Leaders welcome G20 action plan (BBC)

Has the credit crisis bought about a new world order, is the G8 now dead, long live the G20.

Only time will tell but at least on economic matters the exclusive club has got a little more inclusive.

"There was a common understanding by all of us that we should take pro-growth economic policies. Whatever we do, whatever reforms are recommended, we need to be guided by this simple fact - that the best way to solve the problem is economic growth, and the surest path to this grown is free-market capitalism. "

-President George Bush

A quote which confirms that the world's most capitalist country still believes that economic growth can solve everything. If you believe in sustainable development this was quite a depressing sound bite. Sustainable development suggests another way of growing in harmony with our resources, neighbours and the environment.

What President Bush can not answer is what happens when we can not grow, or to grow costs too much as resources become scarce. This credit crunch may well be the first of many as anything we do today will only put a crash off and it will make it bigger and longer. Regulation can only delay the inevitable, it will not solve the problem, it is not a fix more a sticker plaster. Capitalism has a flaw in that it involves the relentless pursuit of growth.

The future in this case is not ours to see, que sera sera.