Megatrends in Global Interaction
Update: “Megatrends in Global Interaction” is now available. You can order a copy via the Bertelsmann Stiftung.
The futurechallenges.org team has published an extensive analysis on the interconnectedness of global megatrends. The book will soon be available under the title “Megatrends in Global Interaction”. The following text is taken from the foreword of the book.
Thinking about “our global future” is often a recipe for vertigo. Although the individual words are simple, the concept is larger and more complex than we as individuals first realize. This book sets out to help us understand how to shape our global future by examining the intersecting megatrends which will greatly impact our world.
Throughout its history, the Bertelsmann Stiftung has tackled a range of major global issues, albeit most commonly in isolation from one another. This elicited the question: Could we design a project that examines our global future through the dynamic interactions among megatrends rather than by looking at each trend individually? From that simple thought experiment, this multi-year project began as an earnest attempt to create a different prism through which tomorrow’s world could be viewed.
These are the ten megatrends that futurechallenges.org focusses on.
We selected six megatrends for analysis, each chosen through a process of prioritization. We do not portend that these megatrends are the only issues that matter, but we feel that each is particularly important in shaping our global future. One chapter is devoted to each megatrend, and each chapter’s author defines the current state of that megatrend and examines its potential interactions with other megatrends in the future. Thanks to the excellent work of Michael Mandelbaum, who wrote the introduction, and Nigel Holmes, who designed the infographics, we can review and reflect upon the interactions between megatrends from a macro level.
This book would not have been possible without the assistance of our partners. We wish to thank the Rockefeller Foundation for its generous support of the project even before it launched. Their advice has allowed us to think big in terms of the dissemination and distribution of the ideas presented here. We are also grateful to the Searchlight grantees, who have contributed ideas and perspectives from their regions around the world. We must, as this book shows, move beyond thinking locally if we are to co- operate and cohabitate on this planet, and develop a truly comprehensive view of the future.
Special thanks go to our own trans-Atlantic staff. The Future Challenges teams in Germany and Washington, DC, consistently overcame linguistic and time-zone issues. More often than not, they turned their differences into strengths.
This project took the efforts of many to create. We hope it enriches and engages you, and encourages you to think and act in ways that secure a better future.
Hello Cat,
Thanks for your post. It is an excellent question, and sits at the heart of our work on the Megatrends book you are referencing.
The Megatrends in Global Interaction book set out to examine the future of the megatrends in each of the six chapters: at first we looked at them independent of one another, but in the second half of each chapter the focus turns to the interplay among the trends. We were more interested in this interaction between the megatrends: how they affect and are affected by the other trends.
This material was meant to inform our current decision makers – in public policy, government, and academia – and to get them to look creatively at long range future planning. As a foundation we cannot advocate for specific policy applications, but we can hope to positively affect the discourse and the decisions made by our leaders by informing them about the trends. flash points, and upcoming areas of concern that we feel are most important.
It is our hope and our goal that by designing this book on megatrends, we could break down issues which sometimes feel too large and cumbersome for day to day policy applications, and insert informed decision making into the policy arena. Policy makers want information that they can understand, and that they can apply to both their long and short term work. By designing this book to be accessible and tangible, we hope that we can provide this information to them.
Now, as to how we can get them to pay attention to the work, we are still working on that. Through various dissemination and communication methods we are getting this book into the hands of key decision makers with the hope that as it is designed to be accessible, it will not only be read, but it will be found useful.
Dear Cat,
thanks very much for your comment.
We tried to attend in the Wilton Park meeting but had some date related problems. Maybe we will attend next year.
It is great to hear from you and your issues. From our point of view we are standing at an edge towards more long term thinking in politics. But we don´t have solutions yet how to reach this aim. From our point of view the methods of open government could be a starting point. If there are more people who are engaged in political decisions the chance of discover hidden risks is much higher. Open government means higher transparency and accountability so that short term interests has less potential to be implemented in decision making. Maybe this is a proper way of coping with these lack of strategic foresight? For that reason we are a member of the international Open Government Partnership.
I am not sure if horizon scanning is the best way of dealing with these insecurities? If only a small elite works as a kind of watchdog the risks of missing important insights and developments in society is very high.
Our main message in our study is that political and economic decision makers have to deal with growing uncertainty. For that purpose we have to start with painting a picture about global interactions. We don´t have such a picture yet. Nor secret agencies neither the administration have the potential to paint the global picture with horizon scanning.
What do you think?
Thanks for a copy of your Megatrends report – I am getting stuck in. I´d be interested if you looked at how to engage policy and decision-makers with these longer trends. We have been debating this very issue at our School of International Futures week-long event at Wilton Park. How do we incorporate strategic foresight when pressures for crisis management, austerity, simplification, all seem to militate against a strategic viewpoint – all the while making it more necessary?
There was an interest in exploring these issues more deeply. And to develop a community to engage in the craft of strategic foresight. If you´re interested, please do get in touch.
Reuters article on the event here: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/17/us-security-prediction-idUSBRE87G0W720120817