The Era of Multiple Transformations: Megatrends for Adults
You have heard it before: “We live in a complex and rapidly changing world that is filled with dangers and opportunities—and a multitude of challenges demanding innovation and creative leadership.”
Yet it is a basic truth of our times. It is the global context that demands change in the way you work and live. Either you will get swept along in what Robert Theobald has called “the rapids of change,” or you can make some attempt to understand the change in some greater detail and to structure your organization for necessary innovation.
I must stress that this attempt will always be imperfect. We cannot know what will happen in the future, and it is difficult to even know what is happening right now. Still, we can make an effort to get some sense of what is happening and what might happen; an imperfect effort is better than no effort at all. We can’t know exactly where we are headed, but if we want some control on where we end up—as individuals, organizations, and societies—we would be wise to put some handles on our whizzing world.
What I seek to provide here is a simple but systematic way to sketch the “multitude of challenges” that we face.
“TS3”: Transformations Scanning, Selection, and Synthesis
The label we use for our times and our society is important. Many profound changes are taking place simultaneously, so it is imperative to view the global context as “The Era of Multiple Transformations.” This may seem to be obvious yet we do not focus on a broad array of changes in the “organizational environment.” Instead, we focus on a single change: a mass society, a computerized society, a service society, a high-tech society, a globalizing economy, or a polluted society. All of these specific labels suggest truths. But no single label is close to adequate in describing the global context, and none is key to all the others.
To get useful handles on our era of multiple transformations, I propose the “TS3 Method,” standing for “Transformations Scanning, Selection, and Synthesis.” Three simple rules apply.
Scan Three Broad Categories: Technologies, Events, and Ideas
We can readily imagine the major forces that shape our individual lives. Technologies such as automobiles, television, computers, drugs, and air conditioners influence our lives for better and, if misused, for worse. Events are a major force in our lives: births, deaths, divorce, getting and losing a job, parenthood, a serious accident or disease, winning the lottery. Ideas are also influential: who we are, what we can be, what work we can and should do, where we live and work.
Similarly, we can use the same three broad categories in thinking about society and the global context of our organizations. Under each category, we can then list the three or four most important ongoing or potential changes. Under the heading of technology, the major clusters that are shaping society are information technologies, biotechnologies, energy technologies, and weapons technologies. (All will be subsequently discussed in somewhat finer detail.) The major events that could alter the course of society include war and nuclear-weapons detonation, economic collapse, population growth (the accumulation of billions of “blessed little events”), and environmental changes resulting from large and small acts of pollution. Ideas that shape society include images and concepts enjoying political power (conservative ideas, progressive ideas) and grassroots ideas that somehow gain widespread force (such as feminism, entrepreneurialism, the death penalty as an element of justice).
These three broad categories overlap, much like the wonderful old logo for Ballantine Beer, with its three rings for purity, body, and flavor. Technology can produce events and ideas; events can stimulate technologies and ideas; and ideas can result in technologies and events.
Consider Both Hopes and Fears
The “TS3 Method” involves megatrends for adults: an honest assessment of the most important aspects of what is happening, what is likely, and what is possible. As is true for any serious intelligence-gathering effort, one must avoid the distortions of both Pollyannas and Cassandras (Laqueur, 1985). It is especially difficult to avoid the childlike extreme of Pollyanna (Matlin & Stang, 1979), because of the widespread tendency to select the positive and to favor people who are upbeat and optimistic. Children evade problems and fantasize with a naive optimism or a debilitating pessimism.
Adults are more likely to face their problems with a “tough-minded optimism” (Gardner, 1963). Our society has a broad array of major problems; collective evasion will only allow many of them to become worse.
Change the List Over Time and to Fit Local Circumstances
Today’s big concern may quickly become small or disappear (urban riots in the 1960s; oil shocks and perceived resource limits in the 1970s). Other major transformations may be applicable only to a city, a region, or an organization (notably natural disasters such as hurricanes and earthquakes, or technological disasters such as Bhopal and Chernobyl).
A case in point is the AIDS epidemic. The disease was identified only a decade ago. It has been seen as a potentially transformative event only in the last few years, and is already stressing the healthcare system in a few major cities. If a vaccine or cure is not found in the next few years (presently considered by experts as unlikely), AIDS could well be one of the major societal problems of our time, with profound impacts on the economy, the health-care system, the family, and sexual behavior. If a vaccine or cure is found, AIDS could just as suddenly be removed from the list of transformations.
