Stockholm (NordSIP) – The annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland of the global great and the good under the auspices of the World Economic Forum (WEF) is also the occasion for the publication of the organisation’s updated Global Risk Report. As usual, the 19th Edition of the Global Risk Report 2024 is based on the results of the Global Risks Perception Survey (GRPS) of roughly 1,200 experts from academia, business, government, the international community and civil society. This is supplemented by further input from a far broader WEF Executive Opinion Survey (EOS). The Risk Report serves to set the agenda and inform the discussions held among global leaders during the Davos meeting.
The report looks at short-term 2-year risks and longer terms ones spanning the coming decade. Last year’s key short-term concern over the cost-of-living crisis lingers on in the form of inflation, lack of economic opportunity and concerns over the economic downturn. However with 2024 being a year filled with significant elections around the globe, the 2-year time horizon if chiefly concerned with the technology-related risks of misinformation and disinformation, as well as overall cyber insecurity. This fuels the ongoing polarisation of the political debate and the report highlights the growing mistrust in the electoral process as a significant destabilising risk.
World Economic Forum Global Risks
Perception Survey 2023-2024.
Green issues dominate the coming decade
The WEF categorises risks into 5 colour-coded categories: Economic, Environmental, Geopolitical, Societal, and Technological. The long-term rankings are dominated by the colour green, representing environmental risks. “Extreme weather events” are already being seen across the globe and sit in second position on the 2-year ranking. The overriding importance of the climate crisis is clearly evident over the longer-term, as environmental risks occupy the 10-year Top 4. These include “Critical change to Earth systems,” “Biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse,” and “Natural resource shortages” alongside the persistent threat of extreme weather events. The 7th long-term risk of large-scale involuntary migration is classed by the WEF as social but will arguably also be largely caused by climate change.
While technological advancements are expected to bring improvements to areas such as climate mitigation, healthcare, and other sectors, there is a risk this will occur highly unevenly across the globe, thus exacerbating inequalities. The WEF predicts that the short-term risks that technological progress will be accompanied by widespread cybercrime and cyber insecurity will persist into the coming decade. Developments in Artificial Intelligence (AI) are expected to lead to widening misinformation and significant disruption to the employment market.
A highly complex polycrisis
The interconnectedness of these various risks is illustrated in the WEF report in the form of a polycrisis wherein economic factors lead to social problems, technology-driven misinformation fuels conflicts that destabilise economies and so on. For governments to manage challenges of this level of complexity requires a high state of preparedness. This is also evaluated in the WEF report, with the readiness of various levels of government and other stakeholders to address the identified risks rated by the report’s contributors. Overall, governments are considered reasonably well prepared for such risks as terrorist attacks or outbreaks of infectious diseases. At the other end of the scale, they are seen as woefully underequipped to deal with the climate crisis and cyber disinformation.
The WEF report concludes with look at which risk are being properly addressed by global treaties and the different levels of private and public co-operation. Despite the ongoing turmoil, and the challenges faced by global major players like China and the United States, the WEF report states unequivocally that: “cross-border coordination remains the only viable pathway for the most critical risks to human security and prosperity.”
