Trends Identified

Society and Conflict in a Changing Global Environment
Our strategic environment is changing rapidly. We live in a world that is at once more connected, contested and complex. The fragile societies, instability and conflict which we meet in many parts of our neighbourhood and beyond also have consequences for our internal security and prosperity. To take account of the new global context, our approach to conflict must also change. Greater connectivity is both an asset as it drives communication, trade and mobility, but also makes us vulnerable to cross border crime, terrorism, global pandemics and cyber-attacks. The rise in human mobility compels us to rethink our approach to migration, sustainable development, security and governance.
2016
Shaping the future
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Cities and Regions of Tomorrow: Drivers of a Better Future?
Cities are catalysts for policy change and the 21st century will be shaped by metropolitan values: diversity, creativity, industriousness, entrepreneurialism.
2016
Shaping the future
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Organised Civil Society and Governance: Trends and Challenges
Advances in technology, wealth and income concentration, shifting demography, migration flows, under employment and climate change are transforming our societies. The (dis)empowered citizen, as introduced by the World Economic Forum 2016 Global Risks Report, describes the tensions between the growing cyber connectivity empowering citizens with more information and means of communications against the increasing feeling of exclusion from meaningful participation to decision-making among citizens and civil society.
2016
Shaping the future
European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS)
Be nice to the telepresence robot
You wouldn’t rest your feet on a colleague during a meeting. But what if your workmate was a robot controlled by a co-worker many kilometres away – would it still be rude? This is typical of the new etiquette questions that will be raised by remote-controlled telepresence robots, which allow you to transport your “self” anywhere in the world to take a look around. A roving version of you, these robots could alter the way we travel and interact with each other.
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist
Stroll through data in the augmented city
Our cities could soon be painted with secrets we cannot see with the naked eye. The streets, buildings and sometimes even the citizens themselves would teem with virtual information. With the help of augmented reality (AR) you could see the occupancy level of a hotel emblazoned on its walls and read a restaurant’s reviews as you walk past. The people you meet might even reveal their names and job titles before you say a word. AR is about to create a new layer over the cityscape by adding graphical information from apps and the internet onto objects in your field-of-view as you peer around.
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist
Don’t invent, evolve
We are on the cusp of a new era in the history of invention. That’s the implication of software that can automatically “evolve” technology, and create designs that often no human would come up with. It’s already transforming fields as diverse as robot locomotion, computer security and drug design.
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist
Eat a printed dinner in your printed home
It’s early evening and you pull the car into the drive of your new home that was erected in just two days. Since it is your wife’s birthday, you are clutching a personalised gold necklace that you picked up from the printer. For dinner tonight, you won’t need to do any chopping or peeling – ingredients just go straight into your kitchen fabricator.
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist
Jacking into your brain
Of all the ways that we have been aided by technology, forging a direct link between our brains and computers is the most intimate yet. Brain-machine interfaces (BMI) are poised to challenge our notions of identity, culpability and the acceptable limits of human enhancement.
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist
The crystal ball internet
For around 20 years, starting in the 1980s, the political scientist Philip Tetlock sought predictions from people considered knowledgeable. His experts, 280 of them, were the kind of folk who, in their work as TV pundits or government advisors, opined on matters such as the rise of China or security in the Middle East. As time passed, he checked their forecasts. The results were dismal. “Human beings who spend their lives studying the state of the world… are poorer forecasters than dart-throwing monkeys,” wrote one reviewer of Tetlock’s work. Not so for a powerful new method of forecasting called “text mining”. It draws on the vast amount of data available online. By sampling the sentiments expressed in the torrent of blog posts, tweets and Facebook updates, you can gain unprecedented insights into the mood of the world and use it to predict what is to come.
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist
Digital wallets will empty faster
Anthropologists know there are three things most of us now carry with us wherever we go: our keys, our wallets and our cellphones. Digital wallets could fold the last two into a single item – and perhaps eradicate cash altogether. Could it change how we spend too?
2011
Seven technologies to disrupt the next decade
NewScientist