2026 is a tipping point year.
It’s a time of great geopolitical uncertainty. Not because there’s imminent conflict between the two biggest powers, the United States and China—that isn’t even a top risk, it’s a red herring this year. There’s not (yet, at least) a second Cold War, with a rising China remaking the global system to its own liking, the Americans and allies resisting. Nor do tensions between the United States and Russia threaten to spiral out of control despite a war raging in Europe, the result of Vladimir Putin’s longstanding grievances against the US-led order.
The United States is itself unwinding its own global order. The world’s most powerful country is in the throes of a political revolution.
In our lifetimes, we have never witnessed an American president so committed to and so capable of changing the political system and, accordingly, the United States’s role in the world. Franklin D. Roosevelt was the closest and, as you’ll see in the report, the comparison is lacking. Whether Donald Trump’s revolution succeeds or fails, the implications for the United States and the broader world will be felt for a generation.
For other countries, the United States has become unpredictable and unreliable. Cliff Kupchan, Chairman. Responding to this new reality has become an urgent geopolitical endeavor. Some will succeed: China is today in a stronger geopolitical position accordingly; so too are India and the Gulf states. Others will fail: Europe is now surrounded by adversaries and is probably too late to remake itself effectively. Others will defend themselves, hedge their bets, and find ways to muddle through as best they can: Canada, Mexico, and much of the Global South.
In the interim, we’ll see a lot of instability. The world today bears witness to some 60 active conflicts, the most since World War II. And while some will resolve into ceasefires, few will become stable. Because at a time of disruption, most everyone is concerned principally with making sure their own house is in order.
All of which is happening in the midst of an extraordinary technological revolution, an AI boom that represents the greatest opportunity and danger humanity has ever created. And it comes with next to no governance, alignment, or coordination.
What a time to be alive. And what a time to present our Top Risks report for 2026.
Further Reading: