9 minute read
Known Black Jellyfish in India
from Harvard Journal
Tobby Simon
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The world is witnessing huge changes and there are plenty of opportunities for India. Its governments will have to be alert to what the future is likely to bring to the Republic and be aware of potential threats. For, global governance is no longer about individual leaders plotting their own course. Instead, it involves bringing together some of the finest and most avant-garde thinking in contemporary societies, replacing competition with collaboration.
n the post-pandemic era, as international systems undergo tectonic shifts and the world gravitates towards a multipolar order, several opportunities lie in wait for the Indian Republic. To capitalise on this potential, successive governments will have to identify and insulate themselves from future shocks. This entails a more informed appreciation of the ‘unconventional threats’ that beleaguer humankind.
One such form of threat most stakeholders are familiar with—‘the black swan’—describes the disproportionate effects of previously unobserved, high impact and hard to predict events. Indeed, it is such rare occurrences that often grab global headlines. There are, however, two additional metaphors worth considering—the ‘Black Jellyfish’ and the ‘Black Elephant’. The former refers to issues that are well-known and comprehensible but turn out to be complex and uncertain in the long run, with a long tail and can deliver a nasty sting at the end. The latter represents a cross between the ‘Black Swan’ and the ‘Elephant in the Room’, where the challenges are visible to everyone, but no one feels compelled to deal with them. In other words, they signify the blind spots that arise due to cognitive bias, powerful institutional forces, short-sightedness and failure (or unwillingness) to read signals. An organisation’s inability to identify, comprehend and implement policies that address such matters can magnify the risk factors involved and incur high latent costs.
For India, it is critical to prepare for all these types of threats that are out of the ordinary and not bound by convention. Although infrequent in nature and operating in contravention of dominant rules and societal norms, unconventional threats can metamorphose and acquire a more conventional hue when there are changes in the surrounding framework. For instance, in the build-up to the First World War, many military experts had classified submarine warfare as an unconventional threat. This was because Germany had announced the renewal of unrestricted submarine warfare in the Atlantic, with their torpedo-armed submarines preparing to attack any and all ships, including civilian passenger carriers, sighted in the war-zone waters. During the course of the war, by employing U-boats on a large scale, they had used this force asymmetrically against the Americans and their allies. By the beginning of the Second World War, however, the use of submarines became more widespread among major maritime combatants, thereby transforming a hitherto unconventional threat into a conventional one. Hence, it is important to assess these threat landscapes, consisting of these unseen Black Swans, seen Black Elephants and known Black Jellyfish.
While globalisation has been the most progressive force in modern history, it continues to raise several questions concerning the diffusion of wealth. With many citizens perceiving greater integration as being fraught with risk, there has been a recent spike in xenophobic, protectionist and nationalist rhetoric. Unfortunately, the institutional capacities to manage
While globalisation has been the most progressive force in modern history, it continues to raise several questions concerning the diffusion of wealth. With many citizens perceiving greater integration as being fraught with risk, there has been a recent spike in xenophobic, protectionist and nationalist rhetoric
such global issues have not kept pace with the burgeoning complexities of modern society. Although international establishments such as the United Nations, International Monetary Fund, World Health Organization and World Bank have arguably registered successes in the twentieth century, they have increasingly failed to adapt to evolving realities in recent years. Meanwhile, at the national level, politicians and policy-makers have found it arduous to strike a balance between the compulsions of domestic politics and the benefits of universal connectivity.
A failure of governance has contributed to the proliferation of unconventional threats. As observed by Maya Tudor, an Oxford scholar, the incapability of a state to meet the rising aspirations of its people in an inter-linked world can further the rise of populism. When such populism fails, it deteriorates into mobocracies and anarchies.
Rising income equalities, as measured by the Gene coefficient, represents another area of concern. Due to growing automation and ‘uberisation’ of the world, along with the ascendancy of platform companies, wealth has become concentrated in the hands of a few. While disparities between countries may have reduced, the inequalities within nation-states have increased. Such a yawning gap between the haves and the have-nots of society is particularly discernible in terms of income, wealth, education, social mobility, prosperity and political heft. If left unchecked, this can be a veritable recipe for disaster.
