It is also important to underscore at the outset the virtually universal recognition that growth is an essential element of the adaptation process – to create the ‘bandwidth’ for new jobs, entrepreneurship and social inclusion. Technocrats have struggled to define this as wise or smart or progressive growth – to emphasise the pivotal importance of sustainability. Some – mostly academic purists – have resurfaced the limits to growth arguments of the 1950s (Meadows 1972). There is no doubt that there still remain many interesting, unanswered questions around carrying capacity of the planet and of specific locations – regional, national and local. These general questions have additional dimensions