A vision and policy agenda for a safer world

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Executive summary

Visionary thinking about how to build a more stable and secure world flourished in the aftermath of the Cold War, but has largely stalled over the last dozen years in the United States. The shock of 9/11, Russia’s revanchism, China’s rise, and a deteriorating international security environment have made long-term thinking seem like a luxury. Populism in the United States and other countries adds further to the challenge. Yet this paper argues that today’s transnational dangers are too great to let strategic imagination be crowded out by traditional great-power rivalries. It also contends that some of the immediate causes of those rivalries are, in principle, addressable, if policymakers engage them creatively and energetically.