But let us put AIDS aside and look at some of the major transformative forces and possibilities, using the three basic categories to help in the scanning, selection, and synthesis.
Technologies
There is no question that we live not only in a highly technological society but in one for which many new tools are being developed, for better or worse. Thinking about technology is generally exciting and upbeat, but there is a downside to each of the technological clusters briefly discussed here.
It’s also known as the information society, the silicon society, the microchip revolution, or the computerized society. The computer, and its ability to store and manipulate information, is the central technology. Robots, talkwriters, and artificial intelligence represent advanced applications of computers.
Another stream of technology involves telecommunications: television, cable, satellites, mobile phones, and VCRs. The two streams of information technologies are merging, as already realized in videotex and, perhaps in a decade or so, to be realized in automatic language translators. In this sense, the French word telematique, anglicized as telematics, is particularly apt to describe the range of information-related technologies.
Still another stream is based on optics technology, involving a host of technologies based on lasers and glass fibers. Resulting products include fiber-optic cable, which will greatly enhance telecommunications capability, and compact discs, which greatly enhance data storage.
The impacts of this growing flood of new information-related technologies are numerous, and only beginning to be recognized. In 1986, I counted one hundred impacts of the new information technologies; today this inventory is surely higher.
What does it all mean? Clearly there are many benefits, as advertisers of consumer and office products ceaselessly point out. We have the ability to store and manipulate vast quantities of information, we have new and quicker access to these vast quantities, more and better linkages to people, enhanced thinking capability through “expert systems,” etc.
But there are three broad negative areas that should also be kept in mind: (1) Infoglut: A growing flood of information does not necessarily result in wisdom and may in many instances inhibit it. Moreover, the ready availability of video entertainment may be at the expense of civic edification about the problems of a complex and changing world: we may be amusing ourselves to death (Postman, 1985). (2) Misuse of Computers: The haul from computer crime is perhaps ten times as great as old-fashioned face-to-face bank heists. There are also legal uses of the new technology that have pernicious effects: paper entrepreneurialism of corporations, and the growth of interlocked data banks in government. (3) Unemployment: Most serious observers foresee more jobs lost than jobs created, at least in the short run, as a result of automation on farms, factories, and offices. Moreover, although some jobs are made exciting by computers, many other tasks are being “de-skilled,” which could lead to a bifurcated labor force of “Gods and Clods.”
Biotechnology Revolutions
Fast on the heels of the telematic revolution is a broad cluster of developments in biotechnology.
At a time when the extinction of naturally occurring plant and animal species is accelerating, the capability to create new species or modify existing species is also growing. Relatively little benefit has yet to be realized, but scientists and biobusinesses are excited by the many possibilities to transform agriculture (Doyle, 1985) through genetic/engineering. The downside of this prospect is the possibility of unleashing some new Frankenstein monster.
New drugs are constantly being developed, and new capabilities for scanning and modifying human genes can have an impact on many ailments. Perhaps the greatest biotransformation of all is the possibility for life extension. If the aging process is retarded, stopped, or possibly even reversed, many more people will be in the labor force at a time when jobs are made scarce by automation. And if more people retire and postpone their ultimate demise, think of the further problems we will have with Social Security! Our collective problems seem likely to be aggravated, but as individuals, would any of us prefer not to live a longer and more active life?
Energy was a major focus in the 1970s, when oil was scarce. Oil is now seemingly abundant and the price has dropped beyond anyone’s expectations (a prime illustration of the hazards of forecasting). Some experts argue that we are using oil more efficiently and that there is much more that might yet be discovered. But others warn that oil supplies are limited and that we will begin to run out in the next few decades, and that, as recent events dramatize, we are still vulnerable to a disruption of supply from the Middle East.
Developments in one or more of a score of potential technologies could result in energy that is cheap, abundant, reliable, and safe. There is promise in nuclear fusion, photovoltaics for capturing solar energy, super-batteries, hot dry-rock geothermal energy, new scrubber technologies to reduce the pollutants from burning coal, etc. A new mix of energy technologies may or may not have a transformative effect on our lives. The transition to this new mix may or may not be smooth. Despite the many exciting prospects, we aren’t out of the energy woods yet!
