e live in hugely paradoxical times. We will see greater change in the twenty-firstcentury than we have in any previous human century. Huge leaps in science andtechnology, accompanied by huge economic and social advances in many societiesaround the world, especially Asian societies, will mean that the texture and chem-istry of the twenty-first century will be massively different from the nineteenth andtwentieth centuries.How will it be massively different? It will be different in three significant dimen-sions. First, we will see the end of the era of Western domination of world history.Second, we will see the return to the success of many Asian societies, especiallythe two most populous societies of China and India. Third, as a result of the rapidshrinkage of the world, through both technological leaps and growing interdepen-dence, partly through global trade, humanity is no longer living on a vast planet.It is living in a small, densely interconnected global village. Indeed, when futurehistorians look at the twenty-first century, they will marvel at how many big changeshappened in the human condition in a small space of time.