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2/15/11

Economic, Social and Geopolitical

A bolt out of the blue...

As events unfold daily in different countries, across mainly the Middle East, once again I'm reminded of the opening lines of PF Sloan's song "Eve of Destruction," made famous in 1965 by Barry McGuire and still well recognized today:

"The eastern world, it is exploding
Violence flaring, bullets loading..."

We live in a tumultuous world but I personally do not believe we are on the eve of destruction. What I do think is we are experiencing another cycle of history and in that sense, events are generally fairly predictable and specific to each era. What is evident now is that we live in an era of significant change, disruptive, uncertain and violent, that can be disturbing but also exciting in context of the narrative of the world.

There is a global shift in power, deep economic dilemmas coupled with currency crisis, political eruptions throughout primarily the Islamic world, major technological and scientific change, creating a multitude of social uncertainties. We seem to be on the cusp of something very big happening in the world around us and what, when, where and how depends on individual interpretations. These range from my historical context, to others views including Biblical prophecy adherents to doomsday believers to New Agers to Zeitgeist followers and more.

I'm a pragmatic man. It appears we are at the nexus of some unascertained change and how that will unfold is unknown to me. I only know I sense something very consequential of large proportions is happening, I trust my instincts, by nature I don't buy into movements that believe they know the outcome. What I do know is most of us can only guess at the most likely course of events.

One thing that has been fairly consistent through time is that in ages such as the one we're in, when humanity as on the verge of a significant shift in thinking it is usually preceded by something quite unexpected and surprisingly, underwhelming common. Like a bolt out of the blue some seemingly small occurrence triggers a chain of events that makes it clear to everyone what happens next.

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