The Commonsphere

I am taking this opportunity today to launch a new Concept, a Concept that, one day will become a political fact, a reality of your world, in the future, when the current post-war generations of political leaders are in our dotage.

If this concept takes shape and form, if it is supported and nurtured and given reality by the young people of today, the world we live in will change forever, making it a more secure and more prosperous place.

This concept, which I call “the CommonShpere” is an alternative to the European Union, in fact it is more than an alternative, because it is larger, more cohesive, more natural and has its own polity and is endogenous.

It derives from the development of civilization from the elected assemblies of ancient Greece and Rome; from the British Magna Carta, Habeas Corpus, the Petition of Right of 1628, and the Bill of Rights of 1689; - from the American Mayflower Compact, the Massachusetts "Body of Liberties," the New England Confederation, the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution, the US Bill of Rights, and Lincoln's Gettysburg Address - which have all led toward triumphant affirmation of individual human dignity and of universal authority consecrated by the oneness of humankind.

Such values have not been uniquely Western. Lord Gautama Buddha, in his precepts 2,500 years ago asked for the following:- moderation in all matters, the middle way in every act, individualism and enterprise, make profits but not excessive profits, encourage savings and investments and promote initiative and entrepreneurship but be constrained by tolerance, mutual understanding and acceptance of other people's differences.

The same philosophy underlies every precept of the Hindu pantheon: tolerance, acceptance, individualism, enterprise, family and investment and protection for the future.

These values, also enunciated by Emperor Ashoka two thousand five hundred years ago and carved out in huge pillars are still to be seen at every crossroad from Afghanistan to the Deccan, from Bengal to Maharashtra

The Global Population today is 6.4 billion people. A sizeable minority live under what I call "the CommonSphere." The majority do not

I now assert that a common set of values is shared by 300,000 Afghans out of 28million , 5 Million Argentineans out of 39million , the whole 20 million population of Australia, 200,000 Bangladeshis out of 141 million , 30 million Brazilians out of 184 million, the whole population of Canada of 32 million, 7 million Chileans out of 15 million, all population of Hong Kong of 6 million, 50 million Chinese out of 1300 million, 10 millions Colombians out of 42 millions, 1 million Egyptians out of 76 millions, 5 million Ghanaians out of 20 millions, 250 millions Indians including the 34 million of the Indian Diaspora out of 1 100 millions, all the population of Ireland of 4 millions, all the population of Israel of 6 million, 1 million Jamaicans out of 2.7 millions, about 5 million Japanese out of 127 millions, about 5 million Kenyans out of 32 millions, about 1 million Koreans out of 48 millions, about 5 million Malaysians out of 23 millions, all the 0.3 million population of Malta, all the population of Mauritius of 1.2 millions, 20 million Mexicans out of 100 million, the whole population of New Zealand of 4 millions, 10 million Nigerians out of 137 millions, all 4 million people of Norway, 10 million Pakistanis out of 159 millions, 10 million Philippinos out 86 millions, 10 million Russians out of 143 millions, the whole population of 4 millions Singaporeans, 10 million South Africans out of 42 millions, 10 million Sri Lankans out of 19 millions, 15 million Taiwanese out of 22 millions, 5 million Tanzanians out of 36 millions, 5 million Ugandans out of 26 millions, the whole population of 60 millions of the UK, the whole population of 283 million of US, 2 million Zambians out of 10 millions, and 4 million Zimbabweans out of 10 millions

I have identified conservatively a total of 911 million people who are all Members of the CommonSphere.

They are not bound together by geographical factors, but by a commonality of values, beliefs, traditions, language, communications, knowledge and future expectations.

They out-number the total population of the EU, NAFTA, the Russian Federation and any other grouping of peoples except China.

The CommonSphere is based on the fundamentals of market economies and constitutional democracies in a strong civil society.

The People of the CommonSphere are bound together by multigenerational persistence of cultural factors such as the English language

The People of the CommonSphere are aware of the depth of cooperation possible among such societies to a degree not possible among weaker or nonexistent civil societies

So what are the particular attributes of this CommonSphere ?

