THE NEW CITIZEN

1. Political leaders: provide the framework for stability and regulated human interactions;
2. Moral leaders (religious & secular): give expression to the eternal values that have always guided humanity;
3. The business community: assume responsibility fo rthe investment and innovation necessary for prosperity;
4. Scientists: take into consideration the ethical and environmental implications of technological developments;
5. Artists: express metaphorically our dreams and tragedies;
6. Our youth: demand that the future be better than the past:
7. Intellectuals: offer penetrating insight concerning humanity's progress toward shared goals.

Only the creative interaction of these groups, rather than the supremacy of one group over the others, will allow the answers we all seek to emerge and guide us as we shape the next phase of human development.


The time has come to choose a new direction of global development, to opt for a new civilization.

The whole world is at the threshold of dramatic changes. Moreover, this will not be just one more transition from one stage to another, of which there have been so many in history. Many signs indicate that it will be a watershed of historic scope and significance, with a new civilization coming to replace the existing one.

The New Civilization should:
1. be consistent with the new conditions of humankind's existence;
2. abolish the confrontational spirit and thinking that underpinned all past civilizations and are still present today;
3. be a civilization of all humankind, responding realistically and constructively to the challenge of interdependence.

Only by renouncing selfishness and attempts to out-smart one another to gain an advantage at the expense of others can we hope to ensure the survival of humankind and the further development of our civilization.

The world disorder:

1. Policymakers lack a necessary sense of perspective and the ability to evaluate the consequences of their actions.

2. Our intellectual and moral development is lagging behind the rapidly changing conditions of our existence, and we are finding it difficult to adjust psychologically to the pace of change. We have suddenly, in this century, become like careless children whose vigor and activity far exceed the development of their morality and consciousness.

3. Increased nationalism, separatism, and the process of disintegration in a number of countries.

4. A growing gap in the level and quality of socioeconomic development between rich and poor countries. Through television, those in poverty can see the material well-being of the wealthy. Hence the unprecedented passions and brutality and even fanaticism of mass protests (aimed at getting what the wealthy have).

5. The fueling of a destructive development that has brought the planet to the edge of a great ecological crisis simply in order to maintain the living standard of those who are privileged by history and circumstances.

6. The gap between basically peaceful policies and selfish economies bent on achieving a kind of technological hegemony. Unless these two vectors are brought together, civilization will tend to break down into incompatible sectors.

7. Further improvement in modern weaponry, even if under the pretext of strengthening security.

Two sets of problems: 1. Global - environment, world economy, population, energy, food and health. 2. Political - both international and national. They are interrelated and interdependant.

We need a new paradigm that will bring us back to reality, recognizing that humanity is simply a part of nature.

The time has come to develop integrated global policies.

The future is challenging us. We will meet the challenge if we become aware of the world's unity, of humankind's common destiny, and of the responsibility of every one of us for the preservation of life on Earth.


Copyright Bill Nathan, 1997