Changes on the Horizon

Kevin Ruth writes in his blog about the need for schools to begin factoring very long-term and macro trends into their strategic thinking.  Specifically, Kevin references an  article by Andy Xie in the Financial Times, advancing the argument that a loss in Chinese confidence in the U.S. Dollar spells eventual doom for the currency.  If the incipient Chinese movement to shift away from the Dollar as the world’s reserve currency finds traction--and it likely will at some point--then that portends a radical restructuring of virtually every financial system.

Regardless of whether one accepts such an argument or not, what cannot be avoided is that, as Fareed Zakaria has said elsewhere in The Post-American World, what we are witnessing is the “rise of the rest” as opposed to the “decline of the West.”  What cannot be avoided much longer is that a new sort of global strategy, not to mention, finance, is required for a multi-polar world.

There are implications of this for every independent, international or post-secondary school--implications that are programmatic and economic in nature.

Not all of the effects will be negative.  Great Britain underwent a similar change in status as the United States rose to prominence in the early and mid-20th Century.  In some ways, the UK has been better off as a result of losing its empire; after all, empires are costly to maintain in both financial and moral terms.  [One potential difference is that Britain enjoyed a close relationship with the new global hegemon, while it seems less likely that the U.S. will be similarly connected to China, India or Brazil.]

Kevin’s point--one that educator-leaders should take very seriously--is that truly massive systemic changes are happening that will totally remake the world our children will inhabit.  What are we doing to prepare them for that world?  And what must we do to position our institutions to thrive then and beyond?