The CommonSphere is a memetic concept. Memes reproduce, spread, and evolve far faster than genes, and thus human societies are far more affected by memetic than by genetic evolution. Those who come to use the language and concepts of the CommonSphere, and who further their evolution, are the memetic heirs of Magna Carta, the Bills of Rights, and the Emancipation Proclamation, whatever their genetic heritage.

The CommonSphere is based on common values and traditions, law, language and institutions.

The Common Values include the recognition of individualism, the rule of law, democracy, trial by jury, development of law by precedent, individual property rights, a free press, an independent Bar and judiciary, the recognition that no person, group or institution is above the law, tolerance, the right of assembly and of free speech, less rather than more regulation, and individual enterprise.

It is now quite clear that prosperous states are rich because of the strength of their civil society, and that peaceful states are peaceful because of the strength of their civic institutions, not the other way around. Within a state, say India, the peoples of the CommonSphere will have their own civic links, completely outside and insulated from the mass of the people, be they the local Rotary or Lions club, the Tennis Club or the Golf Club, or a local NGO or Charity to which they give their time free. The Young Britons Foundation is a similar such body resonating with groups of like minded people across the Atlantic. I have no doubt that the contents or theme of my speech will be broadcast over the internet in somebody’s blog in the next 30 minutes. That is the CommonSphere.

England's strong civic institutions had their roots in the local expressions of civil society, a process that can be traced back to the era before the Norman Conquest and was certainly well-rooted by the fourteenth century. These include the manorial systems, court-leets and barons, grand and petty jury systems, the election of aldermen and other local officials, the quasi-official role of many civil institutions, and the heritage of common law administered by an independent judiciary. Selecting members of the House of Commons was one of many different mechanisms by which local communities gave or withheld their consent to the state.

A civil society is one that is built of a vast network of networks. These networks start with the individual and the family, community organizations, religious congregations, social organizations, and businesses created by individuals coming together voluntarily.

Continuing through the local, regional, national, and international networks, the tying together of local organizations creates civil societies, which in turn beget civic states. Such states are based on the notion that authority begins at the local and community level and is gradually built upwards to deal with wider issues. Civic states rely on community assent and a feeling of participation in a local, regional, and national community.

The idea gains ground, that it will soon be time to reverse the famous slogan and "think locally" to "act globally". This is exactly what happened in Britain in medieval times when local communities thought locally to act nationally.

Now its time to think locally to act globally.

So it is bottom up, not top down.

Democracy and free markets are the effects - the results of a strong civil society and strong civic state, not its causes. We know that a society containing strong networks of voluntary association also develops means of expressing the interests of those networks to the state.

How do we conceive democracy in a global system which escapes more and more the principle of territoriality and is dependent instead on an unregulated internet, worldwide mobility, television and instant communication, financial networks and institutions which are transnational?

In the past, the essence of democracy was the possibility for the citizens to change their leaders; because there was a readily identifiable demos. But what happens when the decision-making centres are spatially dispersed across the world and no one leader has any influence over the primary determinants of the modern demos nor of a polis ?

How do we manage democratically a world system shaped by commercial exchanges, financial innovations and direct investments, in part escaping political control?

How do we influence the communication networks and transactions which bind societies together ignoring territorial boundaries?

At the root of civil society is the individual.

The idea of the direct participation of "civil society" in international life has made extraordinary progress in the last decade. The major conferences and international agreements and treaties on the environment, law of the sea, carbon emissions, decontamination of nuclear materials, proliferation of nuclear arms, population control, the fight against Aids, women’s rights, habitat, etc. in the 1990s, have strongly contributed to creating a public space at the planetary level whilst eroding national rights and the traditional role and importance of the nation.

Generally, international nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) have been successful in carving a space for themselves in the majority of inter-governmental organisations (IGOs) and in making themselves heard.

