Posted by Adam Gordon on Nov 17, 2011 in all, emerging markets, leadership, policy
Ted Turner
In 1950 world population was 2.5 billion. This week it passed 7 billion, an ominous occasion marked by various events across the globe, including a special CNN editorial penned by none other than former boss Ted Turner.
Turner has a right to opine on population growth and global poverty implication, seeing as he donated $1bn to set up the United Nations Foundation, but I wasn’t quite expecting the 1970s thinking that popped out.
Says Turner: “Researchers at the Guttmacher Institute found there are 215 million women worldwide who want the ability to time and space their pregnancies, but do not have access to effective methods of contraception…
“Universal access to voluntary family planning is a cross-cutting and cost-effective solution to achieving all of the Millennium Development Goals…
“There is no better value for the money than international family planning, which provides a higher return on investment than almost any other type of development assistance.”
Turner then rails against Congress’ recent foreign aid budget cuts in funding for international family planning and the U.N. Population Fund.
It is hard, and perhaps churlish, to disagree. Who in their right mind would counter the obvious social and economic benefits of family planning? Other than the Catholic Church, that is. Therein a tiny clue to the bigger nature of the problem and how thinking has moved on.
Since the 1970s when population growth first hit the radar as part of the Club of Rome’s “Limits to Growth” Studies, the provision of family planning has been part of the global population solutions mix. Perhaps not adequately — there can always be more — but supply side solutions to contraception provision and family planning clinics have consistently been funded.
The demand side
The problem is also in demand. Even where a safe and cheap contraceptive is available, there is little guarantee it gets used. This boils down to the social norms and mental models in developing world communities. Which is not to say that developing world families are not smart enough to perceive their own best interest. They are. In the absence of adequate affordable social services, health care, aged care, and disability insurance, the smartest thing a couple can do is have many children.
There’s never a golden bullet to a systemic problem such as this, but the closest thing that does exists is not contraception provision, it is girls’ education.
Educating girls enables them to see and enact opportunities outside of childraising, and once they have other options they become much more likely to reach for the birth control after 2.5 children, just like their Western counterparts (often in direct contravention of patriarchal and religious doctrine — which education empowers them to resist.)
Educating girls does not privilege girls unduly. It’s corrective of a skewed situation where traditional societies educate boys before girls. Figures that demonstrate this are provided by the Population Reference Bureau.
Whispered heresy
While girls’ education was a whispered heresy in the 1980-90s, partly because of patriarchal assumptions in both developed and emerging markets, it is now a clearly defined development platform. See for example the World Bank report: “Getting to Equal: How Educating Every Girl Can Help Break the Cycle of Poverty.” There are organizations such as Forum for African Women Educationalists (FAWE) and NGOs such as Educate Africa Girls. Even the GE Foundation sees girls education as a specific initiative.
There’s a chicken-and-egg here because contraception allows girls to stay in school longer. And of course the UN Foundation is hardly blind the girls education. It is very much part of their mix: see this release.
It’s just a question of where the emphasis is placed when an influential philanthropist such as Turner communicates over global population hitting the seven million mark. Once upon a time the problem looked like a supply side problem. It doesn’t anymore. It’s about inculcating demand. That means it’s about girls’ education and that what the call-to-arms should be for.
Posted by Adam Gordon on Apr 8, 2011 in 2025, all, economy & finance, leadership, policy, politics of the future
The new axis in world diplomacy and global leadership flexes its muscles next week on Hainan Island – the southernmost tip of China – with the BRICS summit on April 14 in Sanya, and the Boao Forum the following day.
BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) is already something of a “G5” of non-Western nations. Next week its leaders (China’s Hu Jintao, Brazil’s Dilma Rousseff, Russia’s Dmitry Medvedev, India’s Manmohan Singh, and South Africa’s Jacob Zuma) will set themselves to discuss their joint concerns in international affairs, economics, development, trade, security, etc.
More than anything, the event signals growing intention to coordinate views and act in closer alignment, and press towards future empowerment and responsibility of non-Western world leaders. Political clout has always gone with economic clout, and in this respect the future can be depended on to “rhyme” with the past.
