Category Archives: Trends

Annual trends and analysis

Advisors, Authors A-H, Trends 2025: Chaotic Times

Well, did I answer your question “Deb?” – by Terry Howard

    “We write history, not erase history.” ~ President Joe Biden 

“Deb,” the editor of one of several global publications I write for posed the following question to me and her other columnists who write on issues of culture, religion, race and other issues:

What do you consider the most critical issue facing our nation in 2025?

Wow, where do I start? 

Well, after mulling through a list of top of mind burning issues for me, I kept circling back to the first on that list that crossed my mind….banning books altogether or, at a minimum, rewriting ugly aspects of African American history – think slavery – in the U.S.

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Advisors, Authors A-H, Trends 2025: Chaotic Times

A realistic approach to 2025 – by Marc Brenman

“When You Stare into the Abyss,
the Abyss Stares Back” ~Nietzsche

The most important event in the new year for the United States will be Trump’s resumption of the Presidency. Will this mean the end of American democracy, as he has pointed to with pronouncements like being a dictator, inciting insurrection, encouraging legal prosecution of critics and Democratic legislators, opposing a peaceful transition of elected power, nominating bizarre people for the highest Executive Branch positions, etc?

There has been much discussion as to what good-thinking people should do. Much of the verbiage concerns self-care, marching around, doubling down on beliefs unpopular with half the American electorate, etc. This reminds me of trigger warnings, safe spaces, and correct pronouns. I’ve been focusing instead on the following:

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Authors A-H, Politics, Trends 2025: Chaotic Times

Political Commitments 2025 – by Kerry Hayes

A few days before November 5, I opined on social media that democracy isn’t a crockpot – you can’t set it and forget it. It’s more like a risotto: something special and quite wonderful, but needing constant attention unless you want it to turn mushy or burn altogether.

 The outcome of the election seemed to reinforce this notion. I guess it would be more accurate to refer to the November 5 elections, as turnout data indicates that every county in the United States, from California to Colorado to New York, moved rightward. The national popular vote bore this out, as did the results of many contests for the U.S. House of Representatives, the Senate, and myriad state and local races.

By the time the sun rose on November 6, it was clear that the right had risen well. We’d failed to stir the risotto; now it was sticky as all hell.

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Trends 2026

Future of Education 2026 – by Muhammad Usman Qazi

Education is a right, not a privilege. As the world moves toward 2026, this idea has grown even more urgent. Digital learning is expanding, new tools are being created every year, and children everywhere are interacting with technology earlier than ever. Yet the learning gap between regions remains wide. Access and affordability do not always move together. Digital tools may exist, but many children still lack devices, internet access, or the guidance needed to benefit from them.

The future of education depends not only on creating platforms, but on making sure children everywhere can use them. Urban or rural, online or offline, developed or developing—every learner deserves the same chance. One example of this progress is the LearnWithQazi Network, a free, child-centered platform created in Pakistan. It shows what is possible, but the challenge for 2026 is scaling such solutions for underserved communities around the world.

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Authors R-Z, Social Issues, Trends 2024: Divisive World

Overcoming Bias: A Guide to Skilled Skepticism – by Sondra Thiederman

Don’t you love being right? I sure do. I think that’s one reason most of us are afflicted with what’s called “confirmation bias” – the pesky habit of noticing only the evidence that proves our previously held beliefs correct. In other words, we see what we expect to see.

This is where our biases – our inflexible beliefs about categories of people – trick us into jumping to the wrong conclusions. Once we get it into our heads that members of particular groups “all” – because they are members of that group – share a particular characteristic, our brain just can’t resist proving that bias right.

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Neuro-diversity, Trends 2024: Divisive World

Embracing Unique Thinking Styles – by Lee Webster

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Navigating Machines and Race: Shaping Cognitive Diversity and Innovation

cognitive diversityWe are at the threshold of a new era where diversity, equity, and inclusion will leap beyond biology into an interaction with Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics.  We are at a stage where robots mimic human motions, AI voices converse and learn, and technology pushes the boundaries of our understanding.  We are witnessing the breakthroughs of innovation advances: quantum computing redefines reality, genetic engineering rewrites the code of life, and self-driving cars reimagine mobility.  But it is the cognitive diversity introduced by AI and robotics that truly compels us to redefine our concept of “different.”  

