UFPPC (www.ufppc.org) Digging Deeper LXIII: December 1, 2008, 7:00 p.m.
Global Trends 2025—A World Transformed (National Intelligence Council,
November 2008).
The 2025 Global Landscape.
Relatively, U.S. power is declining.
Technology will “be key to outcomes.”
“Key uncertainties” include global
“energy transition,” climate change, Iran-
driven arms race, stability in the Middle
East, European and Japanese economic
and social development, and the future
of multilateral institutions (iv-v).
Executive Summary. A multipolar
world is emerging; such processes tend
to be unstable (vi). Power is shifting in a
discontinuous, shock-filled way from
West to East as BRICs use state
capitalism to develop, most population
growth is non-Western, resource issues
trump ideology, and a more complex
international system emerges in which
the U.S. is “less dominant” and there is
“overall potential for greater conflict”;
four “fictionalized scenarios” are
imagined (vi-xiii).
Introduction: A Transformed World.
Reprise of above. Global Trends 2020 did
not assume a multipolar future and
energy scarcity; Global Trends 2025 does
(2). Leadership, economic volatility, and
geopolitical rivalries are fertile sources of
unpredictable discontinuities (5).
Ch. 1: The Globalizing Economy.
China and India are restoring the relative
position in the world that they held two
centuries ago (7-8). A larger global
middle class is developing, but in 2025
65% of the population will still be poor,
and in relative terms this poverty will
increase (8). Developing nations are
adopting a state capitalist model (8-12).
The U.S. still has a “stronger innovation
system” than China or India (13). China
is more likely to democratize than Russia
(14). Latin America will “continue to play
a marginal role” (15). Women will play a
greater role in Asia and Latin America,
with geopolitical effects (16-17).
Secondary and higher education
constitute a “key determinant of
countries’ economic performance and
potential” (17).
Ch. 2: The Demographics of Discord.
World population will grow to 8bn, with
most growth in India and China, but the
rate of growth will slow (19). Aging
populations will lead to higher
percentages of minorities in Western
Europe, heightening social tensions (21).
Latin America, the Middle East, and
northern South Asia will have “persistent
youth bulges” (21-22). Migration will
strain identity (23-24). Population growth
of Muslims in Western Europe will
increase attention to them (25). Russia’s
population will drop to 130m (24-25).
China will grow to 1.4bn (25-26). India
will see high growth in the north and low
growth in the south (26). Iran will grow
to about 77m, and its demographics will
change dramatically as its youth bulge
dissipates (26).
Ch. 3: The New Players. Relatively,
other powers will be more important in
2025 (29). China will rise to be the
number-two power, but it may not be
politically stable (29-30). India will
become more powerful, but could
become more “fragmented and fractious”
(30-31). Russia will face great difficulties
in remaining as powerful as it is at
present (31-32). Europe is unlikely to be
able to translate “economic clout into
global influence” (32-33). Japan, caught
between the U.S. and China, faces an
uncertain future but there will probably
be rapprochement with China (33-35).
Brazil is well placed for regional
leadership (35). Indonesia, Turkey, and
“a post-clerically run Iran” are likely to be
rising powers (35-36). Scenario I: the
West is supplanted as the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization becomes more
important than NATO (37-39).

Ch. 4: Scarcity in the Midst of
Plenty? Technological developments will
be a key factor in determining how well
the world adapts to “growing resource
constraints” (41). 2025 will see the
world “in the midst of a fundamental
energy transition” which is likely to be
very difficult (41-45). High or low energy
prices will determine different
geopolitical scenarios (45-46, 51). A two-
page chart of “technology breakthroughs
by 2025” identifies ubiquitous
computing, clean water technologies,
energy storage technologies,
biogerontechnology, clean coal
technologies, human strength
augmentation technologies, biofuels
technology, service robotics, and human
cognitive augmentation technologies as
“game-changers” (47, 49). Thirty-six
countries with 1.4bn people will be short
of food and water, stimulating “climate
migration” (51-54). Chart of global water
scarcity (55). Sub-Saharan Africa the
globe’s “most vulnerable region” (56).
Scenario II: Sudden climate deterioration
forces evacuation of Manhattan (57-59)
Ch. 5: Growing Potential for Conflict.
Increased potential for conflict, especially
in “the greater Middle East,” where there
is risk of a nuclear arms race stimulated
by Iran; conflicts will also be driven by
competition for resources (61-63). The
Muslim world may develop in two “tiers,”
“liberal” and not (64-65). Naval
competition will be spurred by concern
about energy supplies (66). Climate
change could lead to “low-level” conflicts
(66, 68). Use of nuclear weapons
remains “very unlikely” (67-68).
Terrorism “unlikely to disappear,” but
David C. Rapoport’s “wave of terror
concept” predicts al-Qa’ida will recede
(68-70). Conflict will be more IT,
“irregular,” and mediatized (71). Power
and authority in Afghanistan, Pakistan,
and Iraq will still be contested (72-74).
Ideology will decline in importance (73).
A global pandemic could kill hundreds of
millions (75). Global Scenario III:
Conflict between China and India (76-78).
Ch. 6: Will the International System
Be Up to the Challenges? The power
of states will decline relatively, and that
of “businesses, tribes, religious
organizations, and even criminal
networks” will grow, which may produce
a “patchwork” of shifting coalitions and
greater “regionalism” (81-84). But most
observers do not expect rising powers to
challenge the international system (84).
Networks around issues will develop,
including religion-based networks (84-
87). There will be backsliding and doubts
about democracy (87). Organized crime
threatens to establish a ‘shadow’
international system (88). Scenario IV:
Cooperation through networks of NGOs
“bubble’s up from the grassroots” (89-
90).
Ch. 7: Power-Sharing in a Multipolar
World. The U.S. will still be strongest,
but will be much more constrained (93-
94). The dollar will lose much of its
status as global reserve currency (94,
97). Anti-Americanism may wane (95-
96). U.S. military superiority will be
“more limited” (97). The future holds
more contingencies than certainties (98).
“Leadership will be key . . . human
actions are likely to be the crucial
determinant of outcomes” (98-99).
[About the anonymous authors. C. Thomas
Fingar has been deputy director of national
intelligence for analysis and chairman of the
National Intelligence Council since May 2005.
He was formerly assistant secretary of state
(2004-2005) and has worked for the State
Dept. since 1986. He signed the untitled two-
page preface, describing how the report was
produced. Fingar has a 1968 B.A. in
Government and History from Cornell and a
1969 M.A. and a 1977 Ph.D. from Stanford. He
is an authority on Chinese policymaking and is
also fluent in German. A YouTube video can be
seen at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNYmxpi1W
ew. He attributes a leading role in producing
Global Trends 2025 to Mathew “Mat” Burrows.
According to Fingar, the NIC used the Internet
to share drafts with participants around the
world to make this fourth Global Trends report
the most collaborative of the series, drawing on
the thinking of hundreds of people. The NIC’s
describes its mission as providing midterm and
long-term strategic thinking. The NIC reports
to the director of national intelligence
(currently John McConnell), responds to
questions from policymakers, and acts as a
bridge to academia and the private sector. It
aspires to produce analytical judgments that
are independent of current U.S. policy. Among
those collaborating in producing Global Trends
2025 were SRI International (originally founded
by Stanford University in 1946 as the Stanford
Research Institute but since 1977 a fully
independent non-profit) and PFC Energy (a
global consulting firm), as well as members of
many of the think tanks that have proliferated
since Lewis F. Powell Jr. laid to the leaders of
the U.S. Chamber of Commerce a strategy to
change the public’s thinking about the role of
corporations in society by influencing
education and the media in ways favorable to
business. Others among those involved in
producing Global Trends 2025: the Evian
Group, Global Business Network, the Brookings
Institution, the Wilson Center, the American
Enterprise Institute, China Institutes of
Contemporary International Relations, the
Stockholm International Peace Research
Institute, and Toffler Associates.]
[Critical notes. The domination of global
society by a capitalist economy run by
multinational corporations is the unstated
assumption that underlies this analysis. It was,
in fact, produced in large part by such
corporations and their representatives. The
concern with corporate profits is disguised, but
comes out in the frequency of the use of
“finance” and its cognates (63 times). The
term “human rights, on the other hand, is
mentioned only once, in the context of Turkish
entry to the E.U. Iran appears again and again
as a sort of bête noire in the document; “Iran”
or its cognates appear 84 times. The rise of
China is a chief preoccupation (“China”
appears 190 times, “Chinese” 43 times).
“Militarism,” “materialism,” and
“neoliberalism” go unmentioned. The word
“ecological” never appears, although most
biologists view the present era as part of what
is possibly the fastest mass extinction event
ever, which may cause the extinction of one-
half of all species in the next 100 years. — Cf.
Blaise Pascal (1623-1662): “Human life is thus
only a perpetual illusion; men deceive and
flatter each other. . . . Human society is
founded on mutual deceit . . . Man is, then,
only disguise, falsehood, and hypocrisy, both in
himself and in regard to others. He does not
wish anyone to tell him the truth; he avoids
telling it to others, and all these dispositions,
so removed from justice and reason, have a
natural root in his heart.” (Pascal, Pensées [first
published posthumously in 1670], translated by
W.F. Trotter. Original: “Ainsi la vie humaine
n’est qu’une illusion perpétuelle ; on ne fait
que s’entre-tromper et s’entre-flatter. . . .
L’union qui est entre les hommes n’est fondée
que sur cette mutuelle tromperie . . . L’homme
n’est donc que déguisement, que mensonge et
hypocrisie, et en soi-même et à l’égard des
autres. Il ne veut donc pas qu’on lui dise la
vérité. Il évite de la dire aux autres ; et toutes
ces dispositions, si éloignées de la justice et de
la raison, ont une racine naturelle dans son
coeur” (Pascal, Pensées, §100 [Brunschvicg], in
Oeuvres completes, ed. Lafuma [Paris: Seuil,
1963], p. 637). ]