Larry Taub is a futurist and author and describes himself as a Macro-Historian. B.A. in History from New York University, with minors in Political Science and French. Taub chose not to return to Harvard University School of Law from a two-year leave of absence. Instead he went to the Sorbonne, Paris, to earn a certificate to teach French. In the years that followed, he lived and worked in Los Angeles, Paris, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Israel, India, Katmandu, New York, Munich, and Australia. He eventually settled in Tokyo, where he has lived for 25 years. His book, “The Spiritual Imperative: Sex, Age, and the Last Caste", presents his macrohistorical discoveries and predicts future trends based on them. He has published articles on the subject, and has successfully predicted unexpected trends and events since the late 1970s. The Japanese edition of his book has been a best-seller, and it is also available in Spanish. The Korean edition will be out shortly. Most of Mr. Taub's ideas for Wi-We are related to his macro-history models, as described in his book and in a recent article in the Futures Bulletin (published by the World Futures Studies Federation).

Q. Could you propose Wild Cards based on your macro-history ideas, and point to associated Weak Signals?

Yes, I can imagine the following:

Spirituality becomes increasingly separated from organized and established religion: Massive disengagement of people from established religions, and movement to spiritual expressions outside religion. Within organized and established religions and religious groups, massive movement away from orthodox, literal, and fundamentalist beliefs and practices toward the spiritual tendencies within them. This trend will include spiritual attitudes to issues such as environment protection and climate change, animal rights, gay liberation, moral values etc. This is a worldwide movement that searches for a new world view based on new spirituality: a new version of the Renaissance. It means a reorientation of how humans see the world: a new holistic view of nature and the universe.

Vegetarianism becomes widespread worldwide, with huge impact on the food industry and economic implications.

De-criminalization or legalization of drugs. This will have important social implications and tremendous impact on security and economy of many countries, in particular Mexico and other countries in Latin America.

Disappearing of male chauvinism and "machismo". In this scenario, the majority of world leaders (including heads of states) are women. Even in the religious establishments, both orthodox/fundamentalist and reformist, women become more powerful and dominant. High impact on changing the world view of fundamentalist movements, moving them in a more spiritual direction.

Associated weak signals: more participation of women in governments, in the economy and in religious circles. Women have played reformist role in all religions. There is even a feminist movement ("Kolech") among the "haredim" (the ultra-orthodox Jews) in Israel.

Forming of new international unions similar to the EU:

"Polario": a union that will include the US, Russia, Canada and Scandinavia.

Associated weak signal: Shift in US policy by the Obama government more favorable toward Russia, i.e. by replacing the Bush government’s plan to deploy a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic with a different plan.

"Confucio": East Asian union: China, Taiwan, Korea (reunified) and Japan.

Associated weak signals: Election of the Japan Democratic Party (JDP) as the governing party of Japan and of its leader, Yukio Hatoyama, as Japan’s new Prime Minister, after more than 60 years of almost total rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). Recent thawing (again) of relations between North and South Korea.

“Pan Semitic Union” in the Middle East: Israel and the Arab countries.

Other unions all across the “Religious Belt”, that stretch of land between Tibet, Bangladesh, and India in the East, westward through Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and Islamic central Asia, through the Middle East and Turkey, all the way across North Africa. Israel, Iran, and India will become close collaborators as part of this process.

Major shifts of world power: First, over the next 20 years, from West to East (Confucio as No. 1). Then, from the present industrialized North to the Religious Belt (Israel, the Arab countries, Iran, India, and the federations they will form). Finally, the latter part of the century will witness the rising power and influence of Africa (and indigenous people in general).

Mass migration of Jews from North America to Israel, for at least four different reasons: social (rise in anti-Semitism), economic (increasing economic opportunities in the Middle East), political, and religious.

End of human labor/work as we know it: End of present payment-for-time-or-task system and its replacement by a universal co-ownership, “shareholder” system. Machines do most work, humans do what little the machines cannot do, share the profits, and try to figure out how to spend their endless leisure time creatively.

Q. What is your opinion on the Wi-We methodology?

I think that the current approaches for detecting Wild Cards and spotting Weak Signals are excellent. But practitioners, I feel, overlook the value of macro-history. It is probably true that most macrohistories are useless for Wi-We. But not all, and the three that form the subject of my book, the Sex, Age, and Caste Models, I feel, would be especially useful as Wi-We methodologies. So I suggest that Wi-We methodologists should add them to their repertoire.

Supplement:

In a recent article "Road to Polario: The Coming Russian-American Alliance" Mr. Taub wrote;

"The year is 2020 and the unthinkable has happened -- the US and Russia, together with Canada, several USSR successor states, and the Nordic countries, have announced the formation of Polario, a political and economic union along the lines of the European Union. Economic, security, and mutual confrontation issues, as well as the rise of Europa and Confucio (the East Asian Union), have finally forced the hands of the two ex-superpowers. An economic-political union together with the other countries around the North Pole has seemed the only way to solve their problems “permanently“. Far-fetched? That’s what people would also have said in the 1940s, if you had predicted a union that would have included Germany, England, and France. Today, given the “unfriendly“ and “unpredictable“ relationship between Russia and the US, most people I have discussed this with say that such a forecast is one of the most ridiculous ideas they’ve ever heard. Nevertheless, according to my book, The Spiritual Imperative: Sex, Age, and the Last Caste, an alliance between Russia and the US is almost inevitable, probably by the year 2020. The Spiritual Imperative gives a “big picture“ of history and forecasts trends that are likely to happen over the next hundred years, including this one, which I’d like to explore here."

In the concluding section he wrote: "So if I were you, I would start investing in the polar (or drouble: the rouble-dollar) and polar-denominated securities today, when they are not only cheap, they don’t even yet exist."