The incoming Donald Trump administration faces a world of greater risk of conflict, slower growth and more anti-democratic pressures than ever since the Cold War, a new US intelligence report released Monday said. US leadership is ebbing amid shifts in economic, political and technological power, deep changes in the global landscape "that portend a dark and difficult near future," according to the National Intelligence Council's "Global Trends: Paradox of Progress" report.
"The next five years will see rising tensions within and between countries," said the report. "For better or worse, the emerging global landscape is drawing to a close an era of American dominance following the Cold War." The National Intelligence Council, a research group under the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, issues its global assessment every four years, and the new one came 11 days before Trump is inaugurated as president.
It painted a gloomy picture of the challenges pulling at the post-World War II global order, including extreme income disparities, technological dislocation, demographic shifts, the impacts of global warming, and intensifying communal conflicts. Moreover, Western democracies will find it harder and harder to stick to their principles and avoid being pulled apart from each other. "It will be much harder to cooperate internationally and govern in ways publics expect," it said. More countries will be able to "veto" co-operative efforts and the myriad channels of global communication will leave large numbers and groups of people misinformed and divided.