The escalating cost of education is equally perturbing. As higher learning becomes more expensive, and a large section of the population is deprived of its benefits, social media networks find it easier to generate echo chambers and
Unless there is some form of accountability, a progressively expanding and unregulated information space can blur the difference between fact and opinion. This makes individuals more susceptible to misinformation as well as radicalisation manipulate the human mind. As was recently observed in the context of the US elections, online filter bubbles can polarise populations, erode trust in institutions, perpetuate uncertainty and fuel grievances. Therefore, the weaponisation of information through deep fakes and disinformation should be actively resisted. Otherwise, it will provide opportunities for state and non-state actors to deter and coerce adversaries in an asymmetrical manner. Unless there is some form of accountability, a progressively expanding and unregulated information space can blur the difference between fact and opinion. This makes individuals more susceptible to misinformation as well as radicalisation. More broadly, the agility and ultra high-speed networks of interacting smart devices can be potentially exploited by malicious actors, thereby posing substantial challenges from a societal, organisational and personal point of view. The poisoning of Artificial Intelligence (AI) defence systems can also not be discounted. As a growing number of security companies embrace AI for anticipating and detecting cyberattacks, Black Hat hackers may attempt to corrupt these defences. Even though AI capabilities help to parse signals from noise, if they fall into the hands of the wrong people, they can be leveraged to launch sophisticated assaults. Generative adversarial networks (GANs) that pitch two neural
networks against one another may be deployed to determine the algorithms of such AI models.
Finally, all governments need to account for the new classes of accidents and abuses that may be spawned by ‘twenty-first century technologies’. For the first time, the benefits of nanotechnology, robotics as well as genetic sciences are well within the reach of individuals and small-scale actors. They are no longer required to build large facilities or acquire rare raw materials to derive value from them. Knowledge alone can drive the application of such capabilities.
In other words, it is important to acknowledge that weapons of mass destruction have been replaced by knowledge-enabled mass destruction. This destructive potential is further amplified by the power of self-replication.
Against this backdrop, it is imperative that governments and other non-partisan think tanks undertake research that forewarns policy-makers and the strategic community about predictable surprises. In 2015, the Synergia Foundation, a Bengaluru-based strategic think tank, had analysed the emerging hazards posed by the Internet of Things (IoT). Apart from examining the potential cyber threats for businesses and governments, it had formulated a framework for fostering dialogue at a global level and understanding the impact of digital threats to critical infrastructure and the IoT. With the recently discovered cyber-attacks such as SolarWinds in the US and RedEcho in India, the need for such research has been clearly augmented. Even incidents such as the Juspay
With respect to the future of data breach have underscored the need biosecurity, India and the rest of the to incessantly monitor threats from the world must be prepared to deal with deep and dark web, a vulnerability that threats that emanate from a thawing of the think tank had first reported in 2014. the permafrost As early as in 2008, the Synergia Foundation had also foreseen that pandemics would pose serious threats to national security that goes beyond health. It had simulated the impact of an avian flu attack to more than 300 policy-makers, business leaders and academics. Eleven years later, this prognosis has now been proven right. With respect to the future of biosecurity, India and the rest of the world must be prepared to deal with threats that emanate from a thawing of the permafrost. As global warming continues at an unprecedented rate and parts of the planet witness record-breaking heat waves, the Earth’s ancient and forgotten pathogens, which have been trapped or preserved in the permafrost for thousands of years, may re-emerge with new vigour. It is exceedingly important to ascertain such risks and devise strategies for countering them. Building robust supply chains that are resilient to disruptive factors is yet another need of the hour. The downfall of Ericsson in the early 2000s, owing to its failure in proactively managing supply chain risks, acts as a cautionary tale today. Indeed, most of the successful tech behemoths, such as Apple, Google, Intel or Dell, have retained their value since the 1990s through robust supply chain engineering. Drawing on these lessons from history, it is absolutely critical to work with relevant partners and bolster supply chain risk management in other sectors. By ideating about such unconventional threats and charting a roadmap for the future, a think tank can successfully transition into a ‘do tank’.
Forging Ahead
At the end of the day, the rate of change and the level of uncertainty are such that they may outpace good governance. In light of this reality, it is critical for problem-solving networks to upgrade themselves by becoming more distributed and work in concert with each other.
Global governance is no longer about individual leaders plotting their own course. Rather, it entails a collation of some of the finest and most avant-garde thinking in contemporary societies, which replaces competition with collaboration. High-performing organisations and individuals, both in the public and private sector, should strive to devise complementary solutions. The more valuable their contributions, the greater their influence.
To accomplish this vision, a novel approach that places strategic adaptability at its core will be required in the days to come. Resolving the tension between foresight and inherent uncertainty is the holy grail strategy for thwarting unconventional threats. Any inert failure to predict such risks can trigger chain reactions that unleash catastrophic consequences.
