Networks
Is Bill Clinton the first (unofficial) President of the World? I mean, really. Where does a guy like Clinton go once he’s finished in US politics, having been taken out at the top of his game by the US Constitution? Well, first he has a heart attack, undoubtedly brought on by having nothing to do, sitting on a couch eating pizza watching George W. Bush on TV. Then he recuperates. Then he gets involved in a multi-national initiative like the response to the Asian Tsunami. Fresh from the insights gained throught that experience, he does what other Democratic Presidents have done (if they aren’t assassinated) and founds a global civil society organisation. Bill’s is called the Clinton Global Initiative.
Jimmy Carter did it and his Habitat for Humanity is a paradigm example of what global civil society needs to look like. Can Clinton do the same? I hope so. I don’t expect a world saviour, but I expect Clinton will show the difference between Democratic Presidents and Republican Presidents. Can you imagine seeing George W. Bush out building houses for poor people five years from now? I didn’t think so.
Anyway, Bush-bashing aside, networks are replacing nations. They have done so on the economic side in the process known as globalization, and now they need to do so on the political side. This will happen first through the emergence of a global civil society with serious actors like Clinton leading the charge. It will happen equally at the grassroots level with social networking technologies allowing activists from all parts of the world to coordinate global actions.
Networks cross borders, but the globe is the current delimiting container. Our economy is now global. A side-effect is that our society is now global. Time to reflect that in our institutions.
