ‘futures’ debate in the United Nations

In recent years the future of mankind has become the object of intense and lively controversy which has led to the construction of a number of ‘scenarios of the unacceptable’ and the proposition of various strategies for avoiding them. Of all the reports produced, Limits to Growth has had the widest circulation, notably contributing to the consolidation of the ‘futures movement’ by its dramatic emphasis on the perils threatening the ‘carrying capacity of the planet’. But the United Nations too has had different scenarios and strategies of its own, which it has put forward in such resolutions as those on the International Development Strategy and the New International Economic Order, directed towards the creation of a better society.