Inevitable Surprises: Thinking Ahead in a Time of Turbulence

         by Peter Schwartz
         Gotham Books (Penguin Group)
         Publication Date: June 2003
         Price: $27.00, Hardcover
         Pages: 247 pages
         ISBN: 1-59240-027-2
       
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This was originally going to be another how-to book about scenario planning from the man who had codified the Shell method into a breakthrough guide, The Art of the Long View. As we began talking, however, it became clear that Peter's real vision was a clear sense of the inevitabilities: the trends that could not be ignored because they were already underway. "Inevitable surprises" is another name for the standard scenario planning device of "predetermined elements," in other words. And if you can name a set of reliable predetermined elements, concisely and clearly with a fair amount of precision, then you give people a real basis for action.

Here are the certain surprises that Peter identifies for the next 25 years:

• A world integrated with elders (as aging slows down and lifespans increase, particularly in the developed world) - including a surprising number of aging felons released back onto the streets;
• Huge unprecedented migrations (Asians into the U.S., Muslims into Europe, and Chinese men everywhere);
• The return of the long economic boom, but slower and steadier than in the late 1990s, driven by productivity, globalization and infrastructure innovation;
• The U.S. continues as a "rogue superpower," no matter who is elected President in 2004;
• The U.S. military outpacing all other military capabilities, even more than today (using "Star Wars," for instance, as a pre-emptive weapon);
• The rest of the world is divided between "orderly nations," focused on the international rule of law, and "disorderly nations," which find it almost impossible to recover from poverty, terrorism, and crime;
•Huge growth in passionate Christian and Muslim populations, with the possibility of war between them exacerbated;
• Ecological improvement throughout the world and an opening up of energy possibilities for the first time since the creation of the automobile;
• A renaissance in scientific discovery, including pure physics and biology, that might well dwarf the advances of the 20th Century.

All within the lifetimes of most of us.

This book was one of the smoothest to produce in my experience. Peter knew what he wanted to say. My job was to capture it and to push him, as often as possible, to recognize resonances that he would otherwise not have seen. The greatest resonance of all comes at the end of the book, and it is pure Schwartz: The recognition that when all these factors commingle, they're almost certain to produce a "singularity" - a turning point beyond which humanity is not the same. We don't need a Vernor-Vinge-style revolution in computer power to accomplish this. It'll happen anyway.

Something happened editorially with this book that never happened to me before. We slipped our deadlines a bit - well, a lot - and the editor scheduled the book anyway. There came an awful moment when we realized that, to complete the book, we'd have to draft eight chapters in less than five weeks. And we did. I still go around saying, "Well, if things get really rough, I can always take on more ghostwriting work. After all, I wrote an entire book in a month."

And my associate says, "Yeah, but it was a month of hell."