The Economist’s Predictions for 2024

To some it is a conspiracy theory, to others an assessment built on reasonable predictions about the future. As it does every year, the London-based economics and politics magazine The Economist has put on its cover its forecasts of the events it expects in the coming year. Tom Standage, editor of The World Ahead, has also written about the 10 developments the whole world is expected to watch closely in 2024. Let us summarise Standage’s main points here:

• Vote-a-Rama: Elections Around the World

Elections around the world, with more voters taking part than ever before, will shed light on the global state of democracy. In 2024 more than 70 elections will be held in countries that are home to some 4.2 billion people. For the first time, the combined population of the countries holding elections will exceed half of the global population. Yet even though more votes will be cast than ever, this does not mean more democracy for humanity. Many of the elections will be neither free nor fair.

• America’s Global Choice

Voters and the courts will deliver their verdicts on Donald Trump, who has a one-in-three chance of winning back the presidency. The result may depend on tens of thousands of voters in a handful of swing states. But the consequences will be global, affecting everything from climate policy to military support for Ukraine. Indeed, with Russia’s election rigged, Vladimir Putin’s fate may depend more on American voters than on Russian ones.

• Step up, Europe

Accordingly, Europe must step up and give Ukraine the military and economic support it needs for a long struggle, while also opening the way to eventual EU membership. Besides guarding against the risk that Trump returns to power and withdraws his support, this is the right thing to do.

• Middle East Turmoil

Hamas’s attack on Israel and Israel’s retaliation in Gaza have upended the region and dispelled the idea that the world can go on ignoring the plight of the Palestinians. Will the conflict in the Middle East turn into a wide regional war, or will it offer a new chance for peace? For America it is also a test of whether it can adapt to a more complex and threatening world.

• Multipolar Disorder

America’s plan to pivot to Asia and focus more on its rivalry with a rising China has been derailed by the wars in Ukraine and Gaza. Russia, too, is distracted and losing influence. Frozen conflicts are thawing and local cold wars are heating up around the world. Instability is growing in the Sahel. With America’s “unipolar moment” over, the world is bracing for more conflict.

• A Second Cold War

As China’s growth slows, tensions over Taiwan rise and America keeps restricting China’s access to advanced technologies, the rhetoric of a “new cold war” has hardened. But Western companies trying to reduce their supply chains’ dependence on China will find this much easier said than done. Meanwhile both sides will try to win over the “middle powers” of the global south, and especially their green resources.

• New Energy Geography

The transition to clean energy is producing new green superpowers and redrawing the map of energy resources. Lithium, copper and nickel matter much more, while oil, gas and the regions that dominate their supply matter less. Competition for green resources is reshaping geopolitics and trade and creating some unexpected winners and losers. Meanwhile there is a “green backlash” among voters who see climate-friendly policies as an elite conspiracy against ordinary people.

• Economic Uncertainty

Western economies performed better than expected in 2023, but they are not yet out of the woods. Interest rates staying “higher for longer” will be painful for companies and consumers alike, even if recession is avoided. China may slide into deflation.

• AI Gets Real

Businesses are adopting artificial intelligence, regulators are regulating and technologists keep developing it. Debates will intensify over the best regulatory approach and over whether talk of “existential risk” serves the interests of incumbent companies. Unexpected uses and abuses will keep emerging. There are many concerns about AI’s impact on employment and its potential to interfere in elections. Its biggest real impact, however, is faster coding.

• Uniting The World?

Perhaps the world will set ideological differences aside and enjoy the Paris Olympics, astronauts circling the Moon and the men’s T20 cricket World Cup. But it is just as likely that those hoping for global unity will be left bewildered.

Each heading was also written up as a separate article by a different author in the same issue.

This work can be considered worth examining as a way to see the perspective and expectations for the future of London, one of the world’s major economic centres. The Economist, which Turkey’s pro-government “pool media” singled out as a target especially after its reports that Erdoğan was becoming a dictator, is followed with particular attention. Many people have no doubt that what it says contains hidden messages and codes. Yet how accurate earlier predictions turned out to be can easily be seen by looking at past years’ issues.

The highlights of The Economist’s 2023 cover had been interpreted as follows: economic problems in China, an emphasis on artificial intelligence, the nuclear threat, rising markets and a new balance in energy. Many people believe these covers carry important hidden messages. They are not entirely wrong.

So what is on the magazine’s cover this year?

• Symbols drawn in four colours form a circular field. In the very centre stands a large ballot box. At first glance the focus seems to be the US election, but in 2024 elections are planned in around 70 countries, Russia among them. The other developments are arranged around this central theme. The striking part of the cover concerning the US election is the question mark over the silhouette of former US President Donald Trump.
• The cover also foregrounds images symbolising the use of nuclear missiles and time running out between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. On the cover the two leaders face each other. Yet the state of the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine appears to be linked to Trump.
• Right above Trump’s silhouette there is a dove of peace. Above Zelensky there is the silhouette of a woman, and near it a rocket symbol. These symbols suggest that peace is more likely if Trump is elected American president again, while the war may continue if the Democratic Party’s female candidate (possibly Kamala Harris) is elected. (Update: Kamala Harris did become the Democratic candidate, and Donald Trump won the November 2024 election.)
• There is also a running hourglass with a nuclear weapon symbol at its end. In other words, there may be an expectation that nuclear weapons could be used at the end of the war.
• On the cover, which gives commodities a prominent place in its economics section for 2024, a decline is drawn for the dollar, the euro, the yen and sterling.
• Electric vehicles and battery problems remain topical. It is striking that electric vehicles are drawn on China’s side, the country that has recently come to dominate the world in this field and put Europe’s car giants in a difficult position.
• At the bottom, US President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping are depicted with their backs to each other. As far as we can tell, the United States is taking the lead in green energy, while China has the upper hand in electric cars. Between the two leaders we see South America and the Asia-Pacific islands. They must mean that the power struggle will again be fought not on their own soil but over other regions.
• Another notable point on The Economist’s 2024 cover is electricity generated from renewable energy and implants connected to the human brain. The eye in the middle of this image, however, can be read as a “watched, controlled society”.

In conclusion, everything today is so complex and moves so fast that making predictions about the future has become very difficult. A single sudden event can unexpectedly overturn every analysis and every expectation. We can clearly see this caution in The Economist’s assumptions about the future as well. Rather than making bold claims about the future, they too now put question marks and possibilities in the foreground.