How do computers and robots change the meaning of being human? How do we deal with the epidemic of fake news? Are nations and religions still relevant? What should we teach our children? As technology advances faster than our understanding of it, hacking becomes a tactic of war, and the world feels more polarized than ever, Yuval Harari addresses the challenge of navigating life in the face of constant and disorienting change and raises the important questions we need to ask ourselves in order to survive. How can we retain freedom of choice when Big Data is watching us? What will the future workforce look like, and how should we ready ourselves for it? How should we deal with the threat of terrorism? Why is liberal democracy in crisis? Harari invites us to consider values, meaning, and personal engagement in a world full of noise and uncertainty. When we are deluged with irrelevant information, clarity is power.

“Conventional analysis suffers from a profound failure of imagination. It imagines passing clouds to be permanent and is blind to powerful, long-term shifts taking place in full view of the world.” —George Friedman In his long-awaited and provocative new book, George Friedman turns his eye on the future—offering a lucid, highly readable forecast of the changes we can expect around the world during the twenty-first century. He explains where and why future wars will erupt (and how they will be fought), which nations will gain and lose economic and political power, and how new technologies and cultural trends will alter the way we live in the new century. The Next 100 Years draws on a fascinating exploration of history and geopolitical patterns dating back hundreds of years. Friedman shows that we are now, for the first time in half a millennium, at the dawn of a new era—with changes in store, including: • The U.S.-Jihadist war will conclude—replaced by a second full-blown cold war with Russia. • China will undergo a major extended internal crisis, and Mexico will emerge as an important world power. • A new global war will unfold toward the middle of the century between the United States and an unexpected coalition from Eastern Europe, Eurasia, and the Far East; but armies will be much smaller and wars will be less deadly. • Technology will focus on space—both for major military uses and for a dramatic new energy resource that will have radical environmental implications. • The United States will experience a Golden Age in the second half of the century. Written with the keen insight and thoughtful analysis that has made George Friedman a renowned expert in geopolitics and forecasting, The Next 100 Years presents a fascinating picture of what lies ahead. For continual, updated analysis and supplemental material, go to www.Stratfor.com

Even in the flattest landscape there are passes where the road first climbs to a peak and then descends into a new valley. Most of these passes are simply topography with little or no difference in climate, language, or culture between the valleys on either side. But some passes are different: they are true divides. History too knows such divides. Once these divides have been crossed, the social and political landscape changes; the social and political climate is different, and so is the social and political language. Some time between 1965 and 1973 we passed over such a divide and entered "the next century." Challenging, insightful, and provocative, Peter Drucker's "The New Realities" anticipates the central issues of a rapidly changing world. When it was initially published, in 1989, some reviewers mistakenly thought "The New Realities" was a book about the future, or in other words, a series of predictions. But, as indicated in the title, the book discusses "realities." Drucker argues that events of the next thirty to forty years, or even further on, had already largely been defined by events of the previous half-century. Thus, Drucker discusses episodes in world history that had not yet happened at the time of the book's initial publication, such as: the archaism of the hope for "salvation by society" in "The End of FDR's America"; the democratization of the Soviet Union in "When the Russian Empire is Gone"; the technology boom of the 1990s in "The Information-Based Organization"; and the evolution of management in "Management as Social Function and Liberal Art." Graced with a new preface by the author that discusses both reactions to the original publication of the book and how important it is for decision-makers to consider the past and present when planning for the future, "The New Realities" is mandatory reading for understanding politics, government, the economy, information technology, and business in an ever-changing world.

A best-selling work in France considers what the world will be like throughout the century to come, drawing on the precedents of nine distinct historical periods to predict such future scenarios as a democratic world government and an international community that is significantly impacted by nuclear technology.

