Move by Parag Khanna

Move

by Parag Khanna

Where will you live in 2030? Where will your children settle in 2040? What will the map of humanity look like in 2050?

In the 60,000 years since people began colonising the continents, a recurring feature of human civilisation has been mobility - the constant search for resources and stability. Seismic global events - wars and genocides, revolutions and pandemics - have only accelerated the process. The map of humanity isn't settled, not now, not ever.

As climate change tips toward full-blown crisis, economies collapse, governments destabilise and technology disrupts, we're entering a new age of mass migrations - one that will scatter both the dispossessed and the well-off. Which areas will people abandon and where will they resettle? Which countries will accept or reject them? As today's world population, which includes four billion restless youth, votes with their feet, what map of human geography will emerge?

Here global strategy advisor Parag Khanna provides an illuminating and authoritative vision of the next phase of human civilisation - one that is both mobile and sustainable. As the book explores, in the years ahead people will move to where the resources are and technologies will flow to the people who need them, returning us to our nomadic roots while building more secure habitats. Move is a fascinating look at the deep trends that are shaping the most likely scenarios for the future. Most importantly, it guides each of us as we determine our optimal location on humanity's ever-changing map.

Reviewed by Jeff Sexton on

1 of 5 stars

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A Gold Mine Of Technotyrannical Neoarchy. Wow. Where to begin. I suppose I should specify what I mean by "Gold mine": It is my personal designation for the worst books possible, the ones where you shift through tons of detritus to find even the smallest speck of anything remotely redeemable. Thus, while some might thing that describing a thing as a "gold mine" is a way of denoting massive wealth, for me it is exactly the opposite - something to only be even considered by those with particularly high levels of pain tolerance and masochistic tendencies.

Here, "celebrated futurist" (according to the book's description) Khanna basically does all he can to trash anything remotely Western (and particularly American) while seeking a society that is technologically tyrannical and ruled by the young. (Thus, "technotyrannical neoarchy".) His hubris in claiming that technology and skills are all that matters - and not pesky things like basic human rights and physical geographies - is utterly mind blowing. And his lack of documentation - barely 10% of this advanced reader copy edition I read was bibliography - is truly astounding for such major claims. Perhaps he thinks he gets away with this by claiming to be a "futurist"? Your projections are only as good as your source material, bub, and I expect to see it if you want to make such utterly fantastical claims as claiming that Wakanda is a possibly real society (specifically in saying that Black Panther is a "futuristic" film without ever even alluding to the term "science fiction", as in "Black Panther is a futuristic science fiction film") or that iFunny is a major Gen Z social media platform. Also, proclaiming the mobile home to be the "ultimate symbol of the new American mobility" is so utterly laughable in and of itself that this book should not be classified in any genre but humor.

If you're reading this review and want actual looks at how migration works and the various issues world powers will be looking at over the coming decades, you're *MUCH* better off with Sonia Shah's The Next Great Migration or Tim Marshall's The Power Of Geography and Prisoners of Geography - yes, even with Marshall's own shortsightedness on some issues.

This book is thus not recommended at all, unless you happen to have high tolerances for pain and are particularly masochistic. Which is a major shame, since the title and subtitle were so promising.

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  • Started reading
  • 23 August, 2021: Finished reading
  • 23 August, 2021: Reviewed