Navigating the future can be tricky . . .
The scale of change happening around us can be bewildering, and scary. This book offers clarity, and hope. There is every chance that the world in 2050 will be richer, healthier, more connected, more sustainable, more innovative, better educated, and have less inequality between rich and poor and between men and women.
Enormous challenges lie ahead, from managing climate change to feeding 9 billion people by 2050 and coping with a multitude of new security threats. In its 20 chapters that look at everything from health to wealth and religion to outer space, Megachange confronts these issues in its exploration of the fundamental trends that are shaping the world.
Brimming with (often counter-intuitive) ideas and facts, Megachange provides fascinating insights into what the coming decades will bring.
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Contributors vii
Introduction: meet megachange xi
Daniel Franklin
Part 1 People and relationships 1
1 Not quite destiny 3
John Parker
2 The health of nations 21
Charlotte Howard
3 Women’s world 36
Barbara Beck
4 Friends indeed 51
Martin Giles
5 Cultural revolutions 63
Robert Lane Greene
Part 2 Heaven and earth 77
6 Believe it or not 79
Anthony Gottlieb
7 Feeling the heat 92
Oliver Morton
8 The future of war: the weak become strong 111
Matthew Symonds
9 Freedom’s ragged march 126
Edward Lucas
10 Taming Leviathan: the state of the state 138
Paul Wallace
Part 3 Economy and business 151
11 The age of emerging markets 153
Simon Cox
12 Globalisation, growth and the Asian century 170
Laza Kekic
13 The great levelling 181
Zanny Minton Beddoes
14 Schumpeter Inc 193
Adrian Wooldridge
15 Market momentum 203
Philip Coggan
Part 4 Knowledge and progress 217
16 What (and where) next for science 219
Geoffrey Carr
17 Ad astra 229
Tim Cross
18 The web of knowledge 241
Kenneth Cukier
19 Distance is dead. Long live location 254
Ludwig Siegele
20 Of predictions and progress: more for less 264
Matt Ridley
Acknowledgements 276
Index 277
This anthology’s essays forecast future developments in areas from
social media to religion. Daniel Franklin, executive editor and business
affairs editor of The Economist, and John Andrews, a writer for the
magazine for 30 years, compiled and edited this volume. Since all 20
writers contribute to The Economist, they share a lucid style and a
generally aligned conceptual framework. No one can promise accurate
predictions, but these reporters share deeply informed insights about
forces that will affect the world by 2050. The result is a useful,
intriguing mosaic of the near future. The writers clearly explain
complex concepts as their shared references let one essay build
synergistically on the next. Readers who already know the contents of
one essay will turn the page to remark on how startling the next one is.
getAbstract recommends this collection to futurists, long-term planners,
and readers interested in social analysis and forecasting.
Anonymous
Posted January 23, 2013
No text was provided for this review.
Overview
Navigating the future can be tricky . . .
The scale of change happening around us can be bewildering, and scary. This book offers clarity, and hope. There is every chance that the world in 2050 will be richer, healthier, more connected, more sustainable, more innovative, better educated, and have less inequality between rich and poor and between men and women.
Enormous challenges lie ahead, from managing climate change to feeding 9 billion ...