Next Global Mega Epoch Change Beginning Around 2030
Is the current turbulence in the world only about Trump and his followers playing reckless politics out of the blue, or are we witnessing the beginning of a new era in the global world order?
Dr. Tuomo Kuosa
Tuomo is co-founder and Director of Futures Research at Futures Platform. He holds a PhD from the Turku School of Economics and is an Associate Professor (Docent) of Strategic Foresight at the Finnish National Defence University.
FUTURE PROOF – BLOG BY FUTURES PLATFORM
The current global turbulence isn't only about Trump and his followers playing reckless politics out of the blue. Nor is it simply a pendulum swinging temporarily toward nationalist-conservative politics before inevitably returning to the Obama, Reagan, or Roosevelt-era politics. Instead, we are approaching a logical epoch change in world history. Whether we embrace it or resist it, we are entering an era where nearly all fundamental principles and practices undergo profound transformations. This conclusion is derived from four key sources: macrohistorical analysis, complexity theory, recent global events, and the prospects of forthcoming technological changes.
I discussed the current Epoch Change for the first time right after Russia started its invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The analysis, published here, was an attempt to understand the vast global changes through the concept of Zeitgeist and the principles of Complexity Theory.
According to Zeitgeist's basic principle, when the time is ready for change, no mighty force in the world can stop it. Complexity Theory also states that all open systems undergo three natural renewal cycles to maintain their operational capabilities over time.
These are:
Break of the existing order (bifurcation/entropy release)
Re-assembling/emergence/growth of the new order
Change pressure or entropy increase
Based on this, the booklet stated that if there aren't good enough pressure release valve, any open and evolving system, including a society, will either overheat like a kettle and then explode, or it will break or fade away in a chain reaction over a more extended period.
The booklet also discussed the signs of societal pressure increase in the pre-Ukrainian war years and presented the breaking of the war as a sign of reaching the societal break of the order phase, namely the Epoch Change. It also shed some dim light on the pieces from which the new societal epoch will begin to emerge.
Historical Cycles: A Long View of Change
By the time I wrote the booklet, I hadn’t yet conducted a proper macrohistorical analysis of the topic. Only the timeframe since the Great French Revolution was slightly analysed. Additionally, the study did not identify or incorporate other retroaction models, which are the ultimate drivers behind cyclical changes at standard intervals. Only Complexity Theory was used for that purpose in the 2022 analysis.
I have now thoroughly studied the retroaction models used by other macrohistorians in their analyses. These generally fall into three main categories: economic challenges and technological platforms; theories of social cohesion and natural life cycles; and social-psychological factors, such as generational shifts exemplified by models like the fathers-and-sons model.
The cycles identified in other macrohistorical works can be grouped into micro (approximately 12 years), meta (around 50–65 years), and macro (roughly 100–130 years) patterns that recur at nearly regular intervals. I have also compared these models to societal developments since the beginning of the Roman Republic and concluded that both smaller and larger cycles do indeed exist.
When I extended the timeframe to analyse societal changes since the beginning of the Roman Republic, I discovered something other macrohistorians hadn’t identified: approximately 250-year mega cycles that recur at even more regular intervals than the shorter cycles. The first significant discovery was that there have been ten such mega cycles between the start of the Roman Republic and the year 2030. Each has been a distinctly different epoch from the one before and after it. The second major discovery was that the year 2030 marks a pivotal milestone in world history. When macrohistorical analyses based on different retroaction models are placed in the same context and synchronised, they all point to this same conclusion.
Placing Today’s Turbulence in the Macrohistorical Context
Going back to the first question: Is the current turbulence in the world only about Trump and his followers playing reckless politics out of the blue? And is this change just a temporary pendulum swing that will soon return back to where it was?
The answer is no, if we believe in macrohistorical cycles that repeat over history. The turbulence signals a mega epoch change: a transition to a new era where nearly all fundamental practices and principles will be different from what we have learnt them to be.
Changes in the world economy, geopolitical order, the role of politics and democracy, international institutions, industrial and service production models, and social values were already underway. If it hadn’t been Trump and his administration triggering the avalanche, it would have been someone else.
The signs of growing societal pressure towards new principles, practices and order worldwide have been clear. From this perspective, we may say that we’ve just went through what can be identified as phase 3: pressure or entropy increase, and have now entered phase 1 of the next cycle, breakdown of the existing order (bifurcation/entropy release).
From this point of view, developments such as Elon Musk running the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) can be interpreted as mechanisms carrying out an entropy release, political cleansing, and bifurcation toward new systems and practices across the US government. Next, the waves of this transformation will flow through the world, reshaping the global order—even if many of the initial changes may prove unsustainable and become replaced over time.
I'll discuss the topic further in a longer publication and upcoming blog posts, including the logic behind different cycle lengths and the retroaction models to which they are connected. I will also discuss the implications of the new political era in the US, together with the other emerging characteristics of the next mega epoch that is projected to begin around 2030.
You can read the Finnish translation of this article here.
