Notes from the Editors, June 2007

Abstract

» Notes from the EditorsIn January 2007 the Development, Concepts and Doctrine Centre of the UK Ministry of Defence published a ninety-page report, entitled Global Strategic Trends, 2007-2036, highlighting a wide array of potential dangers to the prevailing order over the next thirty years. The report is organized around three "Ring Road Issues": (1) climate change, (2) globalization, and (3) global inequality (p. xiii). Global warming and the possibility of abrupt climate change, together with the end of "the golden age of cheap energy," are seen as placing increasing strains on populations throughout the planet (p. 31). The globalization of the world economy, embodying "particularly ruthless laws of supply and demand," is viewed as creating new interdependencies, contradictions, and conflicts. Expanding global inequality, the UK Ministry of Defence insists, could lead to "a resurgence of not only anti-capitalist ideologies . . . but also to populism and the revival of Marxism" (p. 3)This article can also be found at the Monthly Review website, where most recent articles are published in full.Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.