When speaking about the future, we often speak only about the disintegration of the global world into pan-regions, completely ignoring both other scenarios and further developments. What will happen after the formation of pan-regions, when yesterday's allies begin to fight among themselves for resources, territories, population and meanings?
Despite the fact that the question of the structure of the future world is one of the central among the materials of the portal, the vast majority of articles and statements boil down to the following:
- a global world in crisis;
- the world will disintegrate into pan-regions / monetary-economic zones;
- to whom and what the disintegration process threatens, and what to do.
Among the comments, the discussion of the above topics prevails, both in a constructive manner and in a negative way - "you are all lying, nothing in the world will change." At the same time, there are no very important things among the materials - a comprehensive consideration of all possible scenarios for the development of the world in the medium term and an analysis of further development.
This gap must be filled, otherwise the picture is fragmentary and unsystematic, creating the illusion of weakness of positions.
Medium term
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the world entered a period of globalization based on right-liberal principles. The concept of a crisis-free existence was formulated, and it seemed to many that the achieved advantage could not be lost. But reality, as always, laughed at human stupidity and self-conceit - the global idea of the world order is rapidly degrading. Some ten years ago, the United States, under the control of Finintern, was the main one in the world and consistently ground everyone under its own principles and laws. Now the states have practically escaped from the tutelage of financiers and are purposefully losing weight, becoming "only" "First among equals." At the same time, the process of de-globalization continues.
World Scenario Tree.
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Scenarios for the further development of the world are shown in the picture. The darker the color used for painting, the more likely, in my subjective opinion, it is. The arrows show the transitions between the scenarios, the arrow to the right edge of the picture means that the scenario is stable and goes into the future. Let's consider the scenarios for the coming years in more detail.
Scenario "Neo-imperialism, multiculturalism"is inertial and until 2012 the world was dominated by the opinion of its predetermination and dominance. I will say more, most of our liberals are still in these fantasies. But this scenario is practically closed. Immediately after the crisis in 2008, on the basis of the G20 and other venues, they enthusiastically discussed how to get out of the crisis and further develop the world, and after 2012, as it was cut off, there is no such topic in public discourse. Is everything working out? Not at all. The development of a global right-wing liberal world is postulated at the level of duty, obligatory and meaningless slogans, and that's all. To implement this scenario, it is necessary to break practically all the trends in the economy and politics, and for this there are neither resources nor consensus of the elites. Finintern is trying to regain control of the United States and / or launch a new globalism in alliance with China and Britain,but they do not succeed. All they can achieve is to delay the processes, but not to expand them in any way. The interests of this scenario are clear - Finintern, China, Britain, EU, Saudi Arabia, Israel.
China's attempt to lead globalization does not stand out as a separate scenario. In China's strategy, it was understood in detail that this was essentially a game of Finintern with Britain, i.e. all the same neo-imperialist project or an attempt to equip your pan-region by making it as large as possible.
"The multipolar world of pan-regions" - this scenario has been substantiated by M. L. Khazin, and we will not dwell on this issue in detail - those who wish can find many materials on the portal. The main thing is that at the present time this scenario is the main and most probable one, no matter how anyone wants the opposite. Who is interested in this scenario? Patriotic elites of the United States, continental Europe, the BRICS countries (except China) and other potential subjects of the geopolitical game. This scenario has the most supporters in the world.
In recent years, there have been several periods when the world has come close to the scenario of "Global catastrophe / war", the clash of powers on the principle of war for the sake of war, up to the local use of nuclear weapons and fragmentation of the world. In particular, we could go in this direction in the event of H. Clinton's victory in the 2016 elections, as well as the logic of events after the destruction by the Ukrainians and their curators of the Malaysian Boeing. Now the likelihood of this scenario being realized has become much less, and the trend for a further decline continues. Potential actors of this scenario are Finintern, Britain, the Islamic world, for the rest this game does not bring anything good.
