Toward a New Social Contract for Our Endangered Species

Dr. Peter Corning argues that we are on a road to collective self-destruction unless we make a radical course change.

Our growing global crisis is a compound of several things: climate change (of course), plus droughts, floods, pandemics, desperate illegal migrants, ever more violent conflict among human groups (who possess catastrophic nuclear, chemical and cyber weapons), and, not least, our increasing economic interdependence. We are on a road to collective self-destruction unless we make a radical course change.

To summarize the more detailed proposal in my 2023 book, Superorganism: Toward a New Social Contract for Our Endangered Species (Cambridge University Press), I am proposing a four part “prescription”: (1) a new global social contract based on the three “Fair Society” ethical principles (equality, equity, reciprocity) including a universal “basic needs guarantee”, (2) changes to the United Nations Charter to permit effective global governance based on democratic principles and the rule of law and two new, well-funded U.N. agencies, (3) one committed to infrastructure development in the countries that still lack the wherewithal to provide the basic needs for their citizens (a Global Infrastructure Fund), and (4) an agency that can respond effectively to the growing number of global emergencies (Global Emergency Management Agency).  

All this is detailed in my 2023 book. The time to make these changes is now. To repeat Tom Friedman’s punch line, “later will be too late.”          

Editor’s Note: To read all of Dr. Corning’s essays, please go to Dr. Corning’s website: http://complexsystems.org. His ninth book Evolution and the Fate of Humankind, will be published this month by Cambridge University Press.