25 Global Developments To Watch Over The Next Five Years
Exploring the certainty of uncertainty in the years to come
2024 was a year of confusing, inspiring, depressing, and energizing developments on many fronts. Politics remained front and center as billions of people selected new leaders in elections held in Taiwan, Pakistan, Indonesia, India, South Africa, Mexico, the UK, and the United States, as well as a dozens of others.
I took two main lessons from what Time magazine has called the “ultimate election year.” First, it was a bad year for incumbents as voters blamed existing leadership for inflation and economic challenges. New parties took power in the United States, the UK, Botswana, Ghana, Panama, Portugal and a host of other nations while the ruling parties in India, France, Japan and South Africa endured major setbacks.
Second, the forces of populism and nationalism are alive and well around the world. Marine Le Pen’s National Rally increased its influence in the French National Assembly while Austria’s Freedom Party earned 29% of the vote in the September election. Trump and his MAGA movement won decisively in the United States while Claudia Scheinbaum channeled the popularity of the populist Morena Party to become Mexico’s first female president. Narendra Modi and Prabowo Subianto demonstrated the populations of India and Indonesia, respectively, still seek strong nationalist leaders.
It was also interesting to note how international conflicts impacted domestic politics. In America, the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East were galvanizing forces that led to within party tensions as Republicans debated the merits of supporting Ukraine while Democrats were torn about denouncing Israel. Lest we think this is just an American phenomenon, similar dynamics unfolded in the United Kingdom, France, and Austria. Interestingly, thinking of China as hostile to Western values and interests is longer a contentious political issue but has emerged as one of the few areas of unity in America’s otherwise polarized political domain.
The natural world also offered its share of noteworthy events. A total solar eclipse led to traffic jams and sold out hotels in remote areas of rural New England, the northern lights were visible beyond the poles, earthquakes rocked Taiwan and the NY/NJ area, wildfires spread in Greece and California, and hurricanes Helene and Milton wreaked havoc in America.
2024 was defined by the introduction of breakdancing as an Olympic sport, planes falling apart in flight, panic among pets in Springfield Ohio, drifting ships disabling bridges, a climate summit hosted in a petro-state, and the eating of a $6 million banana.
Technology continued to accelerate. SpaceX caught its Super Heavy booster, artificial intelligence spread into domain of politics, quantum breakthroughs led to extraordinary excitement, and the FDA approved the first ever personalized immunotherapy treatment targeting solid tumors. Technology-enabled decentralization marched forward in finance, energy, and education while big-tech companies acknowledged their power hungry ambitions by supporting nuclear energy.
And in the world of money, inflation slowed, interest rates began to fall, and the stock market surged. The labor market remained tight, consumer spending was resilient, and US debt levels rose to new records. Gold and bitcoin hit all-time highs as NVIDIA and quantum computing equities faced insatiable investor demand.
In a year that was defined by the introduction of breakdancing as an Olympic sport, planes falling apart in flight, panic among pets in Springfield Ohio, drifting ships disabling bridges, a climate summit hosted in a petro-state, and the eating of a $6 million banana, humorist Dave Berry reminds us not to forget technological risks of our highly interconnected reality:
As I’ve stressed before, uncertainty and change are unavoidable realities of life. Yet all of us are asked to make decisions in the face of these fluid dynamics. What’s the best way to do so? Sadly, there is no one correct answer, but I believe we must look through the day-to-day noise to have any chance of identifying signals. Long-term trends that drive seemingly disconnected developments offer a compass to guide us through the numerous cross-currents that plague our lives; and as I’ve noted several times in the past, I believe this approach is at least marginally more useful than my Ouija board or Magic 8 ball.
Unlike many others who tend to make predictions on a one-year view, I opt for a 5 year look as I believe time allows signals to surface amidst the ubiquitous noise. I’ve been doing this since 2012 and have publicly posted my predictions since January 2015. (Links: 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024). I’d encourage you to revisit any or all of them, not just to see how wrong (and sometimes right!) I can be, but perhaps also to notice how the mere act of considering alternatives can be constructive.
It’s in the spirit of embracing uncertainty and thinking broadly that I offer you this year’s set of global developments to watch over the next five years.
Skyrocketing demand for artificial intelligence exposes decades of underinvestment in American power infrastructure. As brownouts become increasingly common, public sentiment towards technology companies turns hostile, driving them to rapidly deploy (rather than merely invest in) nuclear power. The price of uranium plunges as breakthroughs in extracting uranium from seawater more than offset surging demand for the commodity.
As a result of rising debt levels, extreme political polarization, growing income inequality, and the regular weaponization of the US dollar system, the world begins to abandon the US dollar as a global reserve currency. The US, in what may prove to be one of the most significant actions in thousands of years of economic history, decides to proactively accept the dollar’s death and embraces bitcoin, a move that permanently denies every country the exorbitant privileges associated with having a global reserve currency. Countries with the most bitcoin per capita are enriched by the transition.
