Top risks 2021

Overview*
Just as 2020 was overwhelmingly about healthcare responses to Covid-19 (and how much many governments got wrong), 2021 will overwhelmingly be about economic responses to Covid-19’s lingering symptoms and scar tissue (debt burdens and misaligned politics), even as vaccines roll out and the healthcare emergency fades. As economic issues come to the fore, there is no global leadership on political models, trade standards, and international architecture to follow.
A superpower torn down the middle cannot return to business as usual. And when the most powerful country is so divided, everybody has a problem. Despite an economic recovery, the geopolitical recession—and the factors driving our G-Zero world—will intensify as a result.