By Leopold P. Mureithi When Sir Thomas More’s wrote his book – Utopia –in 1516, he described an imaginary land where life was perfect.[i]Other authors have depicted a dystopian imagery of society. Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World,[ii] written in 1931 describes a dictator’s pharmacological people control and manipulative tool named Soma. George Orwell’s book 1984[iii] (published in 1949) depicts a Big Brother “seeing” everyone anywhere all the time;no privacy these two are examples of scenarios depicting the use of technology to control and manipulate people. Another nightmarish scenario is where technology (machines) is portrayed as a dangerous competitor by Samuel…
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Sohail Inayatullah This blog is based on the book by Sohail Inayatullah and Lu Na, “Asia 2038: Ten Disruptions that Change Everything”, Tamsui, Graduate Institute of Futures Studies, Tamkang University, 2018. DISRUPTIONS ASIA 2038 My own view of Asia is very much informed by the “great rise,” watching the region – particularly, East, South and South East Asia – move from poverty to economic wealth (uneven as it is); from passive recipients of knowledge to the possibility of active creators of reality, and from being past-based to possibly futures-oriented. I see potential in Asia going from strength to strength, and…
By Peter van der Wel New developments in medical science can keep us alive longer and longer. However, should we want to live longer? Perhaps it is necessary to draw a line somewhere in the (near?) future. A fixed maximum lifespan. Imagine we, as a society, determined the moment of death for everyone at 250 years old (for example). That could be accomplished, for instance, by a genetic modification of our genes. This may seem like an absurd idea now, but there are several good reasons for thinking this through. Why do we (at least most of us) have to…
By Dr. Sarah Bell The water-energy-food nexus has become a key concern for governments and researchers confronting future constraints on resources and the environment. Whilst forecasts of future scarcity of energy resources, water resources and food have a long legacy, in the last decade the interactions between resource futures have become apparent, adding complexity to already considerable challenges. The ‘nexus’ reflects inter-dependencies between major resource consuming infrastructures. Water is required to grow food, cool thermal power stations and drive turbines for hydro-power stations. Energy is needed to pump and treat water, and to distribute food from field to market. As…
By Umar Sheraz Dr. Sohail Inayatullah holds the UNESCO Chair in Futures Studies at the Islamic Science University of Malaysia (USIM) and a professor at Tamkang University (Taiwan) and an associate at Melbourne Business School (Australia). He has worked extensively with governments, international corporations, and non-governmental organizations around the globe to re-author their futures. He is co-editor of the Journal of Futures Studies, associate editor of New Renaissance and the author of more than 300 journal articles and books including The Causal Layered Analysis Reader and Globalization and World Systems. He was a presenter at the USIM-COMSATS International workshop on…
By Leif Thomas Olsen. Our democratic systems are failing. Not because they do not work as intended. But because they still work as originally intended. Telling us that democracy equals general elections is nonsense. But it does of course serve our incumbent politicians’ interest. So,it is about time for a new democratic infrastructure. One where elected politicians work for – and report to – the electorate, rather than half the electorate having to wait four years for an opportunity to be at all represented again – the other half simply having to tolerate the fact they did not get what…
By Leopold P. Mureithi On 11th October 2018, an announcement came: The State of the Future 19.0(SOF) won a 2018 Association of Professional Futurists (APF) Most Significant Futures Work (MSFW) award in the “analysis of a significant future issue” category. “This significant future issue” is broken down into fifteen challenges that this review will touch on later. For now, it is important to know that version 19.1 is available, with a note stating that “the difference between this State of the Future 19.1 and version 19.0 is only the addition of info graphics for each of the 15 global challenges.”[1]…
By Kee-Young Yoon General Purpose Technology and Social Change There are a lot of social-change driving forces including science and technological developments. Typography, steam engine, and electricity belong to general purpose technologies(GPTs). GPT is defined as a technology that has deep economic impacts across countries, regions, or globes, and has a lot of applications. The steam engine catalyzed the industrial revolution, which brought about fundamental changes in the political, economic and social sides of human history. It is natural that the assessments on GPTs have been processed after their economic impact. For example, the term “Industrial Revolution” is denominated by…
By Tom Valovic Intense levels of high tech competition and innovation have been with us for decades. Rapid change — with all the complexities and anxieties it creates — now seems to be the new normal. As impressive as the fruits of innovation have been, the pace of change seems relentless and, at times, almost mindlessly linear. It suggests a possible disconnect between the products or services being rolled out to the market and whether a specifically identifiable business or consumer need actually exists in sufficient degree to justify the development and investment of resources involved. In high tech circles,…
By Michael Mogensen “Stay tuned for news about the NEOM Advisory Board: a team of the world’s leading minds and experts, #TeamNEOM combining the best and brightest global experts to develop the future,” tweeted Neom recently. Neom, a planned mega-city, is a privatized semi-state scheduled to be built by Saudi Arabia in the sparsely inhabited northwest of the country, on the Gulf of Aqaba across from Egypt. Earlier in 2017, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman announced the proposed project at an investment conference in Riyadh attended by many of the world’s business elite, hungry for a potential share of…