Bitcoin…permanently denies every country the exorbitant privileges associated with having a global reserve currency.
Guam emerges as ground zero of the US China Cyberwar. Chinese state-sponsored hacking groups continue to intensify their attacks on US critical infrastructure, and after taking down Guam’s electricity grid and disrupting American military operations, the US responds with a demonstration of overwhelming offensive cyber capabilities that releases evidence and data about the CCP’s surveillance operations against its Chinese citizens onto every single Chinese cell phone. Anti-CCP protests simultaneously breakout in China’s top 100 cities.
Evidence emerges that the world’s leading militaries have all been developing weather warfare capabilities. The movie Geostorm proves prophetic.
As surveillance capitalists continue to suck up data about users from every conceivable source and then use propensity scoring algorithms to nudge people into profit-generating actions, the threat to free will creates unprecedented interest in digital privacy technology. Apostrophy becomes the world’s hottest company.
As GLP-1 drugs gain effectiveness at reducing appetites, devastating side effects are exposed that force governments to stop subsidizing them. In the United States, the Make American Healthy Again movement leads to the widespread removal of dangerous chemicals from American food, leading to improved health outcomes. Americans continue to demand convenient and easy-to-prepare foods, even if they’re “unhealthy.” Single serve frozen foods sales double, and global soup sales hit all time records; The Campbell’s Company comes to regret dropping the word “Soup” from their official name after more than 150 years.
The Campbell’s Company comes to regret dropping the word “Soup” from their official name after more than 150 years.
The US abandons its global concerns and opts instead to focus on the Western Hemisphere. The global media rapidly labels this new foreign policy stance as the Trump Doctrine, which is a de facto resurrection of the Monroe Doctrine, and clearly telegraphs to China and Russia that Latin America is off limits. The Venezuela-Guyana conflict over oil becomes a flashpoint in this new dynamic, one that rapidly deescalates when Panama voluntarily sells the Panama Canal Zone back to the United States in return for American security guarantees. Because of its fuzzy geography from a hemispheric perspective, tensions rise in the Arctic.
As the Department of Government Efficiency suggests they will seek to end the government’s heavy use of cost-plus contracting (a dynamic that has supported and protected large defense contractors), hundreds of enterprising Boeing engineers and executives leave the beleaguered aerospace giant and start dozens of world changing companies.
The Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute in Manchester NH becomes the most important tissue engineering effort in the world and begins demonstrating the power of growing organs to solve medical problems rather than using pharmaceuticals to address symptoms.
The largest economies in the world continue to get older as birth rates fall and lifespans expand. After years of stagnation, AARP membership swells to more than 40 million people. Governments around the world create departments and committees to address policies related Aging. Alongside this dynamic, Millennials and Zoomers demand a radical restructuring of entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare. The cross-currents lead to policy proposals such as a wholesale replacement of the income tax with a consumption tax, a development that unleashes an American economic boom.
President Trump and the Republican-led Congress act decisively to revive and pass The Sunshine Protection Act, a law that makes daylight savings time permanent and ends the twice-a-year, sleep-disrupting clock adjustments that CNN has suggested are racist.
Sleep deprivation is declared a public health emergency as analysis of personal data (supposedly anonymized by Apple, Fitbit, Garmin, and Oura) convincingly links many accidents, errors, and medical ailments to inadequate sleep. New laws emerge that require LED light manufacturers to disclose sleep disruption risks. Mathew Walker’s WHY WE SLEEP: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams becomes required reading in most medical schools and residency programs prohibit aspiring doctors from working shifts longer than 12 hours.
Sleep deprivation is declared a public health emergency as analysis of personal data (supposedly anonymized by Apple, Fitbit, Garmin, and Oura) suggests many accidents, errors, and medical ailments are linked to inadequate sleep.
Commercial activities in space surge amidst increasing belief that humans will be an interplanetary species. Many terrestrial communications capabilities (data centers, cell towers, etc.) are moved to low Earth orbit. As lunar mining technologies improve, a Moon Rush draws investors and entrepreneurs in pursuit of gold, helium-3 and other commodities. Alien and UFO disclosures accelerate from major governments, most of which are dismissed as “narrative control efforts" or psychological operations. No credible evidence of alien technology emerges.
Rapid advancements in the use and capabilities of autonomous underwater drone swarms effectively eliminates the strategic value and stealth of the most technologically advanced submarines. After one such swarm run by the PLA Navy embarrassingly forces an Australian submarine to surface in the Yellow Sea and is boarded by Chinese military personnel, American and British politicians call for an immediate termination of the AUKUS partnership. In its place, the US agrees to sell 10,000 Manta Ray drones to Australia, creating panic within PLA leadership and euphoria among Northrop Grumman shareholders.
After a mass deportation of illegal immigrants, America passes comprehensive immigration reform that prioritizes the American worker but also enables businesses to secure much-needed talent. Anti-immigrant sentiment dissipates and America restores its global image as a shining city on a hill.