Other Technologies
Three other clusters of technologies deserve brief mention. A transformation is underway in the generally unspectacular but nevertheless important realm of materials. Plastics and ceramics are finding a wide variety of uses, in automobiles for example. A new process for coating objects with a film of synthetic diamond will enhance the durability of many objects. A new and much stronger cement is being developed, resulting in sturdier buildings.
A second cluster of technologies involves the tools for exploring and exploiting outer space.
A third cluster, somewhat overlapping with the second cluster, involves military technologies. There have been many advances in conventional weapons, as well as devices for delivering nuclear weapons. The Strategic Defense Initiative, or Star Wars, promises a whole new era of space-related military technologies which may or may not enhance national security. Nuclear weapons also may or may not enhance our security. There are today some 50,000 of these weapons in the world, with a total explosive yield 1.6 million times that of the Hiroshima bomb. A single twenty-megaton bomb would have a yield 1,600 times that of the Hiroshima bomb. The detonation of such a bomb would surely be a transformation, not only for the locality unfortunate enough to experience its force but quite possibly for the course of human affairs. How likely is this major event?
Events
In thinking about the future, we generally do not think about unscheduled events because they are unlikely and difficult to predict. Also, most events are negative. Yet we know from our personal lives that major events can be transformational, and we take precautions to avoid fire in our homes and automobile accidents when we travel. We purchase insurance to ease the impact of these improbable events. But they do happen, both for individuals and societies. In thinking broadly about an era of multiple transformations, then, we must think about the possible events, both large and small, that can have a major influence on society.
An Irradiated Society?
For the past forty-five years, we have entertained visions of nuclear holocaust. In the past few years, the ultimately negative vision of immediate destruction from all-out nuclear war has been supplemented by a vision of longer term ecological disaster from a nuclear winter. Certainly, this is a transformation to be avoided at all costs.
What is the likelihood of such a transformation in the next decade or so? It is small but possibly growing. One indicator is the “Doomsday Clock” expressing the sentiments of the editors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In December 1991 the clock stood at seventeen minutes to midnight.
It is somewhat more likely that we might experience a limited nuclear war, perhaps between Third World countries. Such an event would fall short of the image of nuclear holocaust, but it would involve much death and suffering.
It is far more likely—although still not probable—that a nuclear weapon will be exploded in the next decade or so as a result of a terrorist incident or an accident. The detonation of even a single bomb would result in far more damage and suffering than the Chernobyl accident.
The second major transformative event to fear is a major economic collapse. Clearly, a new globalized economy is in formation, encouraged by revolutions in communications and transportation. But this world economy is in precarious shape, with many nations deeply in debt and threatening default. Even in the United States, seemingly on an elusive path to economic “recovery,” the federal government faces a record deficit, there is a record trade deficit, and corporate and individual debt are also at record levels. What happens if these relatively good times come to an end?
In contrast to a nuclear weapons detonation, where thinking about it can help in prevention, thinking about a possible economic collapse could weaken our faith in the system and become a self-fulfilling prophecy. And so we content ourselves that “It can’t happen here”—the same sort of complacency that held, until recently, that space shuttles could get off the launch pad safely and that large chemical plants as in Bhopal were safe.
I am not contending that a Second Great Depression will happen but only that the possibility of such a calamitous event in the next decade or so is large enough that we must keep it in mind.
A Crowded Society
And now a shift from relatively discrete and sudden events to the global accumulation of small and often happy events of human birth. A good way to keep the basic figures in mind is to use this simple ditty: “Two, Four, Six, Eight: Think of How We Populate!”
Think about global population growth in the most general terms. In 1930 there were two billion people. In 1975 there were four billion. Shortly before the year 2000, there will be six billion, and this number will grow to eight billion by 2025—well within the lifetime of many of us. In 1986 we passed the midpoint of this growth from two billion to eight billion, with the announcement of more than five billion people.
Most of the expected growth—some ninety percent of it—will take place in the already overcrowded Third World. Indeed, in some parts of Africa, human population has outstripped the carrying capacity of the environment (Brown, Wolf, & Starke, 1986). We have added three billion people to the planet in the past sixty years, and are likely to add another three billion in the next thirty-five years. Where will we put them? Should we build structures up into the sky? Down into the earth? Out in the oceans? Will the flood of illegal immigrants from the poor countries to our relatively affluent country—estimated at a million a year in recent years—continue to increase at a rapid rate?
