Could the current moment of geopolitical and economic upheaval usher in a new era of progress? A look at previous periods after times of turbulence might offer a clue, find senior partner Sven Smit and coauthors in a recent paper. During the Era of Markets (1989–2019), for example—which came as the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union broke up, among other world-shifting events—new majorities emerged. By 2019, 67 percent of the world’s population had a mobile phone and 72 percent of net new annual electricity-generating capacity globally came from renewables.
To read the paper, see “On the cusp of a new era?” October 20, 2022.