BRICS countries already account for 40% of global population and 20% of global GDP – and they are the nations expected to grow most rapidly in GDP terms in the next decade and beyond, and to provide primary succor to neighbors in their regions.
Hainan 2011 is the third summit of the BRIC countries. The acronym BRIC was coined by Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) in 2001 in a chicken-and-egg prophesy: causing Russia, China, Brazil and India to see their interests as potentially aligned, and politically worth aligning. South Africa was accepted into the group in February.
Without stopping for breath, the diplomatic caravan moves 125 miles overnight up the coast of Hainan Island to Boao, where President Hu will give the keynote address the next day at the annual Boao Forum for Asia (BFA).
Boao is an undisguised knock-off of the World Economic Forum in Davos (with skiing replaced by snorkeling perhaps): a high-level gathering for policy and business influencers, with a similar nudge-and-influence mandate, here with an Asian focus. In attendence, in addition the the BRICS representatives, will be by Korea’s Kim Hwang-Sik, Spain’s Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Ukrainian’s Mikola Azarov, and New Zealand’s Bill English.
Posted by Adam Gordon on Mar 9, 2011 in all, failed predictions, forecast filtering, policy, politics of the future, social change
As the 24-hour news caravan moves on from Cairo to Libya in search of the next news fix, I’m reminded how poorly the media caravanserai thinks about the future: in this case, what real changes (if any) the fall of Mubarak may cause in Egypt, or in the political and business environment in the Middle East, or the world at large, going forward.
That a 30-year despot was toppled by people-power is without doubt a good outcome story for those with broadly democratic and civil-liberties biases. But the breathless pundits have been quick to call the Tahrir Square events “the ‘Berlin Wall’ of the Arab world.”
Is it? The Tahrir Square revolt tells us there is economic hardship and rumbling social discontent in Egypt, and that the populace is emboldened, but it doesn’t tell us much about the future.
Yes Egypt is the bellweather of the region. And yes, it has gone through a cataclysmic moment. But the future is all about momentum. Can we expect momentum? Is there reason to anticipate follow through? Can we expect the “fast-forward” button from now, or is it going to be the pause button that defines outcomes?
The fall of the Berlin Wall fall was symbolic: the symbol of Eastern bloc demise – a crack in the national prison that held back human aspiration. But it was also more than a symbol. In reality, on the ground, the political will that sustained the Wall was gone by 1989. Tricky as it was, and still is, the then West German government had a stake in and a will towards reintegrating the East. The situation went into fast-forward mode.
Egyptian protesters have dislodged a few boulders, and shaken a few certainties. But what is the political will in Egypt and among its Western allies going forward? That’s what will tell us about the future.
Head chopped off
The army is in charge, but the army is more closely allied with the ruling elite than the common protesters. The elite has had its head chopped off, but it can easily grow a new one. The issue it will highlight – as we have already seen – is stability, raising the specter of (a) chaos or (b) Islamists, or both, to stoke the military and cow the population.
Genuine chaos is in fact a high likelihood. Whenever the glue of power melts, and power (over the future) is up for grabs, agencies and interests will contend for it, seeking to win absolutely while the chips are in the aire, or to be in the best pre-pax position when they fall. A merry-go-round of tottering regimes, interspersed by chaos, or even a Lebanon-style multifaceted civil war between army, ruling elite, Islamists, warlords, students, etc., is surely a more-than-possible scenario.
The deeper story, as many have pointed out, is the economic, infrastructural, and civil weakness that defines Egypt, whoever takes over. It has a young and growing population, a stalled economy with chronic high unemployment, inequitable wealth distribution, poor local and regional governance, and corruption.
This is why it should not be believed that any party or interest can deliver a new future. Without considerable change at the grassroots, democratic fanfare, would be just that — fanfare.
So if the political will in Egypt is both fractured and hamstrung, what about outside interested parties and the West?
Friendly dictator
What will be future-defining is whether the US and its allies drop the “friendly dictator” policy — propping up corrupt despots because they are externally benign (and better than the Islamic alternative.) If they keep this up, the outcome for Egypt and the region is a fractured “pause” situation, no matter what blather about democracy, elections, human rights, new constitutions, makes the airwaves, from Hillary Clinton down.
