1. an axe-age, a sword-age,

2. shields will be cloven,

3. a wind-age, a wolf-age,

4. before the world's ruin.

5. Völuspá

The international order at the beginning of the twenty-first century is, many argue, at a crucial turning point. For many, perhaps the majority, the future is likely to be a very positive one, whatever our current difficulties. The growth of humankind's technical and scientific knowledge beckons great improvements across a range of spheres; health, well-being, longevity, food production, energy, and many more. And on top of that there is the possibility of the progressive curtailing or even elimination of age-old scourges such as disease, famine, and even war. But for many others, certainly a sizeable minority, the outlook is much gloomier. A global economy where the rich get richer and the poor much poorer; growing crises over resources (energy, minerals and, perhaps most important of all, water); growing instability in the global order as new powers rise to challenge the existing order; growing ecological breakdown, perhaps verging on catastrophe – a ‘coming anarchy’, as one writer called it a few years ago.