In his book “The Next 100 Years”George Friedman gives his views on the next century. Through a rational feasible process, he aims to identify the main tendencies –geopolitical, demographic, cultural, military – in their broadest sense, and to identify potential major future events. His views are interesting, to mention a few: he foresees another century of American dominance and a shift of European power towards Poland and Turkey.

 

While reading this book, I became increasingly surprised that Friedman hardly mentions the environmental challenges the world is facing. I had expected these to play a central role in any reflection on the next century. However, it was not until the epilogue that Friedman refers to these. “Any reader will have noticed that I do not deal with the question of global warming in this book. This would be a glaring omission”. Friedman states that he believes in global warming but two forces will moot global warming. First, the end of the population explosion (after 2050) will reduce the increase in demand for just about everything. Second, the ever-increasing cost of both finding and using hydrocarbons will boost the hunger for alternatives. “By the second half of the twenty-first century we will be seeing demographic and technological transformations that together will deal with the issue.”

 

While I share Friedman’s view that creativity and innovations will provide much needed solutions and that around 2050 the world will have seen the demographic peak, I doubt whether these justify the fundamental choice he made in his book. Will the population explosion of the next decades (before 2050) not lead to severe scarcity of resources? Just think of water availability in populated areas. Some claim that even wars will be fought over rights of access to water. And think of the social consequences of the rise in food prices. Environmental challenges often have social causes: lack of education, lack of rural jobs, lack of clear land titles. Will a growing population not accelerate pressure on natural habitats and biodiversity? Sure, Friedman is right - there will be technological and social solutions, but will these be available at the right time at the right place?

 

Friedman says: “at a certain level, when it comes to the future, the only thing one can be sure of is that common sense will be wrong.” When I finished this otherwise interesting book, I thought it may be too American, and his views on environmental and social challenges might be explainable from that “common sense” perspective. My common sense, however, is different.

 

I appreciate that Friedman argues that fundamentally only few things matter when it comes to formulating a view on the future. But even though I am an optimist about the long-term, I foresee frictions that can have a fundamental impact in the next decades, especially in emerging and developing countries. Hopefully, we have dealt with all this in 2100, but it is not going to be a smooth ride till then. Unfortunately, neither one of us will be around to see who was right.