The international political system is in a process of profound transformation and realignment, and the reemergence of great power politics and multipolarity – the ‘return of history’ – is one of the principle drivers of change. There is a danger that competition between the emerging powers of the East and South and the status quo powers of the Atlantic World, especially over scarce resources, together with intra-state violence and instability in what Zbigniew Brzezinski has termed the new ‘Global Balkans’, will ignite the conflicts of the 21st Century. Finding new global framework agreements that abet cooperation has never been more important and should be one of the main aims of Europe and the US. The Geopolitics Programme at the Global Policy Institute analyses the dynamics of the current global shifts and identifies practical options for Europe, and the western world in general, to respond to the challenges ahead.