Sustainability: 4 Scenarios for the 21st Century

A report from the Tellus Institute: "The Century Ahead: Searching for Sustainability"
Download the full report in pdf format
Excerpted summaries of  the four scenarios:

 2.1. Market Forces: Market-centered Development
Market Forces is constructed as a future in which free market optimism remains dominant and proves well-founded. As population expands by 40 percent by 2050 and free trade and deregulation drive growth, the global economy expands over three-fold by 2050, eightfold by 2100. All economic figures in this paper are expressed in purchasing power parity (PPP) dollars, which takes account of national differences in the cost of living when converting to a common currency. The availability of sufficient resources- raw materials, land, water, energy- and the means of maintaining ecological resilience in such a huge economy are critical uncertainties. The challenge of satisfying bio-physical sustainability constraints would be compounded by the challenge of maintaining social and economic sustainability in a world of profound inequalities between rich and poor countries, and within each country. Instability and conflict could undercut the evolutionary dynamics of the scenario, triggering a descent of civilization toward a Fortress World or more chaotic outcomes.

2.2. Policy Reform: Directing Growth
Policy Reform assumes the emergence of a massive government-led effort achieves sustainability without major changes in the state-centric international order, modern institutional structures, and consumerist values. Strong and harmonized policies are implemented that, by redirecting the world economy and promoting technological innovation, are able to achieve internationally recognized goals for poverty reduction, climate change stabilization, ecosystem preservation, freshwater protection, and pollution control. The scenario meets tough stabilization targets for carbon dioxide emissions and, in rough compatibility with United Nations Millennium Development Goals, halves world hunger between 2005 and 2025 (then halves it again by 2050).
 Policy Reform is designed as a backcast constrained to meet the objectives shown in Table 5. As total greenhouse emissions decline, growth continues in developing countries for two decades as redistribution policies raise incomes of the poorest regions and most impoverished people. Although such transfers have been debated at climate negotiations, with little success to date, our analysis indicates that a Policy Reform approach will require a deep and widespread commitment to economic equity. As poorer countries converge toward the living standards of richer countries, they accelerate investment in environmentally sustainable practices.
Implementing this grand policy program in the context of Conventional Worlds values and institutions would not be easy: intergovernmental efforts to address sustainability challenges over the past two decades have not succeeded. The Policy Reform path would require unprecedented political will for establishing the necessary regulatory, economic, social, technological, and legal mechanisms.

2.3. Fortress World: An Authoritarian Path
If the market adaptations and policy reforms of Conventional Worlds were to prove insufficient for redirecting development away from destabilization, the global trajectory could veer in an unwelcome direction. Fortress World explores the possibility that powerful world forces, faced with a dire systemic crisis, impose an authoritarian order where elites retreat to protected enclaves, leaving impoverished masses outside. In our troubled times, Fortress World seems the true business-as-usual  scenario to many. In this dark vision, the global archipelago of connected fortresses seeks to control a damaged environment and restive population. Authorities employ geo-engineering techniques to stabilize the global climate, while dispatching- peace-keeping  militia to multiple hotspots in an attempt to quell social conflict and mass migration. But the results are mixed: emergency measures and spotty infrastructure investment cannot keep pace with habitat loss and climate change, nor provide adequate food and water to desperate billions. In this kind of future, sustainable development is not in the cards, a half-remembered dream of a more hopeful time.

2.4. Great Transition: A Sustainable Civilization
In dramatic contrast, Great Transition envisions a values-led change in the guiding paradigm of global development. The transformation is catalyzed by the push-pull of deepening crises and the  desire for a just, sustainable, and planetary civilization. A pluralistic transnational world order coalesces as a growing cultural and political movement of global citizens spurs the establishment of effective governance institutions. The new paradigm is rooted in a triad of ascendant values: human solidarity, ecological resilience, and quality of life. Less consumerist lifestyles moderate the growth thrust of Conventional Worlds scenarios, as notions of the  good life turn toward qualitative dimensions of well-being: creativity, leisure, relationships, and community engagement.
Population stabilizes more rapidly than in other scenarios as more equal gender roles and universal access to education and health care services lower birth rates in developing countries. The world approaches a steady-state economy with incomes reaching about $30,000 per person by 2100, three times the current average. Although this figure is well below the $50,000 of Conventional Worlds, the egalitarian income distributions of Great Transition leave most people far better off, while the
improved social cohesion reduces conflict. In this deeply sustainable vision, crises still linger, but the world is able to confront them with enhanced institutions for reconciliation and cooperation."

Source: Tellus Institute: "The Century Ahead: Searching for Sustainability"
Tellus Institute website