In addition to the rather obvious, the above scenarios, there is another "Invasion of neo-barbarians", in fact, a new large migration of peoples, with the subsequent degradation of states, social relations and economies. The result will be a throwback of world civilization far back. This scenario is beneficial to the same players as the global war option, only add India.
Thus, the most likely development of events is the disintegration of the world into pan-regions. This option is acceptable or favorable for all countries, regions, peoples and elites of the world with the exception of Finintern and China. For Russia, the collapse of the global world provides a chance not only to preserve, but also to return the role of a geopolitical player. The likelihood of the rest of the scenario is low and continues to fall every day, so the inertial version - "Neo-imperialism" is now practically closed.
Actually, here we have exhausted all the topics touched upon on the portal about the future development of the world, and are moving into the new area - what scenarios for the further development of the world are in the long term.
The future after a multipolar world
The entire scenario tree is divided into three groups according to the degree of concentration - the world is global, the world is divided into regions and the world is fragmented into separate local structures and associations.
After the most probable scenario of the world disintegration into pan-regions, the tendency towards an increase in the division of labor and unification will remain; let us separately recall the influence of robotization as part of the transition to the sixth technological order and an increase in the potential for the growth of the system of division of labor. There are three scenarios for the further development of the world, we will dwell on them in more detail.
A multipolar world is an unstable structure, geopolitical projects that are weak in the financial, military or psycho-historical part will be absorbed by the stronger ones, repeating the history of the 20th century. There are two stable positions to which there will be movement - one or three centers.
"Tripolar world"is one of the attractors of further development. The domination of the world by three geopolitical players with different meanings can ensure a balance for a long time. It is important that the centers are "distant" from each other in the field of psychohistory, so that absorption or long-term union is impossible. As a result of the Second World War, the USA, Britain and the USSR were left, which did not create a stable structure, the meanings of the first two were very close, which led to a natural result. And then there was a bipolar confrontation that could not last long. There is no point in talking about the Non-Aligned Movement - it was not a subject and a player, being, in fact, a swamp and a game board. Ideally, if three geopolitical players are located in different squares on the diagram of meanings of geopolitical players: "conservative-liberal","Left-right". There can be only one exception - all three projects will be right-wing conservative, for example - Christian, Islamic and Indian, the construction will be stable, but its formation in the modern world is beyond reality.
The ideology of geopolitical projects.
The figure shows an updated diagram of the ideologies / meanings of potential geopolitical players. I slightly adjusted the position compared to the previous version, but at the moment the only interesting thing is the position of the projects in the squares. As you can see, the project of the left-wing globalists has no competition, and if Latin America can create its own geopolitical project, as I recall, this is one of the most interesting and promising projects, then their future is very non-trivial. The situation with Russia is similar, if the inertial scenario "Third Rome" is abandoned, we have only China as competitors, but taking into account its low specification, there are no competitors in the left-conservative camp.
The next two squares are highly competitive, and given the failure of the global project of right-wing liberals, one of the right-wing conservatives will emerge in the top three.
Thus, the configuration of the tripolar world is as follows:
- left-conservative project of Russia / fallback - China;
- the left-liberal project of Latin America;
- right-wing conservative US project / any of the projects in this quarter, including continuing to rule China.
In the absence of one of the strong left projects, right-wing liberals again enter the scene.
What's the main takeaway? A left-wing conservative project must be built in Russia, and it must survive until there are only three poles of power left. The second conclusion is that for a long-term perspective, Russia needs a strong Latin America in the world.
A new attempt at globalization
If the stable state is passed this time too - the tripolar world, then we will face a new attempt to unite the world. In this case, there are two scenarios of globalization - “One world for all” and “One world for the elite”. "One world for the elite"will be formed if the right-wing project wins in the competition of geopolitical projects. As concrete options, there will be totalitarian scenarios of a "new caste society", "space colonialism", "global ecology", "the world of transhumanism", "the world of technological singularity" and other projects. All of these scripts are currently closed. For example, “global environmentalism” was finally shot by D. Trump by torpedoing the Paris climate agreement, and the “technological singularity” scenario did not gain a critical mass of “believers”. It is necessary to say about "digital slavery", this is not a separate scenario, but an integral part of almost any variant of the future in the format "one world for the elite".