A case in point, in the domain of human rights, is the principle of the right of access to victims, the concept of Fair Trials Abroad, the whole remit of Amnesty International, the establishment of three international penal jurisdictions (Ex-Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sierra Leone) and the Rome Convention of 17 July 1998 creating the International Criminal Court.

In the domain of development and environment, it has to be admitted that nothing durable can be done without the democratic participation of local populations, women, and grass-roots communities.

These experiences have created a better appreciation of the link between strong civil society and prosperity. In the emerging economy of this next phase of the Scientific-Technological Revolution, these strong civil society values will be even more central to success.

In essence these global NGOs are populated by the people of the CommonSphere.

In the CommonSphere, the common traditions never supersede the Common Values.

Many of our common traditions are found in Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu Buddhist or Confucian teaching, and as long as those who believe do so in private without infringing the rights and liberties of others who do not, or do so differently tolerance prevails.

The CommonSphere believes in secularism and libertarianism . Individual traditions - family traditions, cultural, musical, artistic and culinary traditions are cherished since unity in diversity enriches all, and will enrich economically through its inclusiveness in the marketplace of the CommonSphere.

Diversity not harmonisation is an economic opportunity. The CommonSphere then promotes tolerance and individualism within the law because differences, as exemplified by comparative advantage, become the root and the power of the market place and are the best weapons against stagnation and intolerance.

Law is generally accepted in civic states, as the embodiment of the common values of society. The authority of the state is upheld not by the constant exercise of force, but by the willingness of citizens to comply. Civic states are thus opposed to "economic states" in which loyalty is primarily pragmatic and based on expectation of benefits from the state.

So how will the people of the CommonSphere evolve and develop ?

I believe it will be through a new form of temporary migration which has been called sojourneship

A sojourner is one who moves from one country to another to reside and engage in economic activity, but does not give up his previous identity, returns to previous countries of residence frequently, and remains in constant communication with his home network.

The Machine Age was fundamentally one of internal emigration. Individuals were citizens of one nation-state and resided, worked, and paid taxes within that state. The only way to change that status was to give up citizenship in one nation, move to a new nation and adopt residence, employment, and citizenship there. The immigrant who adopted the identity and customs of the new nation and was able to fit himself into that structure, rarely if ever returned. He lost contact with his home country media, and communicated with his previous home and family slowly through surface-mails, or not at all.

The sojourner is an essential element of transnational cooperation, making possible entrepreneurial activity on a wide scale with an extremely low cost of entry appropriate to the era of Internet, cheap jet travel, and worldwide media.

The sojourner often serves to cross-pollinate from place to place, accelerating ties begun or continued via Net and Web. As humans cease to be inhabitants and economic actors solely of physical space, we begin to have an "amphibious" existence split between physical space and information space. Each space has its own rules and realities, and the sojourner is the person who helps tie the two together by inhabiting cyberspace and physical-space.

Existing immigration law is poorly adapted to such activity. The levels of state benefits attached to citizenship had risen to such levels during the Machine Age that an immigrant's slot becomes a valuable prize, particularly for persons from poorer countries. Yet the sojourner does not seek to fill a citizen's slot. What is now required is a new statute for "sojourner" status: a right to travel to, reside in, and do business within all the member-states of the CommonSphere on an equal and reciprocal basis.

I find it astonishing when I travel to distant corners of the globe to be able to buy that morning's edition of the Daily Telegraph or the Times in Indonesia or India. Internet publishing has made a national newspaper a global one. Opinion-forming is now global.

The values of the CommonSphere will become global values

The challenge, we face together is the construction of a society that can lead humankind through the next stages of the scientific-technological revolution without repeating the disasters of the twentieth century.

This is not a trivial piece of work. It is monumental.

It is a task that will subconsciously dominate even the long lives of today's young people and of future generations.

For those whose lives have been occupied with preventing or repairing the disasters of failed utopian visions, this will require a major change of mentality.

Above all, it requires in young and old alike the recovery of self-assurance. It requires the knowledge that we are the standard-bearers of a civilization that stands poised to defeat evil, and lead the CommonSphere, and someday the world, to the stars.