Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World - Globalizing Economy, Demographics of Discord, New Players, Scarcity in the Midst of Plenty, Potential for Conflict, Power-Sharing in a Multipolar World

Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World was prepared by the National Intelligence Council to stimulate strategic thinking about the future by identifying key trends, the factors that drive them, where they seem to be headed, and how they might interact. It uses fictionalized scenarios to illustrate some of the many ways in which the drivers examined in the study (e.g., globalization, demography, the rise of new powers, the decay of international institutions, climate change, and the geopolitics of energy) may interact to generate challenges and opportunities for future decisionmakers. The study as a whole is more a description of the factors likely to shape events than a prediction of what will actually happen.

By examining a small number of variables that we judge probably will have a disproportionate influence on future events and possibilities, the study seeks to help readers to recognize signposts indicating where events are headed and to identify opportunities for policy intervention to change or lock in the trajectories of specific developments. Among the messages we hope to convey are: "If you like where events seem to be headed, you may want to take timely action to preserve their positive trajectory. If you do not like where they appear to be going, you will have to develop and implement policies to change their trajectory." For example, the report's examination of the transition out of dependence on fossil fuels illustrates how different trajectories will entail different consequences for specific countries. An even more important message is that leadership matters, no trends are immutable, and that timely and well-informed intervention can decrease the likelihood and severity of negative developments and increase the likelihood of positive ones. Global Trends 2025 is the fourth installment in the National Intelligence Council-led effort to identify key drivers and developments likely to shape world events a decade or more in the future.

Contents * More Change than Continuity * Alternative Futures * Chapter 1: The Globalizing Economy * Back to the Future * Growing Middle Class * State Capitalism: A Post-Democratic Marketplace Rising in the East? * Bumpy Ride in Correcting Current Global Imbalances * Multiple Financial Nodes * Diverging Development Models, but for How Long? * Chapter 2: The Demographics of Discord * Populations Growing, Declining, and Diversifying—at the Same Time * The Pensioner Boom: Challenges of Aging Populations * Persistent Youth Bulges * Changing Places: Migration, Urbanization, and Ethnic Shifts * Demographic Portraits: Russia, China, India, and Iran * Chapter 3: The New Players * Rising Heavyweights: China and India * Other Key Players * Up-and-Coming Powers * Global Scenario I: A World Without the West * Chapter 4: Scarcity in the Midst of Plenty? * The Dawning of a Post-Petroleum Age? * The Geopolitics of Energy * Water, Food, and Climate Change * Global Scenario II: October Surprise * Chapter 5: Growing Potential for Conflict * A Shrinking Arc of Instability by 2025? * Growing Risk of a Nuclear Arms Race in the Middle East * New Conflicts Over Resources? * Terrorism: Good and Bad News * Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq: Local Trajectories and Outside Interests * Global Scenario III: BRICs' Bust-Up * Chapter 6: Will the International System Be Up to the Challenges? * Multipolarity without Multilateralism * How Many International Systems? * A World of Networks * Global Scenario IV: Politics is Not Always Local * Chapter 7: Power-Sharing in a Multipolar World * Demand for US Leadership Likely to Remain Strong, Capacities Will Shrink * New Relationships and Recalibrated Old Partnerships * Less Financial Margin of Error * More Limited Military Superiority * Leadership Will Be Key