Let's move on to the “One World for All” scenario. By analogy with the previous one, it will begin to be realized in the case of globalization based on the left project. So far, only two options are visible - noospheric liberalism (in Voltaire's sense) and noospheric communism, this is not enough and there should be more options.
It is necessary to explain why the probability of a tripolar world, I think, is higher than the next attempt at globalization - the previous attempt was unsuccessful, there is a law of redundancy in the universe, which is contradicted by a single global world, any globalization interferes too much with the free will of man given by the Lord.
Maybe in the future the tripolar world will again take the path of globalization? There is such a chance, but with a greater probability, the emergence of a tripolar world will open up new scenarios for a more balanced development for humanity, compared to globalization.
Post-disaster scenarios
The fragmentation of the world as a result of catastrophic development options will throw humanity far back, but at the same time it will open several scenarios that were missed earlier. The inertial scenario after a global war will be "Dark Ages". The degradation of the social, political, economic and ethnocultural structure of the world will be significant, not until the Stone Age, of course, but it will not seem a little. A lot will be lost, and given the global nature of the preceding processes, it will affect everyone. In the history of mankind there were similar periods of decline, for comparison, the number of Rome during the Roman Republic was reached only at the beginning of the 20th century. It is clear that we are not talking about a couple of millennia, but several generations will remember the current years as the “golden age”.
In addition to the "Dark Ages", which will be characterized by a very deep fragmentation and degradation, two previously missed scenarios will open - "The World of Corporations" and "The World of Polises". In the first scenario, the corporatocrats, the technocracy of the post-industrial society, gain power. The world will not be good at all, since the best corporation cares about the population (people who do not work in it) worse than the absolute majority of states. Given the degradation of traditional government structures, this path can be quite stable. Subsequently, this scenario will develop in the direction of - globalization in the version "One world for the elite".
The second scenario is characterized by the creation of independent cities / agglomerations around the world and the loss of the concept of "nation". Unlike the World of Corporations, the further development of this scenario will follow the traditional path - the World of Neo-Empires - globalization. By the way, the world can follow the path of building empires (of all kinds) right after the disaster. The "world of neo-empires" in terms of organization and principles of existence will largely repeat the period of the 19th and early 20th centuries, only the players, countries and peoples will change significantly. But all the same, it will be a repetition of the path traveled once.
Thus, the development of catastrophic scenarios can either repeat the path already traveled once, or open new paths, only I doubt that this will have a positive meaning for humanity as a whole.
Conclusion
At the moment, the world has practically passed the crossroads of choice and has decided on the most probable scenario for further development, which will be the “Multipolar World”. Variants of disasters or preservation of a single global world already seem unrealistic. The Finintern and China will bear the greatest losses from de-globalization, while Russia may turn out to be one of the main beneficiaries.
Since the tendency to increase the division of labor remains, the attempt to unite will be repeated once more, but on principles different from the right-liberal principles. But this loop of history has an interesting alternative - a tripolar, stable world. In cases when Russia forms a left-conservative independent geopolitical project, we practically guarantee ourselves a place in the top three hegemons. At the moment, the other "finalists" are the United States, with a right-conservative project, and Latin America, with a left-liberal one.
If we miss the opportunity to form a tripolar world, then we will face a new round of globalization and another destruction of the Tower of Babel. At the same time, if the ideas of the right-wing project are taken as the basis for globalization, then we will have a completely unenviable totalitarian future, and it does not matter whether it will be a “new caste society”, “space colonialism”, “global ecology” or something else. The version of left globalism - "one world for all" is more attractive, but so far humanity has no understanding of how to put into practice Vernadsky's ideas about the noosphere.
Russia's program is clear - the formation of an independent left-conservative geopolitical project, preventing the emergence of other left-conservative projects in the world and all-round support for left-liberal ideas in Latin America, for the formation of its own project planning there.
ANDREY SHKOLNIKOV