Environmental Acceptability as the driver of New Civilization

Abstract

We are on a collision course with nature. And the underlying reason is that humans' creative capacity has largely bypassed their adaptive capacity. Due to existing trends in 10 years the world will be changed dramatically. These trends will change the social standards and human behaviour patterns; shift “centres of gravity” from the West to East, from the North to South, and from nation-states to private actors; spur deep reframing of global governance; force us to develop new patterns of production, trade and consumer standards; advance human capacities to and possibly beyond the limits of the traditional definitions of humanity. The development of new policies to manage these challenges and to respect the realities of the natural world offers a myriad of positive opportunities to generate the new ideas, new policies and new partnerships that are needed to overcome the present crisis by reorient­ing and restructuring our economies on a more sustainable, resource-efficient and inclusive path. But, however important economics and technologies are, achieving the required level of global systemic change and overcoming the seemingly immovable implementation gap that is blocking progress will require political leadership, vision and courage, rather than an adaptive strategy of small steps, and a revitalized multilateral governance architecture adequate to meeting the interconnected challenges reflective of the 21st century