Photo by Jose Antonio Gallego Vázquez on Unsplash
Even as the Delta and the other Covid variants are proving to skeptics that we’re not out of the woods, there are plenty of reasons for optimism for 2022 and beyond.
A number of encouraging signs point to a Great Reset across the globe:
1- Amid overexposure of Covid skeptics and antivax it’s clear these are minorities of activists.
Even in Florida, a majority is in favor of masking and masking. Quinnipiac’s latest poll on Aug 24 finds that “6 In 10 Floridians Support Requiring Masks In Schools”.
France is also rife with antivax activists who spent the summer demonstrating against President Macron’s measures. Their numbers are insignificant as 10 million French citizens got a jab when it became mandatory to re-access public spaces. Media on both sides of the Atlantic have been guilty of over-exposing what remains a minority opinion and stance. An overwhelming swell of citizens are practicing common sense and placing their trust in public health officials.
2- For a growing share of professionals the nature of work itself is shifting.
2020 metastasized a number of trends that were already clear, chief among them the pent up productivity linked to remote work. A landmark 2013 study already pointed to the boost provided by remote work and Fed Chair Powell addressed the changing nature of work in his Aug 17 remarks to educators and students. The nature of work itself is shifting for millions of professionals who value their time with loved ones and recognize how broken our shared experiences were pre-pandemic. As too few have clearly spelled out - Jacques Attali is a notable exception - without our current distributed IT infrastructure /connected workplace G7 economies would have nosedived. Imagine if COVID had forced lockdowns and remote work in the age of the fax machine !
3- Global cooperation among G20 economies is being reignited, the global corporate tax guidelines is a first sign. The alliance of liberal democracies is a reality and its diplomatic weight is paramount.
The pendulum is swinging back towards an increased role for government and one of the first testaments to this remains the landmark G20 accord on taxation, led by the US. The coming together of G20 economies towards a common purpose on a fundamentally sovereign attribute such as taxation bodes well that we are witnessing a renaissance of global cooperation. Rolling back the ahistorical Trump term, Biden's America has been putting together an alliance of liberal democracies against the Russian-Chinese condominium of authoritarian interests.
4- Summer 2021 will surely be remembered as the moment the last holdovers became convinced that climate change was our shared reality.
Europe and North America experienced a series of once-in-a-century floods and fires which is helping convince the last pockets of doubters climate change is indeed our shared reality. Just as with vaccines will remain a small cluster of contrarians but their political and institutional power is waning. Major tectonic shifts are in play deep in the heart of the carbon economy as activist investors are using capitalism’s tools to effect change.
5- Liberal democracies’ institutions show their weaknesses yet remain the best framework for progress.
Fading ideological debates, waning voting participation, and democratic hijacking by the likes of Orban and Trump can inspire despair in our democracies, yet they maintain their superiority as vehicles for progress. China’s “model” is showing its limits as the few freedoms enjoyed by citizens are being curtailed, passport renewals and new passports are being stopped and Xi Jinping builds a new Iron Curtain and is publicly shunning most foreign influences to preserve his vision of a neo-Maoist Middle Kingdom. Liberal democracies’ Achilles heel, the voter, can also be their savior.
6- Demography points to a different future with better opportunities for all.
After decades of warning our planet would see more than 10 billion humans, demographers are revising their forecasts downwards. Women all over the globe, particularly in emerging economies, are able to control the number of children they bring into the world and these children are afforded a better life overall. A world where we are fewer because everyone is a chosen wild also means better outcomes for individual futures, with better opportunities.
7- Technology opens up a better future, especially to combat and contain Climate Change to 1.5C.
The future will be what we make it and we have the tools to combat and contain the effects of climate change, with the goal to keep our global warming to 1.5C. We need collective awakening that caution and timid steps are a thing of the past and that preparing the future entails massive investment on a global scale, for the benefit of all.
We stand on the shoulders of the few thousand hunter gatherers who left the Rift Valley, defied the odds and survived because of our very human superpower: cooperation and collaboration. Let’s make our ancestors and our descendants proud and usher in a renaissance of the human condition.