The Water Sigils

The aim of the Water Sigils is to be a daily scan focusing on water security. We are currently investigating new AI ways to deliver an even better Water Sigils. The original complimentary version ran from May 2012 to April 2023. The Sigils are a series of scans exploring the horizon for weak signals related to various …

What is an Issue in terms of Strategic Foresight & Warning and Horizon Scanning?

An issue, in terms of warning and by extension SF&W, is “a situation, an objective, an opportunity, a danger, a threat or a risk, which is specific and defined.” (Grabo, 2004) For example, SF&W issues can be interstate and civil wars, fragile states, instability, energy security, oil, economic crisis, global water security, epidemics and pandemics such …

Horizon Scanning and Monitoring for Early Warning: Definition and Practice

(Rewritten and revised edition) Horizon scanning and monitoring for early warning are part of the family of activities used to foresee the future, anticipate uncertainty and manage risks. Their practice is crucial for successful strategic foresight and warning, risk management, futurism or any anticipatory activity. While monitoring is a generic and common term used for …

Revisiting Timeliness for Strategic Foresight and Warning and Risk Management

[Fully rewritten version v3] To exist, risk and foresight products as well as warnings must be delivered to those who must act upon them, the customers, clients or users. These anticipation analyses must also be actionable, which means that they need to include the right information necessary to see action taken. Yet, if you deliver …

The Deep-Sea Resources Brief

Human societies currently face dwindling resources and rising competition for them in the contemporary “resources order.” Thus, besides and in accordance with other ways to handle this challenge, new types and sources of resources are increasingly valuable and can make a strategic difference for polities, as well as for humanity as a whole. Meanwhile, if we are to ever learn from our worrying present, we must also, continuously, make sure that the extraction and use of those new potential resources will not have any unfavourable impact on the planet and its ecosystem, including this biodiversity to which we belong.* As has now been known since the end of the nineteenth century (Ifremer, les Nodules, 2012), mineral resources lie on the …

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The Deep-Sea Resources Sigils

The aim of the Deep-Sea Resources Sigils is to be a daily scan focusing on the security and geopolitics of the deep sea. Why deep-sea resources must be monitored and what is at stake can be found in the corresponding Sigils Brief. We are currently investigating new AI ways to deliver an even better Deep Sea …

The Sigils

The Sigils are designed as a series of daily scans exploring the horizon for weak (and less weak) signals related to various issues relevant to geopolitical risks and uncertainties. Such scans can be of interest to all actors, namely citizens, the corporate sector, NGOs and domestic and international political authorities. We selected a couple of …

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