On 18 and 19 November last year, the European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS) held its annual conference. “Thinking about the Future: Europe’s Road to 2030” took place entirely…
Tag: Jonathan Blanchard Smith
Reasonable Worst-Case Scenarios
We’re hearing a lot from Government about “reasonable worst-case scenarios” at the moment. At first sight it seems sensible. We need to think beyond the “base case” or “central case”,…
When oil demand peaks: thinking about the geopolitical impacts of peak oil.
What happens to oil producing countries when oil demand peaks? When petro-economies no longer are able to finance themselves through the extraction and export of oil products, what do they…
New, Next and Never – thinking about how to name our future
What do we call the time after Covid-19? As we’ve already discussed in these blogs, there is a consensus – which we challenge, but let’s go with it – that…
Looking to the future from an uncertain present
I was in a meeting a little while ago when someone asked “can we really make scenarios of the future when the present is so uncertain?” It’s a question I’ve…
Climate crisis – some final thoughts
Back in June 2019, we began our series of blog posts on the climate crisis. Now that we have examined each of the PESTLE categories, it’s time to reflect on…