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Advisors, Trends 2024: Divisive World

2024 Trends, Predictions, Actions We Must Take – by Mauricio Velásquez.

2024 is going to be a very tumultuous year.  It is an election year, divisiveness, hate, polarized manipulation will be the name of the game.  Pitting people, groups against each other will be attempted, fight these forces.  Take the high road – call for calm, unity, understanding, and Peace.

As a global backdrop, a constant reminder of division and hate – Ukraine-Russia, and the Israel-Hamas wars will be a contributing factor in the churning of hate.  Hate opportunists will take advantage of these wars as a backdrop to foment division, suspicion, and outright hate and violence.  Watch the hate on social media and call it out.  I am constantly “Calling for Respect, Dignity, Understanding for All.”

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Advisors, Authors A-H, Politics, Social Issues, Trends 2024: Divisive World

2024 Trends: Healthcare at Risk – by David Grinberg

Despite its overwhelming success, Obamacare remains the target of relentless partisan attacks. Donald Trump is again vowing to end the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, during a potential second term as president.

“Obamacare is a catastrophe,” Trump recently said at a campaign event in Iowa. The twice impeached former president also wrote on his social media platform: “The cost of Obamacare is out of control, plus, it’s not good Healthcare.”

But terminating Obamacare, assuming Trump wins the presidency again, would decimate healthcare for about 40 million Americans for no good reason. These citizens in need of affordable healthcare had been locked out of the private insurance system for decades based on discriminatory reasons — including socioeconomic status and preexisting conditions, which disproportionately hurt minority groups the most.

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Academic Articles, Authors I-Q, Trends 2024: Divisive World, War

Peacebuilding: Growing Strawberries on Coconut Trees – by Ashok Panikkar  

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The Nature of Peace and Peacebuilding in a Collectivist and Illiberal World

This article was originally published in Beyond Intractability 

The only reasonable prediction we can make about the 21st century is that we don’t know what’s coming our way — except that it will be bad.

While triggered by the Israel/Palestine situation, this article is a critical reflection on the role of ‘peacebuilding’ (my umbrella term for all non-adversarial dispute resolution processes) in the 21st century.

To understand why the peacebuilding field has failed to live up to its lofty ambitions, we have to unpack the world we inhabit today. After the heady optimism at the end of the Cold War, the conflicts of the new century have forced Westerners to rethink their short-lived assumptions about abolishing war, making the world safe for democracy and capitalism, and world peace. Hence, I won’t give you a two-point off-ramp for Russia, a five-point plan for the Syrian embroglio, or a seven-point approach for the Israel-Palestine mess. Of course, we should try to make the world safer. However, our attempts should be rooted in hard-nosed realities, not skewered by wishful thinking.

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Advisors, Authors I-Q, Go Green, Trends 2024: Divisive World

New Climate Inflection Point in our Axial Age – by The Rev. Dr. John Pawlikowski

In my contribution to American Diversity Report at the beginning of 2023, I argued that we are living in an axial era where fundamental structures of human society are undergoing profound change. As we enter 2024, I would maintain with others such as former Senator John Kerry, now the U.S. Special Envoy for Climate Issues, that the final communique from the recent COP 28 conference in Dubai may represent an axial moment.

Special Envoy Kerry believes the Dubai decision to commit to a movement to eliminate the reliance on fossil fuels by the global community (as well as methane gas) signals a  fundamental shift in the way we provide power for the human community. Such a wholesale shift in the generation of necessary power throughout the world, if successful, would represent a fundamental reordering of our life together as a global community. It would insure the sustainability of our planet and firmly implant the right to a the right to a healthy environment for all living creatures proclaimed by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 2023.    

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