But if, by some albeit unlikely turn of events, the external political towards Egypt was reshaped to transcend self-interest and neglect; and starts to support quiet, consistent, financial and non-financial development of the mechanisms and institutions of civil governance, backed by education and micro-loan economic stimulus – then the future is on the move and business managers should start realigning their thinking towards stable long-term growth for the region.
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Posted by Adam Gordon on Jan 10, 2011 in all, emerging technologies, leadership, policy, social change
The world is has been changed by the exposure on WikiLeaks of hundreds of thousands US diplomatic cables laying bare the behind-the-scenes manuevering and perspectives of US diplomats and their allies.
The leaks created predictable dismay at the State Department and beyond, along with gritted-teeth promises to bring perpetrators to justice, and there is enough outrage and embarrassment in high places that this kind of action will no doubt go forward.
But, from a foresight perspective, it’s just “noise.” It is not the future. There can be no muzzling in the digital world. Just like we nod and smile when China tries to keep a finger in the Internet dyke, we should nod and smile at these diplomatic machinations to hold back the electronic tide.
A long time coming
This kind of upset has been a long time coming for the diplomatic community. Over the last 20 years, most industries and organizations have been forced to adapt to a world where instant copying and distribution of digital content means that electronic information is soon, if not instantly, freely available in the public domain. That is, an electronic document is effectively a public document no matter what anyone says or does.
Some have learned the hard way. Media companies slow to imbibe this new reality, from Encyclopedia Brittanica to Blockbuster, have gone to the wall. The music industry has fought a long fight against unsanctioned electronic redistribution, a fight it must ultimately lose. Police departments have found out that any time “policing” is going on, someone with a cell-phone is videoing it (digitizing it), and next thing that’s in the public domain too.
So now its US (and global) diplomacy’s turn to learn the digital lesson: if it’s digital, it’s in the public domain — already, or soon.
There are of course good arguments for secrecy. The sensitive baby-steps of international agreements need privacy protection. Leaking information may embarrass partners, scupper deals, put lives at risk, or compromise counter-terrorism. This is all true.
But to wag fingers over this is like EMI saying: “creator incentive is compromised by copyright violation.” True, but there go mp3s, zooming around the Internet.
Far from the public gaze
As already evident, first response of the authorities will be to try to shore up the system. The Secret internet Protocol distribution (SIPDIS) electronic archive will disappear or be ushered behind much higher security, access clearances will be hiked, and tougher followup and penalties for official secrets violations will be enacted —to make it safe for diplomats to go back in the water. That is, back to the 19th Century gentlemanly art of a quiet word here, a confidential nudge there, far from the public gaze.
But electronic information cannot be contained, and to think that it can is to live stupid. We inhabit a world where the electronic machinations of diplomacy and national interest can be sent anonymously to a drop box at any time. If the forces of national interest close down the current actors and Web sites, others will open (broadly supported by the quality news media.) Digital capabilities cannot be withdrawn and the thought of an anonymous electronic drop box cannot be unthought.
The writing is on the wall, and it says: “This Writing is On Everyone’s Wall.”
So we should anticipate that the public going forward will have a much greater visibility into the diplomatic process no matter what diplomats want or think is best.
The issue for senior government leaders is to choose their response path. Do they, as expected, act furiously to preserve the past; or do they embrace the future of their sector and perhaps even exploit the possibilities in it? Not everything should be made public, that’s what “top secret” is for. But for the rest, bringing the public into a high-quality, two-way sense of what is being done in its name could bear fruit of real political grounding for diplomatic initiatives, therein greater legitimacy.
read morePosted by Adam Gordon on Oct 25, 2010 in all, foresight tools & methods, policy, scenario planning, social change, strategic foresight, technology change
This week the Association of Research Libraries in Washington D.C. released The ARL 2030 Scenarios: A User’s Guide for Research Libraries.
