Two newly published global risk assessments, one by the Global Challenges Foundation (GCF) and the other by the World Economic Forum (WEF), highlight an erosion of international cooperation and rising global uncertainty. Both reports stress a complex interconnection of global risks which contributes to increased instabilities and governance challenges. According to Democracy Without Borders, they confirm the urgent need for a new model of global cooperation.
Systemic Earth risks and weak governance
GCF’s 2026 report warns of irreversible tipping points across Earth’s climate and ecological systems. It states that seven of nine planetary boundaries that define humanity’s “safe operating space” have now been breached, most recently with regard to ocean acidification.
The report additionally outlines what it considers five of the biggest risks facing humanity today: climate change, biodiversity collapse, weapons of mass destruction, artificial intelligence (AI) in military decision-making and an asteroid impact. According to the foundation, these risks are defined as “a possible event or process that can threaten the lives of a large part of humanity, across multiple continents.”
Increasing risk levels are attributed to a failure of global governance mechanisms in these areas. “Our collective capacity to mitigate global catastrophic risks and protect both people and planet remains weak at best, while trust in and the legitimacy of the system is eroding,” the document points out, stressing that “planetary commons cannot be negotiated with.” The report says that what “we need now is a renewed approach to global governance. One that reinforces international law, strengthens shared norms and accelerates action, while simultaneously fostering creativity, innovation and foresight.”
Among other things, the report calls for the development of a legally binding international framework to govern the use of autonomous weapons technologies, describing such an agreement as urgent, yet politically difficult.
The document highlights the need for institutional creativity, citing as example mechanisms of citizen participation as pursued by the foundation’s partners Iswe Foundation and Democracy Without Borders, among others.
Strong sense of uncertainty
The annual assessment presented by the WEF is based on a survey of over 1,300 experts and additional consultations with business leaders. The report evaluates risks over three time frames: immediate (2026), short to medium term (to 2028), and long term (to 2036). Uncertainty is the central theme of the report’s outlook. Respondents viewed both the short- and long-term global perspective negatively, with 50% of respondents anticipating either a turbulent or stormy outlook over the next two years, deteriorating to 57% of respondents over the next 10 years, with only 1% expecting a calm future.
Geoeconomic confrontation was ranked as the top risk most likely to trigger a “material global crisis” in 2026, followed by state-based armed conflict. The report says that the global political environment in the next ten years is expected to be “a multipolar or fragmented order in which middle and great powers contest, set, and enforce regional rules and norms” with greater risk of “multipolarity without multilateralism.”
Technological risks show steep increases in perceived impact. Misinformation and disinformation ranked second in the short-term outlook, while “adverse outcomes of AI” rose from 30th place in the two-year ranking to fifth place in the 10-year outlook. The report notes the growing potential for AI and quantum technologies to both benefit and destabilize societies.
Environmental risks, while still seen as severe in the long term, have declined in salience over the short term in this report. In the two-year outlook, extreme weather events fell from second to fourth place, and biodiversity loss dropped by five positions. Despite this, environmental threats make up half of the top ten most severe risks in the 10-year time frame.
The WEF concludes that rising polarization, institutional distrust, and geostrategic competition are eroding the foundations of global cooperation. While the report does not elaborate on solutions, it notes that “the future is not a single, fixed path but a range of possible trajectories.”