Foreword / Jean-Michel Baer -- The Trends: The Asian century -- Poverty and mobility of men and women -- Increasing scarcity of natural resources, vulnerability of the planet -- Tensions: Tension between the current methods of production, of consumption and the future availability of non renewable resources -- Tensions between a general and simultaneous process of increasing economic interdependence and differentiation -- Tensions between spatial proximity in the context of accelerated urbanisation and cultural distance -- The Major Transitions: Stabilising the world, recognising the new key-actors -- Draw on the ecological and demographic challenges to invent a new development model -- Acknowledgements -- Indicative bibliography.