The year has started with deeply sobering assessments of the UK’s geopolitical outlook. Foreign Secretary David Cameron described “the lights [as] flashing red”. In the words of Grant Shapps, the Defence Secretary, we have moved “from a post-war world to a pre-war world.” The mood of policymakers is further darkened by the increasingly complex risks to our safety posed by artificial intelligence, biosecurity and climate change.
We need to ask big questions about how well prepared the UK is for this new world – not simply conducting an inventory of soldiers, planes and ships, but interrogating how our institutions of state and the organisation of society can be geared up for the challenges to come.
Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month
Content from our partners
