In 2058, we'll be lucky if any left is left.

Sorry, I'm not in a very optimistic mood today. I think we've been too arrogant for too long and karma is going to catch up with us.

The US will probably be a fascist dictatorship. Just to keep the immigrants out and the remnants of various resources flowing in.

Excellent, excellent question. I'm finding it hard to answer, and my initial instinct is that you're right -- we're in crisis-response mode, not utopian imagination mode. Responding to rising healthcare costs, responding to rising sea levels, etc.

I'm not certain that this is completely a bad thing. The utopian imagination has not always led the Left in a good direction. (Writer has a fit of coughing, while muttering something that sounds like "Marks"?)

But it's probably not a good idea for us to lose our aspirations altogether. And 2058 is a nice target -- close enough to keep us grounded, but far enough to make us think.

So okay, here goes.

#1: The framework of international security is robust enough that nations are no longer feeling motivated to join the nuclear club. This is int'l, so it may not quite be "The America of 2058," but I think it should be the centerpiece of our domestic security agenda. If we don't deal with proliferation, it's going to affect us on this continent sooner or later.

#2: Racial prejudice may never disappear, but by 2058 I would hope that it has diminished to the point where it's mildly humorous -- on the level of present-day jokes about white ethnicity.

#3: The population of the US has stopped growing. This may be a controversial goal. I'm not proposing any particular measures to achieve it; I'm hoping that it can happen "along the way," without much explicit effort. But it's something that I think needs to happen in one way or another if we expect to continue improving the quality of life for our children.

Those may not be the most important goals, but I'll stop there and let other people chime in.

Our system of high-speed rail is the envy of the world.

Handgun registration.

35-hour work week. Subsidized daycare. Working parents less insane.

The electoral map is no longer divided between North and South (see "racial prejudice," above). Instead, US politics divide along urban/rural lines, in part because the carbon tax affects these constituencies differently. Rural areas of the South, and Appalachia, remain conservative. But concerns about global warming have made Florida, Louisiana, and the entire Southwest (including Colorado) as reliably blue as New York is now.

Great post. And I'll just second TUnderwood's comment here.

We're still an unfinished country, aren't we? I'd love to see North America connected physically by rail in the same way we seem to be becoming more connected via Internet.

My dad was a private pilot in the 70's. It was so fun touching down in small airports across the country. Neither of us could afford it now. I wonder if we've not become somewhat dispirited because we can't afford or don't have the time to get out and see the country like we used to?

I thought about this and I cannot see a happy view on the horizion in 2058. I will defer to the scientists who are much better speculating than I.

Epic floods will hit some areas while intense drought will strike others. Humans will face widespread water shortages. Famine and disease will increase. Earth’s landscape will transform radically, with a quarter of plants and animals at risk of extinction. By 2050 Small alpine glaciers will very likely disappear completely, and large glaciers will shrink by 30 to 70 percent. Austrian scientist Roland Psenner of the University of Innsbruck says this is a conservative estimate, and the small alpine glaciers could be gone as soon as 2037. (IPCC) In Australia, there will likely be an additional 3,200 to 5,200 heat-related deaths per year. The hardest hit will be people over the age of 65. An extra 500 to 1,000 people will die of heat-related deaths in New York City per year. In the United Kingdom, the opposite will occur, and cold-related deaths will outpace heat-related ones. (IPCC) World population reaches 9.4 billion people. (U.S. Census Bureau) As biodiversity hotspots are more threatened, a quarter of the world’s plant and vertebrate animal species could face extinction. (Jay Malcolm, University of Toronto, Conservation Biology)

Earth Timeline from Live Science
http://www.livescience.com/environment/070419_earth_timeline.html

To speculate about social/political/economic issues in the future is really an exercise in futility - we have no clue what to expect.

Sorry to be such a bummer. :(

Great sex; great drugs; and great Rock 'n' Roll!

And where's transhuman when you need him?

I would like to see a world where almost all of us live sustainably, in a way that doesn't require hardship such as not being able to eat enough or not having enough water to drink. As other posters have already mentioned, I would like the work week to be shorter, access to health care to be universal, and the drugs, sex and rock and roll to be awesome.

But I am not convinced that 50 years is anywhere near long enough -- we are still sowing seeds in 2008 that we will reap in 2058.

The sooner number 1 happens, the sooner all of the others will follow.

1. Current, neo-classical economics replaced by Georgist economics:

no monopolies or monopolistic practices allowed/enforced by law;

no or very limited patents/trademarks/copyrights;

personal production is not penalised by taxes;

most or all current taxes replaced by the collection of economic rent; (If you don't know what economic rent is, Wikipedia and most other sources won't help. Read Henry George's Progress and Poverty. It will also describe how everything else in this section works.)

the Earth's wealth (land, water, air, airwaves, minerals, ores, etc., etc.) is "taxed" according to its economic rent, and the proceeds are distributed (not re-distributed) among every person in the world.

An economy based on Georgist economics resolves any and all economic barriers to a universal living wage, universal education, universal health care, old-age and other pensions, and more.

2. Abundant, renewable, non-polluting energy.

3. Education system completely revamped so it's no longer the industrial, increasingly dysfunctional, "second wave" factory it is now, but provides effective and enjoyable educational opportunities for all. (For a description of first wave, second wave and third wave societies, see Alvin Toffler's The Third Wave.)

4. Current penal-prison system replaced by an isolation and/or reform system. Broadly, the most dangerously anti-social are isolated and confined to geographic locations where they can, with assistance, create their own, viable community. Others are kept under supervision and/or surveillance while they are guided through educational programmes tailored to make them viable community members.

5. Computerisation and robotisation at a level at which one is capable of designing and manufacturing for oneself almost all of the personal-use products one may need/want.

Good question, Dan. People seem to be laying out dream scenarios, but I don't think that's what you're asking. I interpret your question as asking what progressives long term goals should be, offering the 50-year-horizon as a foil for the exercise. Futuristic forecasting is fun but damn near impossible to get right, or even close.

So here are my recommendations for broad longterm goals:

1. Invest heavily in the research and development of renewable energy - Between global warming and fossil fuel shortages, this isn't even a choice

2. Improve standards of living in all income and demographic brackets - This is a broad goal which includes health care, employment benefits (i.e. return to the 40-hour work week), child care, education, retirement support, obesity prevention, etc.

3. Protect and extend civil rights - Focus on finding innovative solutions to the intractable problem of endemic cultural barriers.

4. Reduce global poverty and oppression - In particular, we need to create a coherent and practical approach for dealing with oppressive and corrupt regimes.

5. Bolster U.S. competitiveness and international influence - Another broad goal. Includes improving education, maintaining economic competitiveness, reducing federal debt, and improving our global reputation and trustworthiness.

6. Foster international institutions and agreements for cooperation between nations (on global warming and oppressive regimes, for example) and conflict resolution.

What a wonderful exercise! A few dreams of mine...

+ Compact, walkable cities in which you know your neighbors and ride your bike or public transit to work. Crime is largely unheard of because most all residents identify themselves with their community and because of mandates insuring all development to include housing for even low-income residents (no more walled "communities"!!).

+ An economy in which external costs have largely been recognized and internalized, leading to sustainable, ecological business practices.

+ An agriculture in which external costs have largely been recognized and internalized, leading to sustainable, ecological growing practices.

There are several critical issues that will shape society:

a) The next terrorist attack on US soil will be more devastating than 9/11 -- regardless of actual physical damage. Now that we have the DHS, people assume they are safe than pre-9/11.

They are not. The DHS isn't doing it's job -- not because of any particular corruption, but because it's such an unwieldy bureaucratic organization. Therefore, when the terrorist attack occurs, people will assume that it's because the DHS didn't have enough power. As a result, people allow for even more of their civil liberties be given up for their safety.

b) Part of this trend to decaying liberties will be advanced by the huge databases being generated on people even as we speak. Myspace and Facebook are in the process of negotiating sharing databases. Google has vast servers that save your gmail from forever.

Interestingly, this fear of loss of privacy was usually directed at Microsoft. However, the hip, arty, young crowd allowed the confluence of other entities (deemed cute and friendly) to assemble such a structure. And they did and do so willingly.

From these bits of info, it's possible to deduce more than just buying habits, but personal preferences and prejudices. These can be combined with blogs, etc. and you have a pretty complete dossier on any individual who spends anytime on the Internet.

The government can then access this information.

Note that the government couldn't have assembled this as efficiently as a host of corporations and that the corporations have had the willing compliance from their users.

Thus, again, there is no "conspiracy" or nefarious force to enable all of this.

c) The end of cheap energy will cause cataclysmic changes in society. Despite the comments on this blog about "renewable energy sources", that's just more pie-in-the-sky hope. If this seems unnecessarily pessimistic, remember that in 1939, everyone was "sure" we would have flying cars by 1983. I've gone over this in several other blogs and so will not continue to do so here.

The good news is that the large-scale monitoring of citizens will be more difficult with the loss of cheap energy. The bad news is that modern society as we know it will dissolve.

Suffice it to say that human labor will become far more important for things like farming. It's probable that we will see a rise in a peasantry class in the US (much like existed in Europe before the Renaissance) with people (again) trading liberty and "rights" for security.

In it's most extreme case, we may well find a class of indentured servants, possibly even slaves (a la the class of people that existed as slaves in Roman times). Gender roles will eventually ratchet back as well with 18th century views being more common than 21st century views.

So: what to make of all of this?

While I don't think that all of these trends will play out in 50 years, this will be the direction. As a result, the left can do it's thing best by helping to merely hold on to where we currently are.

In 2008 that seems defeatist and easy. But it will become increasingly difficult in the years ahead.

Great question, Dan.

I'd like to see an implementation of a true democracy - no graduated representation, but rather one-person/one-vote, with a well-informed citizenry directly responsible for passing or killing legislation.

I can think of at least a half dozen problems with the implementation of this goal (you, gentle reader, can likely divine many more), but I nevertheless maintain it to be a "nice to have".

in no particular order:

1. a stable urban footprint that looks to densify to accommodate the population
2. environmental restoration on the scale of a massive public works program
3. a commitment to broad cultural and artistic education and free schooling
4. living wages and labor rights for all and another great compression of incomes
5. local food systems integrating vibrant rural communities with urban populations
6. a society of joy
7. open travel between all nations
8. true transportation options with HSR, bicycles, and functioning local transit
9. no more homelessness
10. a government we can believe in