"The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic marks the most significant, singular global disruption since World War II, with health, economic, political, and security implications that will ripple for years to come." -Global Trends 2040 (2021) Global Trends 2040-A More Contested World (2021), released by the US National Intelligence Council, is the latest report in its series of reports starting in 1997 about megatrends and the world's future. This report, strongly influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, paints a bleak picture of the future and describes a contested, fragmented and turbulent world. It specifically discusses the four main trends that will shape tomorrow's world: - Demographics-by 2040, 1.4 billion people will be added mostly in Africa and South Asia. - Economics-increased government debt and concentrated economic power will escalate problems for the poor and middleclass. - Climate-a hotter world will increase water, food, and health insecurity. - Technology-the emergence of new technologies could both solve and cause problems for human life. Students of trends, policymakers, entrepreneurs, academics, journalists and anyone eager for a glimpse into the next decades, will find this report, with colored graphs, essential reading.

Launch activities performed by private entities deal with a complex legal environment. The Space Treaties provide a general liability framework. Launch participants are subject to regulatory or institutional control, and to domestic liability laws. Specific contractual practice has developed due to insurance limitations, the inter-participants' waivers of liability and claims. This book synthesizes information on the norms of play, to allow the grasp of their relative weight and interactions in the assessment of liability risk for launch activities. It reveals a legal framework presently lacking sufficient predictability for an efficient liability risk management: the waivers of liability suffer weaknesses as do all such clauses, and lack uniformity and reliability; and the Space Treaties contain ambiguous terms preventing predictable determination of the States responsible for authorizing and supervising launch activities and for damage compensation, and do not reflect the liability of launch operators. This book offers suggestions of new approaches for: harmonizing waivers of liability to improve their consistency, validity and flow-down; and improving the Space Treaties for their implementation to non-governmental launch activities. In the launch community, the need for lawmaking is less compelling than in fields such as aviation. Nevertheless, adjustments to the present framework are proposed through model clauses and an international instrument, for further thinking and contribution by those sharing the opinion that creative lawmaking is needed now to prepare for tomorrow's endeavors.

YOUR GUIDE TO A FULFILLING BUSINESS AND PERSONAL FUTURE Based on research by one of the world's largest growth-consulting companies, New Mega Trends identifies the ten most important global trends that will define our future, including business models, smart technology, connectivity and convergence and radical social trends. New Mega Trends will give you the tools to not only identify and evaluate these game-changing trends, but also help you to translate them into market opportunities for your everyday business and personal life. How will we travel to work in the cities of the future? Will Zero be the new big thing? How will we stay connected in the Mega Trends World? Will our Wellness and Well-Being top business agenda? If you are a leader with a corporate vision, or a strategic planner within your organization, or just plain curious about your future, New Mega Trends will provide you with stimulating stories, startling facts and thought-provoking case studies that will not only inform your future but entertain you today.

Al-Rodhan sheds new light on the debate about the geopolitics of outer space, going beyond applying traditional International Relations approaches to space power and security by introducing a multidimensional spatial framework. The meta-geopolitics framework includes space and expands classical power considerations to cover seven state capacities.

The current conditions of the Air Transport industry, as well as expectations for the future, are presented in sections covering the historical and present status of air transportation, regulation and administration of air transportation, air carrier aircraft (Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, Lockheed Martin, Airbus, and National Aero-space), and general aviation. The final legislation of the General Aviation Revitalization Act (1994) is presented in a new chapter. The included disk contains a DOS-based summary of the chapters. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR