If I don’t do it, who will?
If nobody does it, what happens then?
Do I care? Is it important for me? Is my well-be-
ing dependent on yours?
Should government look out for us and our
future well-being? Should it be left to civil ser-
vants, or politicians in proverbial smoky back
rooms, or perhaps to industrialists in proverbial
ivory towers, or to Internet billionaires? Or – at
the other extreme – should we leave it to the
wisdom of the crowd? Should you and I have a
say in this, and – if so – how?
There are no simple answers.
Conclusion: Building worlds
that won’t fall apart in a few
years
A societal contract tells a story, and in today’s
world, it’s all about the stories we tell – and those
we choose to hear. Not all of today’s stories
inspire us, or invite us to contribute actively to
societal renewal. Many narratives in the popular
media revolve around fear, imbalance, outrage
and entitlement. Hollywood cinema has been
dominated for more than a decade by comic
book-based fantasies about super-heroes who
battle to save the world; they are popular the
world over. But do we really want to outsource
this to superheroes and wait for them to fix the
world for us? Or for emerging superintelligence
and the next generation of AI to take the respon-
sibility out of our hands?
36 HF |
April 2019
It is about difficult choices. Trying to hold on to
what we used to know is natural, but if we hold on
too long, we will be swept along and may become
victims of change, instead of being part of its de-
velopment. The transition from one era to another
is always challenging, and even more so today
in our noisy communication spaces, with their
notion that everything moves faster than ever be-
fore; where every instant something new impacts
our brain, and no truths last more than an instant
or two (and this is the new ‘forever’).
A new societal contract is needed to meet today’s
and tomorrow’s challenges. This new contract
needs to take into account the developments
occurring today, technological and societal; but
the new contract also needs to prepare us for and
help with future challenges. Social contracts have
served us well, balancing the different actors and
their wishes for freedom and responsibilities. A
new societal contract needs to address and build
on the emerging balance between economy, ecol-
ogy, government, citizens, and technology.
In his extensive pamphlet about ‘rebalancing so-
ciety’, Henry Mintzberg argues for a pluralistic so-
ciety i and the importance of balance for its three
basic sectors—public, private, and plural (the
civil society): “We have to leave behind the linear
politics of left, right, and center, to understand
that a balanced society, like a stable stool, has to
rest on three solid legs: a public sector of political
forces rooted in respected governments, a private
sector of economic forces based on responsible
businesses, and a plural sector of social forces
manifested in robust communities.” (39)
We propose to discuss this more broadly and
propose some initial protocols for a new societal
contract, building on some of the basic questions discussed here: the consequences of the emerging
Anthropocene, the questions we ask of democracy, the rise of AI and superintelligence, a worldwide
awareness of extreme climate events, the neglected individual’s call for attention.
Who should participate in this broad discussion about future societal contracts, and who should take
the lead: Acknowledged thought leaders, vested interests, Internet bloggers and vloggers, political
tweeters? What about teenagers and pre-teens and 75+plussers? Is there such a thing as a ‘European
societal contract’? Or: an Asian one? An African one? One Societal contract for knowledge societies,
one societal contract for the whole world?
Do we want our worlds to fall apart every few years – dependent on political cycles, business cycles,
disruptive technologies, and the next new thing? Considering the shelf-life of new ideas in the 21st
century, we ask: How long should a new societal contract last in a rapidly changing world? A decade?
A generation? Beyond midcentury? An ongoing and agile evolution?
Our keeper’s questions remain, and in every generation it need to be considered anew. Broad reflec-
tion is needed, and deep reflection too, so please respond to this article and let’s think about this
together.
Magnus Jörgel ([email protected])
Hank Kune ([email protected])
Frank van Erkel ([email protected])
37 http://www.fdsd.org/ideas/the-committee-for-the-future-finnish-parliament/
HF | Human Futures 37