Transatlantic Policy Network

Transatlantic leaders seem to have come to a common conclusion: the world’s liberal democracies are facing a new systemic competition. While they support a joint strategy for dealing with their autocratic challengers by strengthening cooperation with each other, they are only at the beginning of thinking about the best way to compete where they must – and to cooperate with competitors where they can. At last year’s Munich Security Conference, world leaders discussed a world shaped by “Westlessness” – as diagnosed by the Munich Security Report 2020. Unfortunately, various developments have vindicated last year’s dire analysis. Not only did Western countries continue to exhibit a lack of joint action on crucial global issues, the past year also saw continued attacks on liberal-democratic norms in key Western countries, with the storming of the US Capitol as the most emblematic symbol of the threat to democracy. But there is hope. In the midst of a global pandemic, almost exactly one year after a divisive Munich Security Conference 2020, the speakers at the virtual MSC Special Edition on February 19, 2021, including US President Joe Biden, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Emmanuel Macron, and other world leaders all voiced their support for a new beginning in the transatlantic relationship and for revamping cooperation among liberal democracies to prevail in a new age of systemic competition. After what can be called an “autocratic decade,” liberal democracies are now willing to push back to turn the “illiberal tide.” President Biden, having declared that “America is back” and ready to lead, is stressing at every opportunity that democracies find themselves at an inflection point and need to prove that democracy is not a phase-out model but can deliver tangible benefits to the people.

The changing nature of work and labor markets — and how best to prepare society and people for the jobs and tasks of the future — is one of the most crucial public policy challenges that countries and policymakers will face over the coming years. While it is far too early to be able to predict the pace and extent of future automation, we do believe that jobs, tasks, and work itself will evolve at a more rapid pace. We also believe that the future of work will affect each country, region, worker, and student differently. For these reasons, this guide seeks to build a bridge from the voluminous future of work research to the core ingredients of future of work policy that will need to be weighed over the coming years. Through our cross-country comparison of future of work dynamics across four case studies — France, Germany, Spain, and the United States — we highlight core factors and key takeaways. We also make the case for more agile public policies that tailor future of work policies to the specificities of countries, regions, and individuals. Ultimately, this guide serves as a resource for policymakers and citizens everywhere who are interested in exploring the essential elements of future of work policy.

Accelerating digital transformation on both sides of the Atlantic and around the world has unquestionably become the single most powerful underlying driver of change across our societies and economies. No community, no sector, no sphere of human endeavour is immune, and there is no opting out. Moreover, we are just at the beginning of the real-world digital revolution. There can therefore be no decisive progress toward a fully functioning XXIst century partnership between the United States and Europe (of the sort first envisioned by TPN 25 years ago) without a common - or at least interoperable - “digital transformation” policy framework.