Scenario Planning

Scenario Planning is all about preparing and anticipating and adapting to possible futures, so naturally is a tool of the Ruling Elite and their ‘think tanks’. It’s also of interest to the rest of the population because it helps to reveal the Ruling Elite’s plans. Pioneers of modern scenario planning include the US military backed RAND CORPORATION and the oil company ROYAL/DUTCH SHELL. Significantly, there is a ‘New Age’ aspect to scenario planning that needs to be acknowledged.

The ROCKEFELLER FOUNDATION inevitably contributed. For example, in 2010 they produced a scenario planning report that contained one scenario that would resonate strongly with the Corona virus/COVID-19 ‘pandemic’ in 2020. That report (“Scenarios for the Future of Technology and International Development”) was made in conjunction with another American think tank that specialised in scenario planning: The GBN (GLOBAL BUSINESS NETWORK), based in California. One of the GBN’s co-founders, PETER SCHWARTZ (also its’ Chairman), wrote an introduction to the aforementioned report, and praised the Rockefeller Foundation’s use of scenario planning.

The GBN was involved in the ‘New Age’-influenced Scenario Planning at Royal/Dutch Shell. See my article “Star Trek, NASA and The Nine” in the New Age section.

Schwartz previously had worked at the Silicon Valley think tank, the Stanford Research Institute (SRI), where he began to develop his unique method of scenario planning, and rose to be director of the Strategic Environment Center. The SRI researched paranormal subjects. The SRI (Stanford Research Institute) and Royal Dutch Shell both were significant contributors to the discipline of SCENARIO PLANNING, resulting in a methodology called INTUITIVE LOGICS, which includes ‘disciplined intuition’ and brainstorming. In Shell’s 2008 guide to using scenarios (“Scenarios: An Explorer’s Guide”), they say that exploration involves a mix of analytical thinking and “informed intuition”. See my article on intuition in the Mind and Consciousness section.

Schwartz worked for Royal Dutch Shell as head of scenario planning, where he continued the pioneering work of PIERRE WACK, in the field of scenario planning.

Royal Dutch/Shell has had numerous employees/consultants who took New Age ideas into the mainstream, e.g. PIERRE WACK, DAVID BOHM, JOSEPH JAWORSKI.

PIERRE WACK – studied under the Sufi mystic Georges Gurdjieff. Wack wanted to merge clairvoyancy with scenario planning.

DAVID BOHM – top physicist who worked with Robert Oppenheimer on the atom bomb. Bohm orked with Albert Einstein after the war. Bohm developed the hologram theory.

JOSEPH JAWORSKI- talked to David Bohm on management issues before they worked for Shell. Jaworski wanted businesses to embrace New Age ideas such as love; intuition; connecting with the ‘source’ of creativity; synchronicity; ‘group mind’; manifesting the ‘future waiting to happen’.

Jaworski was a top lawyer and son of the top lawyer LEON JAWORSKI, the latter a Special Prosecutor at the Watergate trial of Nixon. Leon was a friend of future US President LYNDON JOHNSON, and represented him in trials. See my article “NASA, Gaia and the Great Work” in the New Age section.

GBN members included:-
1) Michael Murphy, a co-founder of the ‘New Age’ Esalen Institute;
2) Freeman Dyson, a top physicist who wrote of an underlying ‘Universal Mind’;
3) Walter Parkes- President of Amblin Entertainment, Steven Spielberg’s production company.

GBN ceased to be an active entity following the acquisition of its’ parent (Monitor Group) by Deloitte in 2013.

The aforementioned Rockefeller/GBN Report (2010) recommended further reading that included reports by The Rand Corporation; the World Bank; the UN Millenium Project; the IFTF (INSTITUTE FOR THE FUTURE). For more info on the IFTF, see my article on them in the Think Tanks section.

Scenario planning, said the report, involves “Engaging your imagination”. Imagination is a pillar of the New Age movement.

The 2010 report revolved around 4 scenarios, of which only one sounded desirable, as if the Rockefeller Foundation/GBN wanted the apparently good option to be adopted. (“Pick a card, any card…”) One of the undesirable scenarios was titled LOCK STEP, about a flu pandemic in 2012. “LOCK STEP – A world of tighter top-down government control and more authoritarian leadership, with limited innovation and growing citizen pushback”.

The seemingly desirable option was “CLEVER TOGETHER – A world in which highly coordinated and successful strategies emerge for addressing both urgent and entrenched worldwide issues…Nation-states lost some of their power and importance as global architecture strengthened and regional governance structures emerged. International oversight entities like the UN took on new levels of authority, as did regional systems like the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), and the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The worldwide spirit of collaboration also fostered new alliances and alignments among corporations, NGOs, and communities…Technology trends and applications we might see [include]: Intelligent electricity, water distribution, and transportation systems develop in urban areas. In these “smart cities,” internet access is seen as a basic right by the late 2010s.”

In the 2010 report was a letter from the then Rockefeller Foundation President, JUDITH RODIN (Jewish. The Rockefellers do like to recruit Jewish people into top positions). Rodin previously had been an associate professor at Yale University, where she held various professorial and other positions from 1972 to 1994. Rodin served as a trustee of the Brookings Institution.

Rodin wrote about the importance of resilience in the face of adversity in her book, “The Resilience Dividend” (2014), which was endorsed by the ex-UN Secretary General KOFI ANNAN; ex-US President BILL CLINTON; ARIANNA HUFFINGTON; ex-New York Mayor MICHAEL BLOOMBERG.

Speaking of resilience, Rodin – writing on the Rockefeller Foundation’s website in 2017 – said: “While the field of resilience is now more widely recognized, and the dividends that resilience concepts and planning provide are more widely appreciated, we have lacked a systematic, comprehensive way to truly measure and quantify the actual value of those returns. Until today. In collaboration with The Rockefeller Foundation, the RAND Corporation developed the Resilience Dividend Valuation Model.”

The Rockefeller Foundation established the 100 RESILIENT CITIES initiative that finished in 2019 but continued on with the RESILIENT CITIES CATALYST, of which Rodin was a Board Director and which had a partnership with FACEBOOK. The original 100 Resilient Cities had partnerships with Bill Gates’ Microsoft; the World Bank Treasury; the BRITISH COUNCIL.

The 100 RESILIENT CITIES President MICHAEL BERKOWITZ (Rockefeller Foundation) had previously been New York City’s Deputy Commissioner at the Office of Emergency Management. In this position Berkowitz worked on major planning initiatives, including the New York City Coastal Storm, Biological Terrorism and Transit Strike contingency plans. Berkowitz was a founding principal of Resilient Cities Catalyst.

Shell Oil’s scenario planning team – under the aforementioned PIERRE WACK – anticipated numerous major ‘shocks’, e.g. the oil price rises in the 1970s; the 1986 collapse of the oil market; the collapse of the Communist Soviet Union.