We can no longer indulge the one-sided, polarizing and divisive ideologies of the 20th century. The stakes are too high. Here is a very different alternative.

If we are looking for a reason to hope that we might ultimately be able to transcend tribalism based on parochial and divisive interests, we may find it in a more global tribe that converts more and more of “them” into more and more of “us.”

The Spencerian, Social Darwinist model was partly right but also deeply wrong. Humankind most likely evolved, over perhaps 5-7 million years, in small, closely cooperating, egalitarian groups. Every human society is, in essence, a “collective survival enterprise.”

From an evolutionary/biological perspective, our basic vocation as individuals and families is survival and reproduction – specifically the meeting of some 14 domains of “basic needs.” And if capitalist markets fail to meet our needs, we have every right to cooperate in an effort to redress our grievances.

The ecological and political underpinnings for global governance and social peace in our increasingly interdependent global economy are being undermined. The search for a more peaceful world order must therefore begin with a biological approach to the “common good.”

Many of the world’s governments are corrupt, dysfunctional and/or the captives of retrograde vested interests. Does this pose an insurmountable obstacle?