"A world in which the leading liberal-democratic nation does not assume its role as world policeman will become a world in which dictatorships contend, or unite, to fill the breach. Americans seeking a return to an isolationist garden of Eden--alone and undisturbed in the world, knowing neither good nor evil--will soon find themselves living within shooting range of global pandemonium." --From the Introduction In a brilliant book that will elevate foreign policy in the national conversation, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Bret Stephens makes a powerful case for American intervention abroad. In December 2011 the last American soldier left Iraq. "We're leaving behind a sovereign, stable, and self-reliant Iraq," boasted President Obama. He was proved devastatingly wrong less than three years later as jihadists seized the Iraqi city of Mosul. The event cast another dark shadow over the future of global order--a shadow, which, Bret Stephens argues, we ignore at our peril. America in Retreat identifies a profound crisis on the global horizon. As Americans seek to withdraw from the world to tend to domestic problems, America's adversaries spy opportunity. Vladimir Putin's ambitions to restore the glory of the czarist empire go effectively unchecked, as do China's attempts to expand its maritime claims in the South China Sea, as do Iran's efforts to develop nuclear capabilities. Civil war in Syria displaces millions throughout the Middle East while turbocharging the forces of radical Islam. Long-time allies such as Japan, Saudi Arabia, and Israel, doubting the credibility of American security guarantees, are tempted to freelance their foreign policy, irrespective of U.S. interests. Deploying his characteristic stylistic flair and intellectual prowess, Stephens argues for American reengagement abroad. He explains how military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan was the right course of action, foolishly executed. He traces the intellectual continuity between anti-interventionist statesmen such as Henry Wallace and Robert Taft in the late 1940s and Barack Obama and Rand Paul today. And he makes an unapologetic case for Pax Americana, "a world in which English is the default language of business, diplomacy, tourism, and technology; in which markets are global, capital is mobile, and trade is increasingly free; in which values of openness and tolerance are, when not the norm, often the aspiration." In a terrifying chapter imagining the world of 2019, Stephens shows what could lie in store if Americans continue on their current course. Yet we are not doomed to this future. Stephens makes a passionate rejoinder to those who argue that America is in decline, a process that is often beyond the reach of political cures. Instead, we are in retreat--the result of faulty, but reversible, policy choices. By embracing its historic responsibility as the world's policeman, America can safeguard not only greater peace in the world but also greater prosperity at home. At once lively and sobering, America in Retreat offers trenchant analysis of the gravest threat to global order, from a rising star of political commentary.

Rapid developments in information technology and precision weaponry are said to herald a 'revolution in military affairs' (RMA), making possible quick and decisive victories with minimal casualties and collateral damage. But has such a revolution taken place? The issues that drive conflict will persist, and many of the technical advances associated with the RMA will not necessarily produce a transformation in the nature of warfare. The end of the Cold War has highlighted another revolution one in political affairs. Major powers appear less likely to go to war with one another than they are to intervene in conflicts involving weak states, with potential opponents including militia groups, drug cartels and terrorists. RMA technology may be less suited to conflicts such as these. If the cumulative effect of these changes has produced a revolution, it is a revolution in strategic, as much as military, affairs. This paper argues that: the RMA is the practical expression of a 'Western Way of Warfare', the key features of which are: professional armed forces; intolerance of casualties; and intolerance of collateral damage the key technological and conceptual components of the RMA were in place by the early 1970s. The trend has therefore been evolutionary, rather than revolutionary. The significant difference is in the new political setting of the end of the Cold War, and the revolution in perceptions of Western particularly US conventional military strength brought about by the Gulf War of 1991 the Gulf conflict could mark the start of a true 'revolution' if future battles offer similar opportunities to exploit the RMA's technology. However, since the US and its allies appear unbeatable when fighting on their own terms, future opponents will fight differently the West will therefore face opponents who will follow strategies that contradict the Western Way of Warfare. They will avoid pitched battles, will exploit the West's reluctance to inflict civilian suffering, and will target their opponent's domestic political base, as much as its forward troops. The problem for the West is not how to prevail, but how to do so in an acceptable manner. The more warfare becomes entwined with civilian activity, the more difficult it is to respond with the type of decisive and overwhelming military means embodied in the RMA. The RMA does not create a situation in which information is the only commodity at stake, and so does not offer the prospect of a 'virtual war'. The new circumstances and capabilities do not prescribe one strategy, but extend the range of strategies available. The issue underlying the RMA is the ability of Western countries, in particular the US, to follow a line geared to their own interests and capabilities.