Welcome to 2033: What the world could look like in ten years, according to more than 160 experts
What the world could look like in ten years, according to more than 160 experts
By Peter Engelke , Uri Friedman , and Paul Kielstra
Prepare for Russia’s coming crack-up. Plan for a Chinese military assault on Taiwan. Temper the optimism about peak carbon emissions. Brace for the further spread of nuclear weapons. Buckle in for even greater global volatility ahead.
These are just some of the forecasts that emerged this past fall when the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security surveyed the future, asking leading global strategists and foresight practitioners around the world to answer our most burning questions about the biggest drivers of change over the next ten years.
A total of 167 experts shared their insights on what geopolitics, climate change, technological disruption, the global economy, social and political movements, and other domains could look like a decade from now. Although respondents are largely citizens of the United States (roughly 60 percent of those polled), their nationalities are spread across thirty countries, with European citizens constituting the majority of non-Americans. (In the following analysis, all geographic distinctions among those surveyed are based on what individuals identified as their sole or primary nationality, not on the countries where they currently reside.)
Respondents are also employed in a range of fields, including the private sector (26 percent), academic or educational institutions (21 percent), non-profits (19 percent), government (16 percent), and independent consultants or freelancers (13 percent). They are quite evenly distributed across age categories over thirty-five, with less than 10 percent between the ages of twenty-two and thirty-five, but they skew heavily male (a result that we will aim to rectify in future surveys).
So what will the world look like in 2033? Here are the ten biggest findings from the survey.
1. Russia as we know it may not survive the coming decade
One of the most surprising takeaways was how many respondents pointed to a potential Russian collapse over the next decade—suggesting that the Kremlin’s war against Ukraine could precipitate hugely consequential upheaval in a great power with the largest nuclear-weapons arsenal on the planet.
Nearly half (46 percent) of respondents expect Russia to either become a failed state or break up by 2033. More than a fifth (21 percent) consider Russia the most likely country to become a failed state within the next ten years, which is more than twice the percentage for the next most common choice, Afghanistan.
Even more striking, 40 percent of respondents expect Russia to break up internally by 2033 because of revolution, civil war, political disintegration, or some other reason. Europeans are particularly pessimistic about Russia breaking up: Forty-nine percent of them foresee such an event, compared with 36 percent of Americans.
This puts another finding into a darker context: Fourteen percent of respondents believe that Russia is likely to use a nuclear weapon within the next ten years. Among those expecting the country to experience both state failure and a breakup in the coming decade, a sobering 22 percent believe that use of nuclear weapons will be part of that history ten years hence.
Some, though, see hope: Of those who believe Russia is likely to experience state failure or a breakup over the coming decade, 10 percent think that it is the most likely of any currently autocratic country to become democratic by the end of this period.
2. We’re heading for more countries with nuclear weapons and less cooperation on stopping the spread of these weapons—but not necessarily actual nuclear use
Barely one in eight respondents (13 percent) stated that no additional country will obtain nuclear weapons in the coming decade, and more than three-quarters named a specific country that they expected to become a nuclear-weapons state during this period. Iran was most often cited as a likely nuclear-armed state by 2033 (68 percent of respondents)—an outcome that the Atlantic Council’s Matthew Kroenig, in a separate assessment , argues is highly likely to occur as soon as this coming year. But Iran may not be alone. Respondents who expect some expansion of the nuclear-weapons club believe, on average, that 1.6 countries will join within the next ten years.
One reason for this anticipation of multiple new nuclear-armed countries could be that experts expect regional rivalries to drive nuclear proliferation over the next decade. For example, of those who believe that Iran will obtain nuclear weapons during this timeframe, 41 percent say Saudi Arabia will as well. In contrast, of those who do not believe that Iran will acquire these weapons, just 15 percent envision Saudi Arabia doing so anyway. Similarly, 57 percent of those who say that Japan will acquire nuclear weapons believe the same of South Korea. The former is almost certainly a function of Saudi-Iranian antagonism (wherein if one gets the bomb, the other will feel pressure to follow suit); the latter is likely less a function of Japanese-South Korean tension than of both countries feeling increasingly threatened by China and/or North Korea. Indeed, among those who foresee China initiating military action to retake Taiwan in the next decade (discussed in more detail below), 22 percent think that South Korea will obtain nuclear weapons over the same period while 16 percent believe Japan will. Among those who foresee no such Chinese use of force, the equivalent figures are 13 percent and 6 percent.
On the positive side, a majority of those polled (58 percent) believe that nuclear weapons will remain unused over the next ten years. On the negative side, it’s nevertheless quite disturbing that nearly a third of respondents (31 percent) expect the next decade to include the first use of nuclear weapons since World War II. Responses from those who foresee nuclear use suggest that the weapons may be deployed in a regional rather than global conflict. Russia is most frequently cited (14 percent of all respondents) as likely to use such a weapon by 2033. But, of those who expect the country to do so, only one-third believe Russia will fight a war with NATO during this period. The second-most-cited potential perpetrator, North Korea (10 percent), presumably would also initially deploy nuclear weapons regionally against neighbors without nuclear weapons rather than, say, a country with superior nuclear capabilities such as the United States.
The proliferation of nuclear weapons is consistent with respondent answers that predict a lack of international attention to this issue. Less than 2 percent of respondents named nuclear nonproliferation as the area likely to see the greatest increase in international cooperation over the coming decade. When given the chance to name the biggest global risks receiving insufficient attention, 10 percent mentioned either proliferation or war involving nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction.