summary
Constant technological change will begin to erase our traditions, religions and emotional security. People will need a more satisfying concept of God that can't be explained by the impersonal advancements in science and technology. Mr. Wishard cites six trends that will shape the psychographics of our new global culture:

• Globalization
• New Geopolitical Structure
• Change is Being Altered
• Acceleration of Information
• Non-Human Technology Progress
• Spiritual Reorientation
  

trends & forecasts
Trend 1: Globalization
Global influences will continue to shape our views of politics, culture, religion and economics. The Internet will form the largest influence on the world economy. Forrester Research claims business-to-consumer commerce will increase $100 billion by 2003. Even more influential, business-to-business ecommerce will rise from $43 billion today to $1.3 trillion by 2003.

Migration will change the cultural bedrock of the developed nations. The United States will receive ten million immigrants over the next ten years. Currently, California offers driver's license registration in over 20 languages. Spanish will be the primary language in California by 2050. Immigration will shape Europe as well. Germany is passing legislation allowing Turkish immigrants to become citizens. Italy will need 10 million new citizens by 2025 just to maintain its current population.

Trend 2: New Geopolitical Structure
As more people from different cultures live together in the same countries, political consensus will fragment. On a worldwide scale, non-Western nations will become more important political players. "For the first time in modern history, Japan and China both have larger economies than any European nation."

Trend 3: Change is Being Altered
The ability to create change is no longer reserved as a Western strategy; it is now a global concern.

• Significant cultural, economic, social and technological changes are evolving simultaneously in every country. For thousands of years, change on such a large and rapid scale has not occurred. Since it has never been achieved before, no country is equipped to incorporate and adjust to new radical changes.
• Tradition is the collection of social images that bind together civilized life. Rapid change is erasing tradition. Nevertheless, tradition is needed to anchor civilizations. Constant change will not provide an adequate cohesion of civilized populations.

Trend 4: Acceleration of Information
The acceleration of information being pumped into personal lives will not allow people time to reshape new input into coherent forms.

• In the past, information traveled slowly from place to place. This gave people time to digest and adjust to new discoveries and changes. Information arriving at faster paces will result in "psychic disorientations."
• Further computer advancements could subsequently decrease the time people need to psychologically absorb new information.
• The hectic pace of life will continue to promote mental and emotional stress. Companies will increasingly find new ways to handle employee stress and maintain personal psychological well being.

Trend 5: Non-Human Technology Progress
In the past, technological progress has been an extension of human abilities. Now, many prestigious leaders think we could "create our own successors." Jaron Lanier, founder of the "world's first virtual reality company", writes, "Medical science, neuroscience, computer science, genetics, biology - separately and together, seem to be on the verge of abandoning the human realm altogether."

Trend 6: Spiritual Reorientation
In today's society, people seek the help of psychotherapists instead of priests. The traditional Juedo-Christian structure is well eroded and will dissolve further.

• As people stray from religious wholeness, they will experience more anxiety and alienation. "As a result, we now have a language of dysfunction that has entered the vocabulary only since the beginning of the twentieth century. Stressed, paranoid, repressed, burned out, mid-life crisis, identity crisis - they're all terms we think of as individual problems, but in fact they represent a deeper condition of our times."
• To regain orientation, people will search for a higher affirmation of life in other forms like Eastern philosophy and New Age spirituality.