Permacrisis: A Plan to Fix a Fractured World

Do you feel like we’re in a permacrisis? Chances are you feel some anxiety about the state of the world. Gordon Brown, Mohamed A. El-Erian and Michael Spence certainly did. Three of the most internationally respected and experienced thinkers of our time, these friends found their pandemic Zooms increasingly focused on a cascade of crises: sputtering growth, surging inflation, poor policy responses, an escalating climate emergency, worsening inequality, increasing nationalism and a decline in global co-operation. They shared their fears and frustrations. And the more they talked, the more they realised that while past mistakes had set the world on this bumpy course, a better path leading to a brighter future exists. Informed by their different perspectives, they sought a common goal: achievable solutions to fix our fractured world. This book is the product of that thinking. At the heart of today’s permacrisis are broken approaches to growth, economic management, and governance. While these approaches are broken, they are not beyond repair. An explanation of where we’ve gone wrong, and a provocative, inspiring plan to do nothing less than change the world, Permacrisis: A Plan to Fix a Fractured World, written with Reid Lidow, sets out how we can prevent crises and better manage the future for the benefit of the many and not the few. The longer a problem goes unresolved, the worse it will get; that’s what happens in a permacrisis and that’s why we must act now.