No Limits to Learning: Bridging the Human Gap.
A Report To The Club Of Rome by James W. Botkin, Mahdi Elmandjra, and Mircea Malitza, 1998
Foreword (by Aurelio Peccei, 1979)
The purpose of this project is to bring to the forefront two intertwined questions which are fundamental for the survival and development of humankind.
One is whether what we call progress is perhaps so hectic and hap hazard that world populations are utterly confused and out of step with the waves of change it causes for better or for worse. The idea implicit in this question is that, though highly advanced in other ways, modern men and women are as yet unable to grasp fully the meaning and consequences of what they are doing. Failing to understand the mutations they bring about in the natural environment and their own condition,
they come to be increasingly at odds with the real world. This is the human gap–already large and dangerous, and yet destined almost inevitably to get much wider.
The second question, then, is whether present trends can be controlled and the gap bridged before a tragic and grotesque fate overtakes Homo sapiens. To give a positive answer to this question, one must assume that the human being possesses still untapped resources of vision and creativity as well as moral energies which can be mobilized to bail humankind out of its predicament. This may indeed seem a far fetched assumption, but many of us consider it perfectly valid. The average person, even when living in deprivation and obscurity, is endowed with an innate brain capacity, and hence a learning ability,
which can be stimulated and enhanced far beyond the current relatively modest levels.
The plain truth these considerations imply is that any solutions to the human gap, as well as any guarantees for the human future, can be sought nowhere else but within ourselves. What is needed is for all of us to learn how to stir up our dormant potential and use it from now on purposefully and intelligently.
These or similar questions are by no means new. They certainly intrigued our forebearers in their simpler times. Nowadays, however, they have become vitally important because of the extraordinary challenges deriving from the thrust and peculiar nature acquired by the current version of progress. Conceived as the acme of human enterprise, progress has the mission of procuring ever more information and know ledge and ever more goods and equipment for the Earth’s growing billions, so that they may have material wealth and power with which to tame Nature and to better their existence. Every human group has interpreted this as a mandate to seek as much of this progress as it can for its own good, not disdaining to outdo other human groups in the process.
For quite a while, humanity thought that in this way it had discovered an optimal pattern of steady, self-propelling development. We were all proud of a civilization highlighted by unprecedented scientific achievement, wonderful technology, and a flood of mass-production which brought in their stride higher standards of life, the conquest of disease, undreamed-of travel opportunities, and instant audiovisual communications.
[However,] it eventually began to dawn on us that by the indiscriminate adoption of this pattern we were all too often paying exorbitant social or ecological costs for improvements obtained, and were even induced to neglect the virtues and values which are the foundations of a healthy society and at the same time the very salt for the quality of life. Then came the creeping doubt that for all its greatness humanity lacked wisdom.
Subsequently, in the matter of a decade or so, the causes for alarm multiplied. Symptoms revealing a precarious state of affairs began to emerge everywhere. What The Club of Rome termed the world problematique was hatching. Tangles of mutually reinforcing old and new problems, too complex to be apprehended by the current analytical methods and too tough to be attacked by traditional policies and strategies, were clustering together, heedless of boundaries and plaguing all
nations, whether developed or developing, and whatever their political regime and societal structure. In overall terms, while apparently still advancing, humankind is now actually losing ground, and is going through a phase of cultural, spiritual, and ethical, if not also existential, decline—thus turning the gap into a chasm.
Although well-nigh impossible to draw a map of this complicated web of problems or to perceive the most virulent knots, even ordinary people feel just how formidable the threat is becoming. They realize that increasing world disorder and real or feared scarcities of natural resources exacerbate political tensions and trigger military build-ups of dementia1 proportions, stifling peaceful development; that in a polity where might is right the myth of national sovereignty but aggravates the inequalities among states, while social injustice coupled with inefficient, often corrupt institutions breeds civil violence, which readily expands internationally; that polluted and impoverished environments, besides vitiating our life, also drag the economy downwards at a time when recession and inflation already conflow into stagflation, spawning unemployment, frustration, and still more tension and disorder and so on and so forth.
There is a desperate need to break these vicious circles and set humanity on the ascent again. An entirely new enterprise is thus required, comparable to, but of a higher order than, that which set the world on the road to progress. Focusing on people themselves, this new enterprise must, in fact, as explained, aim at developing their latent, innermost capability of understanding and learning, so that the march of events can eventually be brought under control.
The immensity of the task does not need to be stressed. It should not deter us either. For one thing, there really is no other way of turning the global situation around than by improving human quality and preparedness–and this is therefore what we must do. For another thing, people throughout the world, particularly the young, fortunately begin to perceive that something of this nature has become indispensable—and this should give us enough courage not to waver.
For these reasons, this learning project is timely and, if successful, can become a milestone. The Club of Rome opened a cycle in 1972 with a provocative presentation of the outer limits which narrow our possibilities of material growth on a finite planet. It now closes it with this argumentation about the free inner margins which on the contrary exist within ourselves and are pregnant with the potency of unparalleled developments. The immediate objective is to involve as large a segment
as possible of public opinion in reflections and debates on the extreme alternatives looming up and how by improving our individual and collective capacity for judgment and choice we can steer the human course towards favourable futures. The recognition, finally, of how much depends on us will rekindle faith in the human spirit and provide fresh inducements to renew our thoughts and actions to keep this spirit perennially alive. Should the older generations lag in this renaissance movement, no doubt the younger ones will lead it.
