The radical disruption caused by
COVID-19 has resulted
in a heavy social and economic toll across the USA that has also highlighted
deep interconnections between the multiple challenges we face, and provides an
opportunity to radically rethink existing systems.
A new report from Forum for the Future
maps out four potential scenario pathways, and explores the various pressure
points we need to act on to solve our climate, biodiversity and societal crises.
From System Shock to System Change – Time to
Transform draws on crowd-sourced signals
of change, extensive desk research and engagement with more than 100 business
and civil society leaders worldwide. It reveals four distinct trajectories
forward from this point, which are based on the mindsets and narratives we are
already seeing emerge from the response to COVID- 19. Click on the links for
each to view short videos detailing each scenario:
-
Compete & Retreat: Characterised by a
retreat into national borders driven by the perception that there is not
enough to go around — resulting in the strengthening of existing nationalist
dynamics, the gradual collapse of what's left of globalisation and
international collaboration, and the emergence of fragmented regionalism.
-
OK, Now What?: Navigating Corporate Sustainability After the US Presidential Election
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Discipline: Characterised by greater
state control to manage public health and safety —resulting in the ramped-up
use of technology for automation, remote connection, surveillance and
control, as well as a concurrent sacrifice of personal privacy, in order to
keep growth and global interconnection going as ‘normal’.
-
Unsettled: Characterised by a continued
inability to settle on a ‘new normal’ due to ongoing discontinuity and
disruption — resulting in a volatile and strange world beyond previous human
experience.
-
Transform: Characterised by a growing
understanding of the deep connections between human and planetary health —
using the pandemic recovery as a ‘reset’ to catalyze a fair and equitable,
zero-carbon transition; and a shift towards new business and economic models
based on resilience and regenerative thinking.
The report notes that elements of each mindset and trajectory are clearly in
evidence today, with negatives and positives in each, and with the potential to
create markedly different futures. The trajectories are designed to serve as a
useful framework for business, governments and civil society organisations and
leaders to navigate the current uncertainty, and to understand the impacts of
the decisions they are making today on what the future holds.
But as Forum CEO Sally Uren points
out,
only a Transform pathway will deliver the systemic change needed to solve our
climate, biodiversity and public health challenges. She points to hopeful
signals from the private sector — including Amazon’s $2 billion Climate
Pledge
Fund
to invest in companies building products, services and technologies to
decarbonise the economy and protect the planet; and Jeff Bezos’ subsequent
$10B Earth
Fund
to ‘preserve and protect the natural world’; as well as
Unilever’s Climate and Nature
Fund to
invest in landscape restoration, reforestation, carbon sequestration and water
preservation projects. The European Union and Canada are putting
sustainability front and center in their post-COVID-19 recovery
plans;
and Amsterdam is using ‘doughnut
economics’
to guide its post-COVID recovery.
Other reasons for hope include the growing mobilization — in both the
food
and
fashion
industries — around regenerative agriculture
practices,
Walmart’s new goal to become a regenerative company by
2030,
and Ford’s new metric for defining
and measuring a company’s social
impacts.
Speaking of social impacts, Hawaii is calling for a feminist economic
recovery
plan,
which aims to deliver gender equality in the state. And the groundswell of
support for the Black Lives Matter
movement —
along with the recognition of the role organizations must play in driving
change; and the corresponding shift in corporate policies surrounding
diversity, equity and inclusion
issues
— bodes well for a more just and equitable future for all.
“Devastating as the COVID-19 crisis has been for many, the radical
disruption it’s caused has forced us to revisit what we value and to explore
how we might change the way things work,” says Samantha Veide, Associate
Director at Forum for the Future Americas. “Together, we can put the country
on a forward pathway in which new, sustainable business models scale; the
goals of the US economy are broadened to include rebuilding social and
environmental value; systemic racism and other structural inequalities are
addressed; regenerative practices are scaled up in the mainstream and
nature-based solutions become the norm. This needs to become the dominant
version of our future if we are to solve our climate, biodiversity and
public health challenges.”
The report also examines five interconnected dynamic areas set to define the
decade ahead:
-
the possible breakdown of our biosphere if hidden climate, biodiversity
and freshwater thresholds are crossed;
-
a global economy at a crossroads, torn between short-term profit and
long-term value;
-
the burgeoning power of technology to enable or block rapid
transformation;
-
a decade of societal transitions which could address or deepen social
inequality;
-
and a growing proliferation of new, regenerative approaches that put
more back in to natural and social systems than is taken out, and
fundamentally shift how value is created.
These approaches aim to replenish and renew our social and natural systems, and
could unlock our ability to solve the systemic challenges that we face.
From System Shock to System Change is calling on leaders across society to use
the COVID-19 recovery process to implement bold solutions that place the world
on a Transform trajectory.
Read the
report,
as well as Forum for the Future’s recommendations for urgent
action
from business, governments, investors and civil society.
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Sustainable Brands Staff
Published Oct 14, 2020 2pm EDT / 11am PDT / 7pm BST / 8pm CEST