High school students and their tuition-paying parents increasingly question the value of a liberal arts education from an elite institution. An unprecedented number of high school graduates enter the trades, motivated in part by Mike Rowe’s Dirty Jobs. Public opinion turns against the Ivy League and their prioritization of elites over national interests, leading politicians to threaten their tax exempt status.
Public opinion turns against the Ivy League and their prioritization of elites over national interests, leading politicians to threaten their tax exempt status.
In an acknowledgment that global multilateral institutions no longer work, leaders from more than 50 nations suggest the United Nations should be disbanded.
Academics and practitioners alike conclude that a large pool of low-priced and young workers no longer provides an economic benefit to an emerging nation. Some go further to suggest that unemployed youth are a liability to governments that must figure out how to create jobs for them in a world that increasingly utilizes technology and automated manufacturing instead of unskilled labor. India debates implementing a one-child policy.
The world achieves peak climate alarmism and begins to question the motivations of the carbon control efforts. Climate change conferences are increasingly hosted by petro-states eager to gain favor with global elites who, despite flying carbon-spewing private jets, seek the virtue-signaling benefits of attending such events. Guyana’s president Dr. Irfan Ali’s exposure of climate hypocrisy inspires other nations to push back against catastrophizing by elites; Bjorn Lomberg’s False Alarm: How Climate Change Panic Costs Us Trillions, Hurts the Poor, and Fails to Fix the Planet develops a cult-like-following among emerging countries with abundant hydrocarbon reserves.
The Chinese gender imbalance leads to a large pool of spouseless men who become disgruntled and restive. To minimize the perceived threat to stability, the CCP launches a development assistance program that grants interest-free loans to countries with more females than males, with a requirement they offer residency and work visas to Chinese males. Moldova, Latvia, Armenia, Georgia, Belarus, Lithuania, Tonga, and Serbia immediately sign up for the program.
An increasingly competitive dynamic emerges among contenders seeking to succeed President Donald Trump, splitting the Republican Party into two factions (MAGA vs. MAHA?) that each threaten to leave and start their own party. On the back of such infighting, Democrat strategists salivate at the possibility of a midterm “Blue Wave” that fails to materialize.
Private equity begins to feel the pinch of higher interest rates and starts investing at lower multiples, leading to disappointing returns for prior vintages. Holding companies and conglomerates with the ability to redeploy cash flow into the most promising opportunities emerge as the most productive return generators.
Holding companies and conglomerates with the ability to redeploy cash flow into the most promising opportunities emerge as the most productive return generators.
Persistent work from home pressures continue to be a headwind for commercial real estate, specifically office buildings. Despite the acknowledged loss of productivity and employer demands that workers return to the office, large employers find the tight labor market prevents material changes in work from home practices which seem to be set. A sudden and rapid adoption of augmented and virtual reality headsets increases work-from-home productivity as managers are better able to monitor employee engagement.
The world increasingly bifurcates into countries that respect individuals and those that prioritize the community or group. This individualist-collectivist divide leads to a resurgence of interest in the ideas of Atlas Shrugged. Standing out and producing become the gold standards of measuring usefulness in individualist societies while blending in and not-rocking-the-boat is highly valued in collectivist societies.
Corporate America abandons stakeholder capitalism en masse and embraces shareholder capitalism in a move that revitalizes innovation and productivity. DEI goals, ESG metrics other non-economic considerations are acknowledged as being de facto socialist in objective and are removed from the criteria used by investors and boards to evaluate management performance.
Each year, I end my predictions with the prescient words of John Kenneth Galbraith, who eloquently captures the essence of forecasters. There are, he notes, two types: “those who don’t know and those who don’t know they don’t know.” Feel free to decide which you think I am, but I do hope that these 25 possibilities are useful in spurring your thoughts.
And if you find today’s overwhelming uncertainty distressing, don’t! Remember that uncertainty and opportunity are two sides of the same coin — you can’t have one without the other! I’ll leave you with an excerpt from Fleetwood Mac’s hit song “Don’t Stop” which I often have conference organizers play as my “walking up on stage” music.
Best wishes for a happy, healthy, and productive 2025!
Regards,
Vikram
VIKRAM MANSHARAMANI is an entrepreneur, consultant, scholar, neighbor, husband, father, volunteer, and professional generalist who thinks in multiple-dimensions and looks beyond the short-term. Self-taught to think around corners and connect original dots, he spends his time speaking with global leaders in business, government, academia, and journalism. LinkedIn has twice listed him as its #1 Top Voice in Money & Finance, and Worth profiled him as one of the 100 Most Powerful People in Global Finance. Vikram earned a PhD From MIT, has taught at Yale and Harvard, and is the author of three books, The Making of a Generalist: An Independent Thinker Finds Unconventional Success in an Uncertain World, Think for Yourself: Restoring Common Sense in an Age of Experts and Artificial Intelligence and Boombustology: Spotting Financial Bubbles Before They Burst. Vikram lives in Lincoln, New Hampshire with his wife and two children, where they can usually be found hiking or skiing.