The future-looking analysis sought to respond to the following focal question: What will the EU civil security market look like by 2032? Specific questions also guided the research to better understand how the market is expected to evolve in the future and identifies where gaps might exist in terms of supply and research: What new threats will the EU civil security market need to address? Will the EU civil security market be able to meet EU civil security needs autonomously in the future? How will the four identified civil security areas (border management, fighting crime & terrorism, disaster risk management, critical infrastructure resilience) evolve?
This exercise brought together the observed market dynamics and scenario planning. Scenario planning refers to the disciplined method and process, which results in extreme yet plausible alternative hypotheses about how the world might unfold, designed specifically to highlight risks and opportunities facing the organisation. It takes into account factors that might eventually influence and disrupt the security market, i.e., political, economic, social and others. Ultimately, its results can support the future-proofing of new strategies and options and, as decision-makers weigh possible strategic directions, help in assessing the viability of those options in different possible futures.
The purpose of the future-looking work is to look at how the market is expected to evolve in the future and identifies where gaps might exist in terms of supply and research. Through the analysis of drivers and the development of scenarios, the output of this task allows to understand the implications from each scenario for the EU civil security market stakeholders.
Note: The scenario planning exercise was developed based on the identification and analysis of the drivers through interview and iterative research process using an AI-based research tool, combining human intuition with machine objectivity. Next, the 72 drivers identified were discussed and prioritised as input for the interactive workshop sessions. The final prioritisation was achieved via a digital survey, collecting feedback from a wide range of stakeholders from the security ecosystem (including industry representatives, associations, workshops participants, and others).
Based on this prioritisation, drivers were clusters into common topic categories, denominated critical uncertainties. Two critical uncertainties were selected to provide possible axes for the scenario matrix: ‘Consolidation of the EU civil security union’, which includes two opposites: one EU voice (where there is alignment in technology standards, supply, demand) vs highly fragmented priorities (leaving to the players to decide what is best to develop), and the second uncertainty, ‘Capacity to respond to dynamic threat landscape’ with two extremes: Enabled / Anticipating vs Hindered / Falling behind. Within this matrix, scenario narratives both for the end state 2032 as well as the 2027 half-way point were collaboratively created and detailed across the four security areas.
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