A Polluted Society
Each act of pollution is an event, and these events add up. Some forms of pollution (e.g., auto emissions) have been reduced in the last decade or so. But others have increased: for example, the various pollutants resulting in acid rain. This has led to the dying of some American forests, especially in the East. The forests of Europe are dying at an alarming rate. (Tropical forests are disappearing too, but for economic reasons.) Only in the past few years have we discovered the pernicious and expensive problem of toxic waste, which must be controlled and cleaned up. Release of chlorofluorocarbons has damaged the global ozone layer and is expected to result in an increase in cancer. The ultimate environmental catastrophe is the “greenhouse effect”: the warming of the global atmosphere due to human activity, resulting in climate change and melting of the polar icecaps, in turn flooding major low-lying cities.
We cannot continue to pollute the earth, and environmental consciousness must become part of our thinking (and our economics) sooner or later. This will involve a necessary transformation in our assessments of what can and cannot be done, and at what cost.
Other Events
What else could happen? Natural disasters (floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions) can transform a small country or a region of a large country. The United States is too large and diverse to suffer irreversibly from any one natural disaster, although a major earthquake of 8.0 Richter scale magnitude or more could strike either the West Coast or the Midwest in the next few decades.
The discovery of beings from outer space, although very unlikely, could have a very high impact (or it could merely be an ephemeral sensation). Presidential assassinations or sudden death in office can also change the course of a nation’s history, but this is unlikely, and the successor regime frequently carries out the predecessor’s policies. (This rumination leads to considering the impact of political regimes, below.)
A recent article reminded us that “Ideas Move Nations” (Easterbrook, 1986). Consideration of how this is so is a vast topic that can only be touched on briefly here by sketching three idea clusters (or ideologies or worldviews) that could transform society.
A Conservative Society?
The advent of the Reagan regime in the 1980s (unanticipated by any futurist that I know of) signaled the beginnings of a more “conservative” era to many, especially to those who favored it. Ideas empowered by the Reagan Administration included a “strong defense” (military buildup), free markets (deregulation of transportation, communication, and finance), and privatization of government functions where possible. The notion of the Strategic Defense Initiative, nurtured at the conservative Heritage Foundation, is an exemplary instance of how ideas shape our destiny.
How long will the “conservative era” last? Partisans argue that it will last for decades and that liberalism is discredited. Opponents assert that it is a historical anomaly. Much depends on the fortunes of the economy, and at this moment the fate of that seems profoundly ambiguous.
A Neo-progressive and Sustainable Society?
The alternative regime under the Democratic Party would pursue policies that are socially “progressive” to some degree (favoring more equality, higher employment levels, less defense spending) and environmentally “sustainable” (more controls on pollution and more expenditure on cleanup). How likely is such a regime in 1992? Politics is the area of human affairs perhaps least amenable to any prediction, and even informed nonpartisan speculation can often prove wide of the mark. All things considered at this time, though, it would seem that there is a small chance of a different regime—and hence different ideas in power—following the 1992 Presidential election.
A Feminized Society?
Some ideas are best realized by political power; others well up from the grass roots and may or may not benefit by laws and government programs. An example is the changing role of women in society, with ever greater numbers of women participating in the paid labor force instead of doing unpaid household and community work. Some argue that the growing presence of women in management and the professions has led to a greater feminization of our public and private lives (Lenz & Myerhoff, 1985). Others argue that this is still far from being realized, or that “women’s values” are not substantially different from those of men.
Other Ideas
Other political ideas (libertarianism, socialism, anarchism) are not especially widespread at this time, although their fortunes could change over the course of a decade or so. Other ideas about society wax and wane. One idea deserving comment is that of “entrepreneurialism” (or, within organizations, “intrapreneurialism”), which seems to be one of the legacies of the 1980s, for better or worse. It is probably associated with the Reagan regime, and will last for about as long as the conservative movement lasts. The ideas of “cooperation,” “consolidation,” and “control” could become fashionable and dim the lustre of the unfettered entrepreneur. Or “entrepreneur” may simply be a synonym for the innovation that is necessitated and enabled by our times.
Systems Increasingly in Crisis
To synthesize these transformations, and to summarize, there are many big changes that are taking place and that could take place. Some complement each other and some are in conflict with each other. But clearly, for better or worse, we are in the midst of an era of multiple transformations.
Our capability for understanding any of these single transformations is generally not very good. Our capacity to look at these transformations all together is nil.
