Offers a treatment of modern-day social and environmental concerns, discussing how Western and world development are unfolding. It explains how key historical, political, and economic factors influence the way world development has evolved, also discussing the role of rising emerging-market economies and where our civilization is headed. The twenty-first century has seen a new level of global economic growth and globalization, yet it has also heralded in the Anthropocene epoch and important stress on global cultural diversity, society, and nature. As we face the interconnected issues of overpopulation, rising world urbanization, and climate change, we need to seek solutions and restore hope through a new way of thinking -- the coming of a new Renaissance.