The US intelligence complex predicts seven trends that will shake the world

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The world is threatened with a big shake-up, which only stable states can withstand. This conclusion can be drawn from the report "Paradoxes of Progress" published by the US National Intelligence Council (NIC) in January this year. It presents an analysis of the main trends that will determine the development of world civilization over the coming decades.

But first, a few words about the National Intelligence Council (NIC). It is a well-known think tank serving the interests of the entire US intelligence complex, which includes 16 independent agencies. Based on the data provided by the US intelligence services, they develop medium-term and long-term forecasts of the development of countries, continents and the whole world.

The purpose of the report "Paradoxes of Progress" is to present the prospects for the development of the world community for the period up to 2035. They are summarized in three scenarios, each representing a different combination of the seven megatrends 'game'. Note that these trends themselves were highlighted after discussion in the expert community (interviews were conducted with 2500 people from 35 countries). But it is unlikely that the intelligence analysts who prepared this report in 2016 assumed that they would be so sure to guess the name. After all, the new US President Donald Trump, like no one else, can claim the role of this very "Paradox of Progress".

One way or another, the main conclusion of the authors of the report: the expected future will be filled with conflicts of various kinds, and the prospects for the survival of civilizations will be determined by the ability to identify and resolve these conflicts. The seven megatrends identified will become the generator of future conflicts.

We presented them in a diagram (dividing it into two parts for ease of perception) and included the main components of the mentioned trends. The result is a map of "major world problems" shaping the world's future.

The first part of the diagram

The second part of the diagram

And now more about the megatrends themselves.

I. The rich get old, the poor don't

The fastest growing population group in the world is people over 60 years old. Society needs to learn how to return older people to work in order to compensate for the loss of the working category. The leaders in terms of the rate of “loss” of the working population will be Europe and China

The young population will grow rapidly in the so-called “chronically young countries”, which are often the poorest and most unable to create normal conditions for work and vocational education

A separate problem is integration into the cohort of working women

The growth of urban civilization. Two thirds of the world's population will live in cities by 2050. This will require a radical revision of the principles and level of social services in accordance with new needs

II. "Displacement" of the centers of the world economy. Unexpected reality

The decline in the labor force and labor productivity in large countries will occur against the background of high debt burden, weakening demand and public doubts about the positive outcome of globalization

Between 1989 and 2008, as a result of globalization, there was a decrease in the relative size of two social groups - the poorest (in China and Asia as a whole) and the middle class - in developed countries. This will definitely affect the future

China is trying to shift its economy from an investment-driven, export-driven model to a consumption-driven one

Slowing growth threatens the rate of poverty reduction in the developing world

III. Technological acceleration. Deepening the abyss

Technology accelerates progress, but it also widens the gap between winners and laggards

The accelerated development of robotization and artificial intelligence threatens too rapid changes for the economy, as a result of which the traditional mechanism for the development of poor countries along the path of industrialization will be closed

A breakthrough in biotechnology (primarily in the ability to edit the genome) will revolutionize medicine, but at the same time will sharpen many moral problems

IY. Governance is getting more complicated. Demand rises, supply shrinks

The growing complexity of management is driven by several factors

First of all, the demands of voters are growing, which demand economic prosperity and national security at the same time

But the possibilities of the government itself are diminishing - due to stagnating state revenues, a growing atmosphere of mistrust and a polarization of the social structure

As a result, the growing number of challenges for the government with a fixed or decreasing set of resources leads to a decrease in its effectiveness

The pressure on the state and partial replacement of its functions from NGOs, corporations and simply influential people is growing. Both due to the number of such players and due to the increase in their political weight

This weight is enhanced by technological capabilities, which provide a kind of political leverage for such influence

Y. Ideological and identical bundle. "Highlight and Conquer"

Nationalism as a form of populism will be used as a tool to consolidate society. It is especially active in China, Russia and Turkey and other states, where leaders will strive to establish complete control over domestic politics

Any internal alternatives to such regimes will be destroyed, and the system of international relations will be presented as a threat to the internal world order

According to a similar scenario of supporting an exclusive identity, only in a religious form, countries in the Middle East and North Africa will develop

Religious identity will remain the main social bond of people. Its role will even increase as a result of an increase in the birth rate in regions where religion plays a large role

In Russia, national and religious identities will unite for greater control

Research carried out by Pew Research in the United States shows that the "factor of religiosity" itself, which characterizes the degree of religiosity of a person, is capable of more accurately predicting voter behavior than affiliation with a particular religion. This means that politicians will seek to use this leverage to mobilize their constituencies

YI. Changing the nature of the conflict. New war of a new generation

The likelihood of the emergence and escalation of various kinds of conflicts (including interstate ones) is increasing. This is due to the complex relationships between large states, terrorist threats and new technologies

New strategies, technologies, and the geopolitical context are changing the nature of the conflict and the types of weapons used in it

Future conflicts will focus on the destruction of infrastructure, social networks, and government functions

The goals of future conflicts may include the achievement of psychological and geopolitical benefits

Opportunities to wage war "from afar" have expanded and allow remote attacks not only to states, but to small groups

The emergence of new advanced technologies (especially in the biosphere) significantly lowers the threshold for opportunities for their acquisition

The massive spread of "gray conflict zones" in which there is no clear border between peace and war

YII. Climate Change, Healthcare, Era of Ecological Scarcity

Public requests for stricter environmental regulations will need to be approved internationally

"Environmental awakening" of the population of developing countries and "new" developed (especially China)

Half of the world's population will experience a water shortage in 2035

Strengthening global connections will lead to an increase in infectious diseases, which are difficult to quickly detect and eliminate foci

Age-related diseases and diseases related to lifestyle and nutrition will dominate

All of these trends listed above are of interest from the point of view of a common understanding of world problems. But we decided not to limit ourselves to a general story about these problems, but to formulate (in “global” coordinates) the main prospects of Kazakhstan. The project “Megatrends. Kazakhstan - so to speak, an agenda for the future leadership of the country. About this in our next article.

Below are a few more illustrations from the report. Interesting numbers.