Prof. David Passig is a futurist, lecturer and consultant who specializes in technological, social and educational futures. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Future Studies from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, USA. Prof. Passig is a faculty member at the Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel, where he teaches at the Graduate School of Education: Systems Theories, Future Methodologies, technological, social and educational futures. He is heading the Graduate Program in Information & Communication Technologies (ICT) as well as the Virtual Reality Laboratory. He has consulted with entities in Israel, Asia, Europe and North America.
In 2008 he published (in Hebrew) a book entitled "The Future Code" – about futures methodologies and their applications to foresee the future of Israel.
Q. Looking towards the future and thinking about wild cards, what are the current critical issues/trends, in your opinion?
The biggest problem (in Europe in particular), that will drive new types of research and new developments, including possible wild cards, is the demographic problem.
2020 will be the first year in human history in which people older than 64 will outnumber children aged 5 or less. This is a very important strong signal. The impact on Europe will be enormous, because there will be no sufficient young, creative and productive work force to replace the old. This situation implies that huge effort is needed to develop technological solutions, namely robotics and automation. Robots will be needed to do everyday work in houses, to help in health care, in everything.
The most critical point is related to military defense. The society will refuse to let the young to risk their lives. Here again robotics is relevant. These are critical trends.
Q. Can you mention major potential wild cards?
Yes, I can envision several wild cards.
Wild Card: Military conflict with Russia
The east-west conflict is not over. History shows that sudden ends of conflicts are not really ends, and the conflicts tend to re-emerge in even more dangerous forms. Russia is not accepting its defeat. It is coming back, and Europe will have to deal with the new threat. Russia is likely to come to the conclusion that it must take over Eastern Europe again and occupy the "lost" countries, perhaps other European countries too. Without these countries Russia feels exposed and defenseless. The weak signals are already here. The current tensions between the west and Russia (e.g. the deployment of US ballistic missiles in east Europe) indicate the possibility of this development. Russia will feel that it is their only way to survive the 21-st century. This situation will become even worse because of the serious demographic problem in Russia (diminishing of the young generation).
Implications: re-evaluation of the relations between Western Europe countries and the Baltic countries. Significant increase of defense/military research. Strengthening of NATO.
Because of the demographic problem (see above) and its current strategic military weakness, the EU will be forced to look for solutions: mercenaries, robots, increased military R&D... More investment will be needed is the development of defense (not security) technologies. The Security research programme is certainly insufficient. The EU is not prepared for a period of military tension/conflict. The current "altruistic" attitudes of the EU may prove to be a strategic mistake. Combined with the demographic problem (decreasing percentage of young population) it is becoming a serious strategic problem of the EU. The too little investments in defense R&D can become a critical strategic mistake, considering the large investments of Russia.
(We should remember that after the first world war nobody imagined that in less than 30 years there will be another world war.)
Although the above wild card and the "strong" signals are negative, they have positive aspects: Europe can become a world leader in robotics, if appropriate investments in R&D are made. The demographic problem also has positive potential: extension of life extension, more research on quality of life in old age and better health care, etc..
Wild Card: disintegration of China
China will not be able to manage such a huge country and population, and deal with huge economic differences between different regions. It will disintegrate into several independent countries.
Wild Card: Military conflict between Japan and the US
Japan will emerge as a new strong military power in the next decades. A military conflict between US and Japan is possible (in the mid 21-st century) for several reasons (it will be one of the topics covered in a new book that Passig is writing).
Wild Card: Energy from space as a real alternative to fossil fuels
There is a growing recognition that there are currently no real (affordable) alternatives to fossil fuels. The real future of energy is space: new technology that enables transmission of solar energy from space efficiently and affordable. (There are old ideas in this direction, but almost nobody is taking it seriously).
Q. Could you comments on the WI-WE methodology?
Learning from history, we must consider wild cards as the most important topic in futures studies. Currently too little attention is paid to this. The problem is that we don’t have yet a systematic method for identification of WI-WE's. Current methods are too primitive and insufficient. That's why wild cards are so surprising. The chances to identify wild cards by means of brainstormings are very low.
A promising approach (that has not been sufficiently explored yet) is to look at major current trends and to think what would happen if they are "reversed". To look at a completely opposite direction.
In fact, the very name "wild card" results from the fact that we don't have yet the appropriate methodology to analyse future trends. In reality there are no "wild cards". There are historic processes that need to be understood.
Supplement:
Wild Card Scenarios for Israel described in Passig's book "The Future Code":
- Violence and street brawls between citizens of well established and successful cities and failing cities
- In most of the nations surrounding Israel an accelerating process of social and national decay is underway. A flow of masses might storm the borders of Israel and no peace treaty will hold the collapse of the borders.
- A group of terrorists might detonate a small nuclear bomb in one of the US cities. The US might be persuaded to cut its strategic ties with Israel in response to the outcry of various local and international groups.
- By 2020 the price of an oil barrel might reach $500. In that case, the Israeli society will deteriorate to lower levels of complexity which might cause the Israeli elites to flee the country.
- A strong anti-religious movement might rise to challenge the religiosity of the state and succeed in separating the two.
