December 19, 2022
The Top Ten Global Risks of 2023
We have identified the top global risks in 2023 from a U.S. and global perspective.
by Mathew Burrows Robert A. Manning
Drawing on our many years of experience in forecasting global risks and trends at the U.S. Intelligence Community’s National Intelligence Council, where we were tasked with providing U.S. leaders with long-range analysis and insights, we have identified the top global risks in 2023 from a U.S. and global perspective. Our track record is pretty good based on the risks we identified for 2022. COVID variants were indeed a source of concern, particularly in China, holding down Chinese economic growth, as we also predicted. We forecasted a Russian invasion of Ukraine and oil prices reaching $100 a barrel, which occurred earlier this year, although energy prices have declined somewhat in the second half of 2022. Food shortages, economic crises, and growing debt problems among developing countries were all highlighted last year, as they are this year. Some economists anticipate the debt crisis may not be as widespread as we and others have projected, but low- and middle-income countries, such as Sri Lanka and Pakistan, are already facing this reality. Last year’s prediction about a shortfall in fighting climate change was borne out at the underwhelming COP27 gathering in Cairo, Egypt, in November; we assess this trend will continue in 2023. Finally, owing to the growing tensions surrounding Taiwan, as well as the U.S. embargo on the export of high-end semiconductor designs and equipment, Sino-U.S. differences will persist in 2023.
Each risk is assigned a probability. A medium probability means there is a 50/50 chance that the risk will play out as we anticipate this year. Making such projections has become more difficult because so many of the risks are interlocked with one another. Polycrisis is the term being used to describe the interwoven nature of one crisis embedded in others. Although polycrises have existed before, the Ukraine War has highlighted the current set of interdependent crises facing the world. The food crisis was exacerbated by Ukraine’s inability to export its grains until recently. The energy crisis is rooted in Western efforts to deny energy profits to the Russian war machine and Vladimir Putin’s retaliation in cutting gas supplies to Europe. Inflation has been boosted owing to energy- and food-price hikes, but it is also linked to supply chain disruptions resulting from the pandemic. As with debt, inflation is also rooted in the increasing prices of commodities because of the war in Ukraine, as well as the strong dollar and fiscal outlays by states to combat the economic downturn caused by the pandemic. The fact that most of the risks are interrelated means that the reduction in risk of any single one will depend on many other risks decreasing concurrently. Similarly, the severity of any single risk is linked to and often aggravates others. Nevertheless, we think it useful to examine each risk individually, keeping in mind the interlocked nature of all risks, and forecasting the direction that each will move in terms of probability—higher or lower—even though any individual risk cannot completely diminish while the others have not been resolved.
The Risks
