ANTIPREDICTIONS 2023+: looking beyond the polycrisis?

Will the world go bust or recover in 2023?

As the adage says, futurists exist to help astrologers look serious…

At each year’s eve, analysts and institutions compete to share their predictions for the coming times. Quite a perilous exercise that often results in mixed outcomes, as we highlighted in the ‘loss of the future" ⁽¹⁾.

This year makes no exception, with the usual battle between doom preachers and utopians. The former hesitate between eco-apocalypse and mutual nuclear destruction. The latter see transhumanism and sustainable technologies reverse the odds to build a better future.

Both share surprising bonds: doom preachers foresee a new era of human redemption after the collapse, and utopians openly call for a crash to impose the new world order they preach for ⁽²⁾.

In the middle, most institutions deliver more prudent forecasts, with various scenarios that cover both alternatives of crash and recovery (an easy trick that will help them be right whatever the outcome). But all highlight an unprecedented level of risks and uncertainties.

The IMF, the OECD, the World Bank, and large institutions such as BlackRock describe the world today as being “at a critical inflection point”, with a polycrisis, massive energy price shocks, high inflation, a slowing global economy “perilously close to falling into recession”, and “growing faultlines between geopolitical tectonic plates”.

All predict "turbulent twenties”, and - as described by the World Economic Forum - "a decade of disruption, decay and impossible choices“, with “colliding risks of disintegration".

Deep uncertainties that consulting firms (Bain, BCG, E&Y, McKinsey...) advise addressing through resilience-focused strategies. 

Between pessimists and optimists, should we choose a side?

Each one has strong arguments and potential scenarios are infinite. We must not be fooled, though. Truth is the first victim of war. And the future is a battlefield…

If we give an objective look at the world situation, trying to get beyond postures, self-serving predictions, and ideology, only one thing is sure: we are at the turn of what is probably the most decisive decade of the century. One that will lead to a new phase of history. 

This is not only what is openly stated by both the presidents of the USA ⁽³⁾ and Russia ⁽⁴⁾, at the beginning of what we must recognize to be the fourth World War. This is also what economists with incredible track records, such as Nouriel Roubini or Ray Dalio, both predict . 

Signs are visible everywhere: economic Ponzi schemes, financial instability, deep social troubles, ramping resource shortages and dramatic geopolitical tensions with the burst of the first high-intensity war in Europe for 70 years, the rise of BRICS and the OCS, the start of de-dollarization, plus rising tensions in Asia, etc.: everything points to a deep world fragmentation. With a major recession looming, at least in the OECD and notably in Europe. 

Is it still time to avoid the downfall?

To hope that financial troubles will have a soft landing? That social mouvements will subside? That new resources will be found? That negotiation will prevail over conflicts? 

Even if wars favor the rise to the extremes, as stated by Clausewitz, and if past lessons of historical cycles are not reassuring, nothing is impossible. We can always hope.

But those who bet on optimistic scenarios to bypass the crisis miss the point:

The question is not IF the tsunami of disasters will hit or not.

It is: WHEN will it hit? And WHAT will be its magnitude? 

Because the earthquakes have already stroke into the abyss!

We have echoes all around us. The demographical, geopolitical, ecological, and technological tectonic moves that are rambling for years have already created deep underground explosions that many people don't want to see yet but whose seismic shockwaves are rising full speed to the surface of the economic ocean ⁽⁵⁾.

They are preparing a tsunami of disruptions that threatens to dismantle many of our certainties of the post-World War II and World War III (the cold war) decades. 

The permacrisis shocks we have experienced since 2008 are not temporary hurdles: They are early signs before the flood.

When will the tsunami hit in full force? This year? In 2 or 3 years, as forecasted by Ray Dalio? Even if macro forces at stake are clear, events are chaotic. It’s futile to try to do too precise predictions.

All we can do is "antipredictions". State that peaceful recovery won’t probably happen. That demographic and resource dilemmas are worsening. That world powers are pivoting. That technology disruptions are accelerating. That we must prepare for growing tensions that will lead first to a new iron curtain in a fragmenting world, and then to a profoundly reconfigured geopolitical landscape at the turn of the next decade.   

What can we do in this awkward situation, at the turn of the global transition crisis?

Pursue business as if nothing happened, and hope to be among the protected circles? Hide in our basements and prepare for survival? Dive into distraction? Hope to be saved by miracles? Or even trying to escape, and “Go to Croatan” as in Hakim Bey’s prophetic “Temporary Autonomous Zone” essay? ⁽⁶⁾ 

As History shows: it’s futile to face a tsunami head-on.

All we can do is to embrace the chaos and find the sweet spot 

Find the mindset and behaviors that will help us be more than resilient: anti-fragile. To not just survive but thrive.

Because in any period of chaos, there are massive opportunities. New technologies. New markets. New growth paths. New business models

We are at the turn between two worlds. When global extinctions of old species are accompanied by a new explosion of life, offering us incredible opportunities we may not have even dreamed of up to now!

So, is it the end?

Of an era. Sure. 

But it’s also the beginning of a new one. 

What is the cause of concern can also be a source of hope. 

Provided we develop the right strategies.

In one of the cryptic formulas of which he has the secret, the ‘oracle of Omaha’, the best investor of all times, Warren Buffet, said "what the wise man does in the beginning, the fool does in the end."

We know we shouldn’t wait until the end to avoid being fooled. 

But isn’t it time also to prepare for the new beginning? 

The next post of our "Global Transition Crisis" series will be published in two weeks. Click here to subscribe >

_{(1) See our previous post "ANTIPREDICTIONS 202x+: towards the loss of the future?" >}

_{(2) See our previous post "GREAT RESET: is resistance futile?" >}

_{(3) "We are now in the early years of a defining decade for America and the world" - Joe Biden, 2022}

_{(4) "The most dangerous and unpredictable decade is ahead of us” - Vladimir Putin, 2022}

_{(5) See the previous articles of our "Global Transition Crisis" series >}

_{(5) T.A.Z.: "Temporary Autonomous Zone" is a book by the anarchist writer and poet Hakim Bey. Inspired by pirate utopias, the book describes socio-political hacker tactics for creating temporary spaces that elude global structures of control.}