This important report, Global Trends 2030-Alternative Worlds, released in 2012 by the U.S. National Intelligence Council, describes megatrends and potential game changers for the next decades. Among the megatrends, it analyzes:

- increased individual empowerment
- the diffusion of power among states and the ascent of a networked multi-polar world
- a world's population growing to 8.3 billion people, of which sixty percent will live in urbanized areas, and surging cross-border migration
- expanding demand for food, water, and energy

It furthermore describes potential game changers, including:

- a global economy that could thrive or collapse
- increased global insecurity due to regional instability in the Middle East and South Asia
- new technologies that could solve the problems caused by the megatrends
- the possibility, but by no means the certainty, that the U.S. with new partners will reinvent the international system

Students of trends, forward-looking entrepreneurs, academics, journalists and anyone eager for a glimpse into the next decades will find this essential reading.