This chapter studies the role of several epistemic communities in the realm of area studies—in particular Sovietology, Middle Eastern studies, and China studies—when these communities produce knowledge about the future. Future claims made by academics are predominantly linear (Chapter 2) and predictions about radical junctures—sudden changes in a political trajectory—are very rare. Within these communities whose members can be counted by the thousands, great conformity towards dominant and consensual paradigms prevails and scholars tend to rally around the study of the same issues as they want to anticipate the social demand. This is the ultimate paradox of experts’ future telling, building linear and consensual claims about the future, which in turn make radical changes in political trajectories all the more surprising (chapters 4 and 5).