Source: http://www.arl.org/rtl/plan/scenarios/
Now it would seem that a 20-year-future-gazing process for libraries is a world away from the concerns of managers making today’s critical decisions, but it is not, for two reasons:
First the study deals with the critical trends and forces changing the operating environment in just about every industry today – digitization, sustainability, social media, China, etc. The scenarios are instructive because they lay out forces changing the operating environment not only for libraries but pretty much every significant organization or company going forward.
Second, while four different “futures” are described and investigated, the organizational subject (libraries) are not explicitly written into them. As the user guide comments: “Scenarios created for use in scenario planning intentionally leave the organizations that are planning out of the picture. This allows the organization to better focus on the main forces that are shaping the environment around it. Thus, each scenario has a blank where the library can fill itself in through the planning process…
“This approach means that other kinds of organizations might also find blanks that they can explore through a scenario planning process. ARL can consider its future as an association using these scenarios, but other kinds of libraries, other actors in the research enterprise, or other participants in the scholarly communication system could find value in using this scenario set and the user’s guide.”
In fact, all kinds of organizations and businesses can use the study in this way: inserting themselves into the stories and asking themselves: do “we” still work? That is, is our value proposition, our business model, our resource or alliance base, still valid? Do our success recipes still apply? If not, what are the necessary new ways to be valuable and to engage with consumers and stakeholders? What would we need to do—how would we need to innovate to transform our organization such that it creates value for future users—given the overwhelmingly powerful external dynamics redefining our operating environment?
The organization deferred
Although the ARL doesn’t say it, it’s actually quite remarkable in the scenario world that the subject organization is NOT written into the story. Often scenarios are hamstrung by exactly this problem: Conflating what the world will do and what the firm can do in response, therein becoming no more than wishful-thinking stories. It is much better for the purposes of real-world decision-making when these two questions are dealt with sequentially, as they are here, and organizations can then think through the options and priorities they can shape within the larger future world they can’t shape.
Bearing in mind that scenarios are not predictions, and that the whole point is that the most likely future operating environment will combine elements from all, these are the four independent strands that the AFL comes up with:
In Research Entrepreneurs, individual scholars are central and their orientation matters more than institutional or disciplinary affiliations. Research institutions provide support services to these agents rather than driving the research agenda. Scenario 2, Reuse and Recycle, describes disinvestment in the research enterprise. With fewer resources, the crowd-cloud approach is widespread, producing information that is “ubiquitous but low value.” In Disciplines in Charge, “computational approaches to data analysis” force scholars “to align themselves around data stores and computation capacity that addresses large-scale research questions within their research field.” Global Followers describes a world similar to today, but where Asia is prominent in providing money and support for research, and Eastern “cultural norms” govern the process.
ARL 2030 Scenarios: A User’s Guide for Research Libraries is available for free athttp://www.arl.org/bm~doc/arl-2030-scenarios-users-guide.pdf. More information on the ARL project, “Envisioning Research Library Futures: A Scenario Thinking Project” can be found athttp://www.arl.org/rtl/plan/scenarios/.
Posted by Adam Gordon on Jul 16, 2010 in all, policy, risk management
I was interested to see FEMA’s (U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency) launch of its “Getting Urgent About the Future” Strategic Foresight Initiative, not only in itself unfashionably embracing deeper, longer-term thinking about key policy & security issues, but also making an excellent fist of defining its benefits (a definition that is in all essentials equally valid for business-industry foresight):
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“The world around us is changing in ways that may have profound effects on the emergency management enterprise. Collectively, we must begin to think more broadly and over a longer timeframe if we are to understand these changes and their potential impacts. To this end, FEMA has launched a Strategic Foresight initiative (SFI), the objective of which is straightforward: to seek to understand how the world around us is changing and how those changes may affect the future of emergency management and our community…
“The SFI can serve as one important tool in the development of both strategy and plans. By understanding the potential future environment, organizations will better understand and anticipate risk while ensuring opportunities can be fully capitalized. For example, the SFI may identify new or increasing capability requirements as well as emerging capabilities that do not exist today. Such identifications could support decisions about future investments as well as planning activities and exercises. In a more indirect manner, the SFI can help establish a research agenda for the emergency management field by highlighting areas of emerging relevance and the key questions that remain unanswered.”
[On March 1, 2003, FEMA became part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.]
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