My prediction is an abrupt and painful escalation of environmental predicaments. Many populaces will fail to adapt, or "succeed" in anihilating each other. But on community level, a good portion of them will fare well enough to survive a decade (or two) of utmost hardship. In this sense, I agree with the Oil Drum discussion on social localization. In particular, small communities can handle "tragedies of commons" problems without going into general theoretical discussions.
A couple of days ago you brought-up an interesting point when you commented Climatic Patterns are stable-ish for long periods of time.
that is true when the time period used is based on the fundamental human decision-making time period: (roughly) one second. If one collapses geologic time such that it approximates human time one sees continents merrily whizzing around, bashing into each other, rebounding, joining, spliting apart, & etc.