Formulation of the project was entrusted to three teams and a number of consultants representing different cultural areas and a variety of disciplines, convictions, and backgrounds. The authors of this report did a good job, for it was no easy undertaking to blend together the vast gamut of approaches and opinions that were offered—this in it self being an experiment in learning, I am sure that all those who have been connected with this exercise will again learn much and be further motivated, by the criticism and suggestions that these pages are no doubt going to draw from many quarters.
If I may conclude with a micro-riddle within the macro-riddle, I will just add that what we all need at this point in human evolution is to learn what it takes to learn what we should learn—and learn it.
[Following this are the ~180 pages of the book. Immediately below is the Epilogue. Ed.]
Epilogue
If one were to extrapolate the current trends—for instance, in the demand for energy, in various economic and trade relations, in the arms race, and in many other conflicts—a gloomy picture emerges for the period to the year 2000 and beyond. [However,] ours is not the first generation to live through a time of great changes and dramatic challenges. Our continued survival is testimony that humanity indeed learns. It has successfully threaded its way in and out of disasters, which many look upon as a natural means of acquiring wisdom. [However,] with a dense, highly interconnected population, and possessing a tremendous power for destruction, we are confronted now with the possibility of catastrophic error with unimaginable consequences. Lessons might be created by disaster, but no one might remain to make use of them or the world may be so harmed that the damage is irreparable. So, we have to re consider what is meant by the statement “humanity learns.” Does the statement no imply—indeed demand—that learning occur at the right time and on a scale sufficiently large not only to avoid disasters but also to conclude a century, so much traumatized by successive follies, with a gain in peace, dignity, and happiness? Is it beyond our reach to create and choose a way that minimizes suffering?
There are many positive trends visible on the horizon. Governments now meet not only to discuss the classical politics of peace and war, but also to search for solutions to global issues which, until only yester day, were considered isolated domestic issues but which today are tying us to a common destiny. Great debates are being conducted under the auspices of institutions originally created after World War II to oversee international security. [However,] who would have foreseen that these same institutions would turn their attention, for example, to an international Year of the Child and that, regardless of differing convictions and creeds, many people would be drawn to examine the destiny of the coming generations?
The new complexities have increased the role of experts, of scientific expertise, and of specialized research studies. These are all indeed necessary, but rapidly dissipating is the myth of the expert who can solve problems more social than technological through technical fixes. Ours is becoming an era of participation. At present, our era is still in the transition phase in which participation lacks adequate understanding and supporting institutions. In the making is a true constituency whose subject is the human impact of global issues and whose experiences and gatherings are workshops for new ideas. Yet debates alone do not solve issues. The key demand is for action. Seldom has the human problematique offered so many opportunities for bold and generous initiatives. This vision is compatible with the perspective offered by innovative learning, which goes beyond the means inherent in simple analysis and decision or in conventional technologies and organizations. It draws its resources from wide participation and from looking to the future.
A new decade of development is being launched by the United Nations. It must [consider] the lessons of the two preceding decades of development which saw an overemphasis on economic expertise. What could be more challenging than for all people to join the renewed efforts aimed at narrowing the gaps which divide humanity, focusing our energies towards a peaceful, profoundly human, enterprise?
If we consider development as a process of learning, many assumptions long taken for granted fade away. For instance, the issue of development is global. It cannot, as conceived in the past, concern only a part of humanity. All countries have a stake in development, from which ever perspective it may be seen. It would be a gross error if a privileged minority, preoccupied with its own concerns, were to look with in difference on the struggle of others seeking solutions to their acute problems—as if the concerns of part of the world are not related to the problems of others.
The innovative learning perspective does not focus on a pattern so familiar to managers of local or larger organizations, of fixing objectives, marshalling resources, and initiating methods of implementation. In the context of innovative learning; objectives, resources, and methods are all subject to change. The manner in which they are linked may be more important than their operation. The human factor is more central and predominant than the problem to be solved. The development and unfolding of human potential is what ultimately determines the success or failure of economic, social, or any other kind of development.
A good strategy for formulating and evaluating action in the coming decades should center on how many obstacles impeding participation have been removed, and how many alternative options have been opened up by an anticipatory approach. The prevailing criteria based on short term economic success seem increasingly to be leading to triumphs quickly followed by new and irremedial difficulties. No process can be judged successful when it leads to solutions that induce further and more severe problems.
Recent currents of thought have provided clear indications that development should foster self-reliance, meet basic human needs, and promote harmony with nature, and we would add—ensure human development. A wide international context of global cooperation based on humanistic values is essential for this type of development.
A report such as this one on learning must be open-ended. Had it proposed any fixed formulas, it would have been self-defeating. Instead, the publication of this report is intended to be an invitation to reflect on some basic assumptions and concepts, and to stimulate discussion and debate among concerned people everywhere about learning and humanity’s future.
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