Case 1: Seeds of Dystopia
Risk Constellations and Potential ImpactsTwo dominant issues of concern emerged from the Arab Spring, the “Occupy” movements worldwide and recent similar incidents of civil discontent: the growing frustration among citizens with the political and economic establishment, and the rapid public mobilization enabled by greater technological connectivity. A macro and longer-term interpretation of these events highlights the need to improve the management of global economic and demographic transformations that stand to increasingly define global social trends in the decade to come.

These trends are evolving differently across developed, emerging and least developed economies. In developed economies, such as those of Western Europe, North America and Japan, the social contract that has in recent decades been taken for granted is in danger of being destroyed. Workers nearing retirement fear cutbacks in social entitlements they have grown up to expect, such as state pensions, pre-established retirement age and guaranteed access to quality healthcare.

Meanwhile, young adults in this same group of economies realize that they are part of a compressed labour force that is expected to support a growing population of elderly citizens, while bearing the brunt of austerity measures required to offset growing national debts. At the same time, these same youths must save enough to provide for their own old-age needs in the most challenging economic climate in a generation. Experts anticipate that high unemployment rates will increasingly co-exist with employers’ unmet demands for skilled labour – a sign that many young people may lack the skills needed to make the necessary economic and social contributions.

In emerging economies, the context – and the challenge – is different. Countries such as Indonesia, Vietnam, the Philippines, Mexico, Peru and the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China), are racing to take advantage of a demographic window of opportunity presented by large labour forces with relatively few dependents, before this population also ages. These nations’ ability to seize the opportunity is far from guaranteed, given sluggish global growth and reduced demand from developed economies. Rapid economic growth in emerging economies has fuelled an impatient expectation that a rising tide will lift all boats, but social contracts may not be forged quickly enough to rectify increasingly
visible economic inequalities and social inequities.

Failure to meet demands for civil and political rights could also have harmful consequences. Figure 9 shows that in most countries, improvements in economic living standards have been accompanied by increases in political and civil rights such as freedom of speech, assembly and belief. In approximately a dozen countries, citizens who have enjoyed rapid economic growth in the last 20 years have instead seen deterioration in their political and civil freedoms, often resulting in social unrest. A closer look reveals that many countries in this group share recent episodes of social unrest as a common characteristic.

In the world’s poorest countries, rapidly increasing populations of young people, who are growing up in extremely vulnerable circumstances, are posing urgent demographic challenges. Least-developed economies and fragile states, such as Afghanistan, Pakistan, Timor-Leste and many Sub-Saharan African countries, are still struggling to ensure basic health and education for their growing populations and to take advantage of the wealth-generating potential of women.

The three distinct economic and demographic contexts described above are linked by migration. Across the globe, as population growth puts pressure on rural economies, people are being rapidly pulled into cities that struggle to absorb the new arrivals in an orderly way. Figure 10 shows that the rural population is expected to decline around 2023, while the urban population will continue to increase. Young people entering the urban labour force often ﬁnd that their education has not equipped them with the technological skills and entrepreneurial know-how to access employment opportunities presented by global connectivity.Cross-border migration adds a dynamic element to this demographic picture. If managed well, labour can be mobilized from one part of the world to another through legitimate channels that match available skills to employer demands, while also protecting the rights of migrants and their families. In the absence of such channels, higher rates of irregular migration are likely, as is abuse by illicit migration networks and smugglers. Cross-border migration can therefore either be a remedy or a further complication. In addition to irregular migration, experts express greater concern about people who are unable to relocate satisfactorily, grow frustrated and drop out of the formal labour market where they reside.

This dynamic is summed up in Figure 11 with the potentially potent combination of chronic labour market imbalances, chronic fiscal imbalances and severe income disparity. When amplified by extreme demographic pressures, these conditions could lead to a retrenchment from globalization and the emergence of a new type of critical fragile states – formerly wealthy countries that descend into a spiral of decay as they become increasingly unable to meet their social and fiscal obligations.

The signs already exist that the world is becoming more fragmented, inconsistent and mistrustful; the question is the extent to which these developments could lead to a global dystopia.Trends and UncertaintiesBy 2050, the world will experience a near doubling of the urban population to 6.2 billion – 70% of the projected world population of 8.9 billion. This means that we will have to build the same urban capacity (housing, infrastructure and facilities) in the next 40 years that we have built over the past 4,000 years. Meanwhile, the number of people globally over 60 years of age has risen from 8% in 1950 (roughly 200 million people) to 11% in 2009 (760 million people), but is now projected to double in rate by 2050 (2 billion people). Globally, the population of older people is growing at a rate of 2.6% per year, considerably faster than the population as a whole.

