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Global Trends 2015: Dialogue About the Future With Nongovernment Experts (2000)

20 points by interestica 6y ago

interestica 6y ago
Also of interest: a Global Trends report released in 2017 https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/nic/GT-Full-Report.pdf https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/nic/GT-Full-Report.pdf
- akclr786 6y ago
  https://www.dni.gov/index.php/who-we-are/organizations/mission-integration/nic/nic-related-menus/nic-related-content/global-trends https://www.dni.gov/index.php/who-we-are/organizations/missi...
- patagurbon 6y ago
  One of the first sentences of that report mentions an increasing difficulty in maintaining shared understanding of world events. I wonder, what are we to do?
cm2187 6y ago
The problem with a public document like that is that it has to be fairly diplomatic (it is not the role of the CIA to create undesired diplomatic tensions), so not sure how much of an honest forecast it is.
- remarkEon 6y ago
  Are ... are you familiar with the history of CIA?
  - snypher 6y ago
    >public document like that
  - 47ryddheu 6y ago
    It's not really creating tension if you already don't get along.
whatshisface 6y ago
>Beijing's capacity to control or shape the content of information, however, is likely to be sharply reduced. If only. :) This report dates from the era when then "Washington Position" was that economic development in China would somehow change the CCP's political ideology. Of course that never made sense, even in America, the political ideology predated the economic modernization.
jnurmine 6y ago
Speaking of global trends. The famous Limits to Growth report was published in 1972. In 2008, Graham Turner wrote "A Comparison of The Limits to Growth with 30 Years of Reality" where he compared 30 years of historical data to The Limits to Growth, he found the data to match the "business as usual" scenario. Then, in 2012, Turner did another take using 40 years of data. Again, the data matched the "business as usual" scenario. The point here is that The Limits to Growth "business as usual" scenario predicts a collapse of the global system by the mid 21st century, with first signs appearing somewhere between 2015 and 2030. This Global Trends report, like many other future-probing reports, do not seem to place much emphasis to the megatrends explored in The Limits to Growth. I find it strange, since resource depletion, environmental/climate problems and sudden population drops certainly would have a massive impact on everything and completely perturb e.g. the geopolitical landscape. Of course the "business as usual" isn't going to end up exactly as described. But, since according to Turner, the data in 2012 was more or less tracking the "business as usual", factoring it in might perhaps make for more robust predictions.
- 47ryddheu 6y ago
  The only place facing a massive population drop in the future is China and for all the bluster none of the big dogs are particularly threatened by environmental/climate change (if anything they'd save money by focusing on mitigating it's effects locally rather than globally). Even resource depletion is only really a problem for nations of little consequence. So it doesn't seem very obvious that any of the things you're discussing are actually on track to cause the sorts of disruption Rudy your describing.

20 points by interestica 6y ago

Also of interest: a Global Trends report released in 2017 https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/nic/GT-Full-Report.pdf https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/nic/GT-Full-Report.pdf

akclr786 6y ago
https://www.dni.gov/index.php/who-we-are/organizations/mission-integration/nic/nic-related-menus/nic-related-content/global-trends https://www.dni.gov/index.php/who-we-are/organizations/missi...
patagurbon 6y ago
One of the first sentences of that report mentions an increasing difficulty in maintaining shared understanding of world events. I wonder, what are we to do?

cm2187 6y ago

The problem with a public document like that is that it has to be fairly diplomatic (it is not the role of the CIA to create undesired diplomatic tensions), so not sure how much of an honest forecast it is.

remarkEon 6y ago
Are ... are you familiar with the history of CIA?
- snypher 6y ago
  >public document like that
- 47ryddheu 6y ago
  It's not really creating tension if you already don't get along.

whatshisface 6y ago

>Beijing's capacity to control or shape the content of information, however, is likely to be sharply reduced. If only. :) This report dates from the era when then "Washington Position" was that economic development in China would somehow change the CCP's political ideology. Of course that never made sense, even in America, the political ideology predated the economic modernization.

jnurmine 6y ago

Speaking of global trends. The famous Limits to Growth report was published in 1972. In 2008, Graham Turner wrote "A Comparison of The Limits to Growth with 30 Years of Reality" where he compared 30 years of historical data to The Limits to Growth, he found the data to match the "business as usual" scenario. Then, in 2012, Turner did another take using 40 years of data. Again, the data matched the "business as usual" scenario. The point here is that The Limits to Growth "business as usual" scenario predicts a collapse of the global system by the mid 21st century, with first signs appearing somewhere between 2015 and 2030. This Global Trends report, like many other future-probing reports, do not seem to place much emphasis to the megatrends explored in The Limits to Growth. I find it strange, since resource depletion, environmental/climate problems and sudden population drops certainly would have a massive impact on everything and completely perturb e.g. the geopolitical landscape. Of course the "business as usual" isn't going to end up exactly as described. But, since according to Turner, the data in 2012 was more or less tracking the "business as usual", factoring it in might perhaps make for more robust predictions.

47ryddheu 6y ago
The only place facing a massive population drop in the future is China and for all the bluster none of the big dogs are particularly threatened by environmental/climate change (if anything they'd save money by focusing on mitigating it's effects locally rather than globally). Even resource depletion is only really a problem for nations of little consequence. So it doesn't seem very obvious that any of the things you're discussing are actually on track to cause the sorts of disruption Rudy your describing.