The Global Risks Report 2024

Over the longer term, developmental progress and living standards are at risk. Economic, environmental and technological trends are likely to entrench existing challenges around labour and social mobility, blocking individuals from income and skilling opportunities, and therefore the ability to improve economic status (Chapter 2.5: End of development?). Lack of economic opportunity is a top 10 risk over the two-year period, but is seemingly less of a concern for global decision-makers over the longer-term horizon, dropping to #11 (Figure E). High rates of job churn – both job creation and destruction – have the potential to result in deeply bifurcated labour markets between and within developed and developing economies. While the productivity benefits of these economic transitions should not be underestimated, manufacturing- or services-led export growth might no longer offer traditional pathways to greater prosperity for developing countries. The narrowing of individual pathways to stable livelihoods would also impact metrics of human development – from poverty to access to education and healthcare. Marked changes in the social contract as intergenerational mobility declines would radically reshape societal and political dynamics in both advanced and developing economies.Simmering geopolitical tensions combined with technology will drive new security risks As both a product and driver of state fragility, Interstate armed conflict is a new entrant into the top risk rankings over the two-year horizon (Figure C). As the focus of major powers becomes stretched across multiple fronts, conflict contagion is a key concern (Chapter 1.4: Rise in conflict). There are several frozen conflicts at risk of heating up in the near term, due to spillover threats or growing state fragility. This becomes an even more worrying risk in the context of recent technological advances. In the absence of concerted collaboration, a globally fragmented approach to regulating frontier technologies is unlikely to prevent the spread of its most dangerous capabilities and, in fact, may encourage proliferation (Chapter 2.4: AI in charge). Over the longer-term, technological advances, including in generative AI, will enable a range of non-state and state actors to access a superhuman breadth of knowledge to conceptualize and develop new tools of disruption and conflict, from malware to biological weapons. Censorship and surveillance Adverse outcomes of frontier technologies Cyber insecurity Adverse outcomesof AI technologiesTechnological powerconcentrationMisinformation and disinformationIntrastate violence Terrorist attacksErosion of human rights SocietalpolarizationInterstate armed conflict Insufficient infrastructure and services Lack of economic opportunity Labour shortages Geoeconomic confrontation UnemploymentDebtInflation Illicit economic activityInvoluntary migration Infectious diseasesPollutionBiodiversity loss and ecosystem collapseCritical change to Earth systems Extremeweather events Chronic health conditions Biological, chemical or nuclear hazardsDisruptions tocritical infrastructureNon-weather related natural disastersNatural resource shortages Concentration of strategic resourcesDisruptions to a systemically important supply chain Economic downturn Asset bubble burstsGlobal risks landscape: an interconnections map FIGURE D Source World Economic Forum Global RisksPerception Survey 2023-2024.Edges Relative influence High LowMediumRisk influenceNodes High LowMedium Risk categories Economic Environmental Geopolitical Societal Technological Global Risks Report 2024 9