This rate is projected to grow annually less than 1% over the next 10 years, and the trend is not confined to developed economies. The percentage of people between the ages of 10 and 24 has already begun to decline in many emerging countries. Figure 12 provides a snapshot of the projected population age distributions in 2025.
Meeting social contracts for the youth and elderly depends on the resumption of strong growth in the global economy, which shrank by 2% in 2009. Within a two-year period following the liquidity crisis, 27 million people around the world lost their jobs; many more accepted reduced working hours, wages and/or benefits. Young people have been hit especially hard by the lack of career opportunities – a trend that prompted the International Labour Organization to warn of a “lost generation”. Since the onset of the global recession, many countries have experienced increases in rates of poverty, mental illness, substance abuse, suicide, divorce, domestic violence and the abandonment, neglect and abuse of
children.

On an unprecedented scale around the world, there is a sense of receding hope for future prospects. Gallup polling data in 2011 reveal that, globally, people perceive their living standards to be falling, and they express diminishing confidence in the ability of their government to reverse this trend. Their discontent is exacerbated by the starkness of income disparities: the poorest half of the global population owns barely 1% of the global wealth, while the world’s top 1% owns close to half of the world’s assets. Figure 13 provides a global snapshot of inequality, while Figure 14 shows a rise in inequality across many developed economies. respondents remained pessimistic about the global economic outlook; one in four said there is a lack of global leadership to deal with global problems. A majority fear greater geopolitical as well as societal upheaval in the years to come.

Equally striking contrasts are emerging within national borders; for example, residents of Shanghai now live an average of 15 years longer and earn US$ 20,000 per year more than their fellow Chinese citizens in the inland province of Guizhou. Gross inequality is not a new phenomenon, but the fact that this year’s survey respondents selected severe income inequality as the most likely global risk to manifest in the next 10 years suggests that concern about its consequences is growing.

In developed countries, household and national debts compound the challenge of providing for ageing populations. On average, households in emerging economies owe 30% of their annual income, while households in developed economies owe almost 150%, or 1.5 years, of their income. Shrinking tax revenues have deteriorated the fiscal positions of governments and reduced their ability to ease social hardship with welfare and counter-cyclical spending.

While ageing populations and economic slowdown put pressure on social contracts in advanced economies, in emerging economies there is a growing demand to formalize social contracts. India’s National Rural Employment Guarantees Act and Brazil’s Plano Brasil Sem Miséria are examples of new government programmes that aim to redistribute wealth and guarantee incomes in an effort to fight poverty and inequality. However, like welfare systems in developed economies, these programmes depend on continued growth and expanding employment and are therefore vulnerable to economic contraction.

In 2011, the World Economic Forum launched its quarterly Global Confidence Index. The final results show that over half the respondents remained pessimistic about the global economic outlook; one in four said there is a lack of global leadership to deal with global problems. A majority fear greater geopolitical as well as societal upheaval in the years to come.Key InsightsGeneral expectations about the potential of the world economy may not be met due to the interplay between fiscal imbalances and demographic trends. The resulting disappointment is amplified by a growing sense that wealth and power are becoming more entrenched in the hands of political and financial elites. Though rapid urbanization offers economies of scale if infrastructure keeps pace, it also makes the gulf in living standards between the rich and the poor more immediately visible to more people – a trend which is further amplified by the Internet.

When social mobility is widely perceived as attainable, income disparity can spur people to reach for success. However, when ambitious and industrious young people start to feel that, no matter how hard they work, their prospects are constrained, then feelings of powerlessness, disconnectedness and disengagement can take root. The social unrest that occurred in 2011, from the United States to the Middle East, demonstrated how governments everywhere need to address the causes of discontent before it becomes a violent, destabilizing force.

The world has at its disposal the human resources to manage its ageing populations and to ensure that scores of youth do not feel that the opportunities presented by economic growth are beyond their reach. While the problems manifest themselves differently across developed, emerging and least developed economies, the experts contributing to this report suggest that their solutions may be surprisingly similar: equip youths with the skills to succeed and enable them to move to where their labour is most needed through safe, well-managed migration channels.

Dangers arise, however, when the necessary leadership is not forthcoming, and populations are not equipped with the skills to adapt to new realities. As a result, a vicious cycle could take hold: as tough times feed disillusionment, populations may retreat from global connectedness, which in turn will limit the ability to arrest a potential slide into dystopia.Questions for Stakeholders- How can countries collaborate more effectively to correct
chronic labour imbalances?
- What will social contracts be like in 2022? How can unemployed
workers be better trained for the skills required?
- What steps can be taken to reduce income disparity?
- What measures should be undertaken today to deal with the
changing socio-economic dynamics of an ageing population
and bulging young population?
- How can fostering entrepreneurship prevent the seeds of
dystopia from taking root?