As a result, more than ever, we are an “unprepared society” (Michael, 1968). We are undergoing several major technological revolutions, and we are subject to a variety of major “mega-events” that are likely to change our policies and our lifestyles. A profusion of ideas about where we are and what we should do will continue to influence our lives, to cancel out the effect of earlier ideas, or (justly or unjustly) to be ignored.
The pace of change is accelerating, and individuals and organizations are caught in this maelstrom. And thus, like it or not, we must innovate to survive.
As an individual, what can you do in general?
Acknowledge uncertainty. The “Multiple Transformations” concept makes it easy to do so, and opens the doors to necessary learning.
Keep on learning. Slogans about lifelong learning and self-renewal are more important than ever. Your image of self and society will necessarily change as society inexorably changes. As noted by Harlan Cleveland (1985), leaders in an information society must reeducate themselves for this new environment.
Keep inventing your future. Collective choices for your community and your organization will have a major impact on your future; as a leader and a citizen, you should try to influence them. These choices are generally not a single choice between two one-way paths but the ongoing invention of futures in an uncertain world.
Smile, if you can. We live in exciting and interesting times, but they are not necessarily happy times for many. Many systems in both the public sector and the private sector are in crisis or will be in crisis. Most of us will be unable to avoid some pain of transition, but much of this thinking could be lessened by better thinking in high places. An appreciation of our era of multiple transformations could stimulate this improved thinking.
The only certainty is that your organizational environment will be uncertain—increasingly so, I suspect. So acknowledge the uncertainty, keep on learning, keep flexible and innovative, and smile if you can. With luck, and a lot of creative leadership in the public interest, we may all muddle through to the twenty-first century.
Bibliography
Brown, L. R., Wolf, E. C., & Starke, L. (Eds.). (1986). State of the world 1986: A world watch report on progress toward a sustainable society. New York: W. W. Norton.
Campbell, D. P. (1974). If you don’t know where you’re going you’ll probably end up somewhere else. Greensboro, NC: Center for Creative Leadership.
Cleveland, H. (1985). The knowledge executive: Leadership in an information society. New York: Viking.
Doyle, J. (1985). Altered harvest: Agriculture, genetics, and the fate of the world’s food supply. New York: Viking.
Easterbrook, G. (1986, January). “Ideas move nations”: How conservative think tanks have helped to transform the terms of political debate. The Atlantic Monthly, pp. 66–80.
Gardner, J. W. (1963; 1981). Self-renewal: The individual and the innovative society. New York: W. W. Norton (p. xii in 1981 revised edition).
Laqueur, W. (1985). A world of secrets: The uses and limits of intelligence. New York: Basic Books.
Lenz, E., & Myerhoff, B. (1985). The feminization of America: How women’s values are changing our public and private lives. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher.
Marien, M. (1986). Future survey annual 1985: A guide to the recent literature of trends, forecasts, and policy proposals. Bethesda, MD: World Future Society (Appendix 1, pp. 186–187).
Matlin, M., & Stang, D. (1979). The pollyanna principle: Selectivity in language, memory, and thought. Cambridge, MA: Schenkman Publishing Co.
Michael, D. N. (1968). The unprepared society: Planning for a precarious future. New York: Basic Books.
Postman, N. (1985). Amusing ourselves to death: Public discourse in the age of show business. New York: Viking.
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At the same Creativity Week (number IX in 1986) that Michael Marien presented this paper, Alan Bean, astronaut and artist, spoke of his contacts with Soviet cosmonauts. He was asked if the Soviet Union would ever discard its affection for Darth Vader and The Dark Side. Bean replied that the Soviets were still reverberating from World War II and that substantive change could not occur until the leaders no longer remembered, personally, the 1940s. He said he doubted that a change would occur in fewer than twenty years.
There we see the hazards of predicting the future. Michael Marien points out that the timing of events, even events driven heavily by ideas, is essentially unpredictable. It’s no trick to predict that the fault at New Madras, Missouri, will give us another major earthquake. The difficult issue is when.
For those of us who have been astonished by the events of the recent past, Marien’s prescription for responding to our age of “Multiple Transformations” makes real sense. The beginning of a new century has traditionally been a good excuse for inventing a new future. If you begin to feel plagued by a plethora of millenniumists, Michael Marien is still at the World Future Society in 1992, ready to offer you tough-minded assistance. SSG and DAH.