(Credit Image: ESO/P. Horálek)
This is the 27 February 2020 issue of our weekly scan for geopolitical risks (open access). Using horizon scanning, each week, we collect weak – and less weak – signals. These point to new, emerging, escalating or stabilising problems. As a result, they indicate how trends or dynamics evolve.
- The Red Team Analysis Weekly – 30 March 2023
- China, Saudi Arabia and the Arab AI Rise
- Early Warning for Individuals and Small Businesses – Overcoming Energy Insecurity
- The ENA of Tunis – Training in Early Warning
- For the ESFSI and the Ministry of the Interior of Tunisia – Trainings in Early Warning
- War in Ukraine, Europe, and the Weaponization of Winter – Anthropocene Wars (7)
- Can You Unbias Analysis? The Russian Nuclear Threat
- An Excluded Russia? Not for Asia – Anthropocene Wars (6)
- An Alternative Red Scenario for the war between Ukraine and Russia
Practically develop and enhance, step by step, your anticipatory analytical skills to tackle complex geopolitical, national and global security and political issues. Online course 1: from process to analytical modeling – Online course 2: scenario-building
Here, we focus on signals that could favourably or unfavourably impact private and public actors in international security. That field is broadly known under various names: e.g. global changes, national and international security, or political and geopolitical uncertainty. In terms of risk management, the label used is external risks.
Horizon scanning, weak signals and biases
We call signals weak, because it is still difficult to discern them among a vast array of events. However, our biases often alter our capacity to measure the strength of the signal. As a result, the perception of strength will vary according to the awareness of the actor. At worst, biases may be so strong that they completely block the very identification of the signal.
In the field of strategic foresight and warning, risk management and future studies, it is the job of good analysts to scan the horizon. As a result, they can perceive signals. Analysts then evaluate the strength of these signals according to specific risks and dynamics. Finally, they deliver their findings to users. These users can be other analysts, officers or decision-makers.
You can read a more detailed explanation in one of our cornerstone articles: Horizon Scanning and Monitoring for Warning: Definition and Practice.
The sections of the scan
Each section of the scan focuses on signals related to a specific theme:
- world (international politics and geopolitics);
- economy;
- science including AI, QIS, technology and weapons, ;
- analysis, strategy and futures;
- epidemics (New);
- energy and environment.
However, in a complex world, categories are merely a convenient way to present information, when facts and events interact across boundaries.
The information collected (crowdsourced) does not mean endorsement.
Featured image: Milky Way above SPECULOOS / The Search for habitable Planets – EClipsing ULtra-cOOl Stars (SPECULOOS) is searching for Earth-like planets around tiny, dim stars in front of a panorama of the Milky Way. Credit: ESO/P. Horálek.
Image for the online course: Science fiction becomes science fact, “The Future Battlefield“, Army ALT Magazine, Science and Technology, July 18, 2018 – Public Domain