“Compare those societies that respect women and those who don’t,” says Texas A&M Professor Valerie Hudson, quoting former USAID Deputy Administrator Donald Steinberg, in this week’s podcast. “Who’s trafficking in weapons and drugs? Who’s harboring terrorists and starting pandemics? Whose problems require U.S. troops on the ground? There’s a one to one correspondence.”

With dangerous levels of climate change already in the pipeline, countries across the world are tasked with adapting to a drastically changing Earth. The Wilson Center and a consortium of international partners recently released an independent report commissioned by the G7 that examines the risks to stability from climate change.

The stakes are high for the UN climate conference in Paris later this year, so high in fact, some scholars feel it’s foolish to be putting all our eggs in one basket.

After Typhoon Haiyan ripped across the Philippines in 2014 leveling nearly every building in sight, 4 million people – mostly poor and from coastal regions – were displaced. In response, the government set up “no build” zones in vulnerable areas and worked to move people to new land. But many of the newly relocated people discovered this land came with no access to water, electricity, or other services.

“The Sahel faces huge problems,” says Jack Goldstone, Virginia E. and John T. Hazel professor of public policy at George Mason University and Wilson Center global fellow, in this week’s podcast. “It is facing massive population growth. It is facing environmental decay. It has a history of violent conflict.”

Rapid population growth, which many Sahelian countries are experiencing, is often associated with an increased risk of sociopolitical violence. But in this week’s podcast, Cornell University Professor Parfait Eloundou-Enyegue argues there is another factor related to demographic change that governments and development organizations should account for: inequality.

In the Sahel, one of the most food-stressed regions of the world, “women bear the brunt in terms of coping mechanisms that are employed at the community level,” says Sylvia Cabus, gender advisor for USAID’s Bureau for Food Security, in this week’s podcast.

The world is changing quickly thanks to a convergence of megatrends, says Singularity University’s Banning Garrett in this week’s podcast, but urbanization could be the most critical. “If we get it right in cities, we can solve a lot of big problems,” he says.