What are the underlying forces at work in the 2020’s? Haim Israel:   We identified 28 underlying forces in three categories. The first is innovation: Big Data, artificial intelligence, robotics, cybersecurity, privacy, genomics, all that stuff. Second is people: aging, silver economy, Gen Z, Gen Y, millennials, education, inequality, everything that has to do with demographics. […]

Even if our world is lucky enough to save itself from self-annihilation in the coming decades by avoiding a nuclear war, Diamond believes an end point may still come from a more obvious threat: climate change. The starting point of this issue comes down to the increase of the world’s population – reaching 9.8 billion […]

Dalio, who grew up middle class, is alarmed about the growing divide between the haves and have-nots. He points out that over the span of a decade, America’s lowest paid workers had just a 14 percent chance of rising to the middle class. Bill Whitaker: What has happened to the American dream? Ray Dalio: I […]

Octavian Report: What do you think is driving the seeming realignment of certain nations towards Israel? Michael Oren: Today, you’ll find that Israel today is pointedly and emphatically less isolated than at any other time in its history. To the best of my knowledge, we’ve yet to make peace with Palestinians. Our relationship with Latin America is […]

I met with Kronman in his office at the Yale Law School to talk about democracy and aristocracy, campus debates over free speech, affirmative action, and what he calls “the conversational ideal.” • The Assault on American Excellenceis tonally restrained and evenhanded, but there’s also anger here. What are you angry about? What is it […]

In Estonia, public administration is completely digitalized. Residents can pay their taxes, register their cars and even set up a company online. It’s not only convenient — the country also saves around 2 percent of its gross domestic product by eliminating bureaucratic costs. DER SPIEGEL: How do you define innovative governance then? Kaljulaid: I remember […]

Interview with Manfred Curbach, a professor and one of the engineers behind the reconstruction of Dresden’s Frauenkirche church.   SPIEGEL ONLINE: Mr. Curbach, how do you rebuild a church like Notre Dame, which is more than 800 years old? Manfred Curbach: That depends greatly on how severe the damage to the walls is. The Frauenkirche in Dresden was […]

DER SPIEGEL: Sir David, did you have a treasure chest as a child? DER SPIEGEL: You obviously haven’t stopped collecting things since your childhood. Attenborough: Yes, collecting is a basic male instinct. DER SPIEGEL: Why is that? Attenborough: I don’t know. There are a few women who collect, but not really great ones. One or two I can think of […]

Interview with The New York Times Publisher A. G. Sulzberger‘To Produce Good Journalism, There Are No Shortcuts’ Sulzberger: This is a really difficult time for media. Journalists and journalism are under attack by political forces all over the globe. Trust in media is declining, the business models are changing. Anyone who cares about journalism should […]

Could the world be running out of people? After painstakingly breaking down the numbers for themselves, the pair arrived at a drastically different prediction for the future of the human species. “In roughly three decades, the global population will begin to decline,” they write. “Once that decline begins, it will never end.” The authors John […]