It is no small irony that in an age of unprecedented movement of information and knowledge, leaders across all domains-government, private sector, civil society, and academia-have less and less time to focus on longer-range issues and trends. Progressively, long-range planning and strategic thinking are being crowded out by immediate, short-term priorities.

As a result, many of the challenges that require complex, sustained approaches and solution-especially the daunting global issues of our time-are increasingly beyond the pale . . .

For these and other reasons, there is an urgent need to promote farsighted thinking on a range of global strategic issues. The Global Strategy Institute at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is dedicated to meeting that need-by advancing understanding on the range of challenges that lie before us.

The mandate of the Institute is twofold. First, it is a research center on longer-range global trends. Second, it is an executive education program designed to meet the growing needs of senior business, academic, and government leaders in the post-911 global environment.

In an age of heightened complexity, reduced decision timeframes, and instant pressures, leaders find it more difficult to focus on longer-range issues.

The CSIS Global Strategy Institute has been established to meet that need-to work with leaders in government, the private sector, academia and other communities to promote "strategic" thinking about global trends.

To meet this challenge, the Institute conducts research and sponsors executive education programs.

Center of Research
As a center of research, the Institute hosts seminars, conferences and issues publications aimed at assessing the longer-range forces shaping political, economic and social trends across the world

Executive Education
As an executive education program, the Institute is dedicated to providing custom experiential learning programs by drawing on the thinking and perspectives of the many internationally recognized experts at CSIS.

In these ways, the Institute seeks to promote strategic thinking among leaders across the world, raise the level of understanding on looming global challenges, engage the best possible thinkers in discussion on longer-range trends, and, in the process, help shape a better and brighter future. Albert Einstein once said that
"no problem can be solved from the same consciousness that created it."

That statement captures the overarching goal of the Institute-to develop a new consciousness, a deeper understanding of the long-range forces at work, and to explore the new paradigms necessary for us to address the challenges in our future. We are dedicated to both those objectives.

Research Agenda
As a center for research, the Institute focuses its analytical efforts on longer-range trends across the world. The mandate for this research is to look well beyond the headlines-to analyze issues on an anticipatory and integrated basis:

THE SEVEN REVOLUTIONS: This prominent research initiative identifies and analyzes the key policy challenges that policymakers, business figures, and other leaders will face out to the year 2025. The answers lie in the seven areas of change we expect to be most "revolutionary" . . . population, resource management and environmental stewardship, technological innovation and diffusion, the development and dissemination of information of knowledge, economic integration, the nature and mode of conflict, and the challenges of governance.

THE SEVEN FUTURES: This assessment explores the various trends fueling the futures of seven regions across the planet: Latin America, Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa, Russia and Eurasia, South Asia and East Asia-Pacific. It zooms in on developments in each of these geographical areas and then examines which global trends will be most significant out to the year 2025 and beyond.

THE SEVEN SCENARIOS: Building on the baseline projections of the Seven Revolutions presentation, Seven Scenarios examines three upside contingencies, three downside scenarios, and one ambiguous outcome-any one of which would have a profound impact on the way we think about the world.

CONFERENCES AND SEMINARS: In addition, we plan conferences on a wide variety of topics related to global issues and trends.

OUTREACH: The Institute publishes a monthly newsletter, HORIZONS, as well as periodic reports and monographs. In addition, the Institute maintains an active website.

EXECUTIVE EDUCATION

The Global Strategy Institute executive education program draws from the distinguished team of CSIS scholars as well as experts from government, business, and academia. Through our specially designed simulations, we engage participants in role playing that emulate real-life crisis scenarios. Our presentations on various global regions and topics provide the basis for intense, thought-provoking discussion designed to both challenge embedded assumptions and explore new ideas and initiatives.

The Institute's executive education program targets leaders in six areas:
The physical infrastructure of Russia is roughly three times older than OECD countries and will need substantial direct investment in the next twenty years.

• government;
• delegations from outside the country;
• the private sector;
• associations;
• membership groups; and
• colleges and universities.

An executive education program designed for your organization could have some or all of the following elements:

• Seminars: Half-day or full-day programs with CSIS scholars and/or outside experts on national security/foreign policy themes.
• Feedback: Specially designed curricula tailored for specific interests, including stress-testing strategic plans, carrying out global surveys of political, security, and economic trends, forecasting, and other planning techniques.
• Exercises: Exercises to help groups refine skills, test assumptions and propositions, and exchange views on various global policy issues.
• Modeling: Program participants ask "What if?" questions and work through sensitivity analysis on key substantive issues and policy challenges.
• Simulations: CSIS has designed several high-profile simulations on key foreign policy and national security issues, including:
  • "Dark Winter" . . . a simulation where a National Security Council is confronted by a bioterrorism attack involving smallpox.
  • "Silent Vector" . . . a simulation involving a highly credible but imprecise threat of attack on the U.S. energy infrastructure.
  • "Bold Sentinel" . . . a contingency arising from the current tension on the Korean Peninsula regarding the threat of nuclear weapons in North Korea.

LEADERSHIP

The CSIS Global Strategy Institute is guided by a prominent Advisory Board consisting of distinguished individuals from business, government, and academia:

The Global Strategy Institute (GSI) is an initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), an international policy and strategy think tank based in Washington, D.C. GSI is dedicated to tracking long-range global strategic trends and the policy challenges that policy-makers, business figures, and other leaders will need to address in the coming decades.

The Institute is directed by Erik Peterson, CSIS Senior Vice President, who also holds the William A. Schreyer Chair in Global Analysis. It is guided by an expert Advisory Committee consisting of several members of the Center's Board of Trustees as well as representatives of government, the private sector, non-governmental organizations and academia.

The Institute has two main functions. The first is to consolidate and develop research at CSIS on long-range global trends. Second, it will develop an executive education program targeting leaders in six areas: government, delegations from outside the country, the private sector, associations, membership groups, and colleges and universities.

To this end, we have developed a series of presentations scanning the world of 2025 that cover many different perspectives and range of topics. Additionally, we draw from these presentations and the expertise at CSIS in planning custom-tailored programs for groups and organizations interested in strategic trends and long-range thinking. The purpose of the Global Strategy Institute is to foster understanding about the driving forces changing our planet and to inspire vision in leaders across levels of management, across sectors, across the world.