Peter Senge - a real mentor of mine - is director of the Centre for Organizational Learning at the MIT Sloan School of Management. He is known as author of the book The Fifth Discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization.

Senge says humanity is currently stuck in a dire era of fatalism. We live with the assumption that the deep problems our societies are faced with will never be solved. 

Paradoxically, ending this mentality will be the only way to move forward with development. 

In the following video he gives examples of how we can begin to believe we can affect the future and break the cycle.

Link to video.