What risks do our civilisations face, and how will we identify them? Are we living through a key transition for our species and civilisations, and how would we know if we were? What forces have shaped past civilisations and our civilisations today, and what will protect future civilisations? What will determine human sustainability and resilience in the face of these planetary dangers? Is human and planetary sustainability compatible with our current expectations for economic growth and material prosperity?
To answer these and other questions, The Lancet and The Rockefeller Foundation are launching a commission and convening a major global gathering at the Foundation’s Center in Bellagio, Italy. This special edition of The Economist magazine will, together with other inputs, help shape that ongoing conversation.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by the United Nations member states in 2015, requires “each government (to set) its own national targets guided by the global level of ambition” set out by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The natural world has a lot to teach us. Above all, it teaches about systems and cycles; that altering one component of a system, however small, can have wider implications within and beyond a given cycle.