At this time of Coranavirus Covid-19 Crisis, there is some good news.

This is not a crisis of humanity, it is a crisis of a terrible political-economy that is now dead.

A system that has been driving humanity over the cliff-edge, certainly since the aftermath of the Second World War (1945).

Often referred to as ‘Neo-Liberalism’ or ‘Free-Market Capitalism’ or more simply ‘Market Democracy,’ there is no way back for this failed experiment.

An economic system that died with this first global pandemic contagion. 

Hope arrives in the design for a new political-economy.

One where politics is opened-up to people.

Not simply a five-yearly vote for representatives, but a fundamental citizen-led participatory democracy, capable of making decisions at all scales of the global system.

Our digital technologies can enable this and collective intelligence can power it.

A new society and economy, built at speed and with accuracy over the debris of an outdated, predatory system.

This old economics depends on exploitation of material and human resources with no end, except enrichment of the few.

Even now a wilful ignorance appears bent on the destruction of all life, which it simply does not value.

Including all human life, well, excepting that small strata of human beings driving the system who possess no concerns but their own.

Capitalism and its orthodoxies, until now, were hurling humanity towards the cliff-edge of a combined environmental, social and economic catastrophe.

Thankfully, this deeply flawed system has, in 2020, finally melted beyond repair.

Still, the political-media and economic elites will attempt to resuscitate it.

Despite their best efforts, this post-war era is now quite dead.

So, what can replace it? 

That surely is a good question.

It’s actually not that difficult, although some will resist change.

It’s not difficult, while it is a big task.

However, shared by 7.6 billion world citizens, any task can be simplified mathematically to something trivial.

What it needs is not only the aforementioned democratic renewal, giving every citizen a role to play.

It also requires a new set of assumptions, or agreements about the future.

These are agreed only by communities working within a framework of a new digital social democracy, although here now, we can lay-out a few hints as to what the future may offer.

Firstly, let’s outline five core principles and nine systems for life support.

Principle One

All people have value and the purpose of social-democracy and its political-economy is to protect every human life and its wellbeing.

Principle Two

All life has value, which value is the purpose of people in democratic association, who decide how to value life, their own and that of others.

Principle Three

All decisions are only enacted at multiple levels of citizen participation  and thus digital technologies enable transparent global, regional, national and local decision making.

Principle Four 

In return for their participation in self-governing communities, citizens are given economic value derived from their data, information and communication as generated during their participation. Joy not work.

Principle Five

The non-renewable and renewable resources of Planet Earth — the one living planet — are shared optimally by all citizens grounded in multi-level global-to-local public systems of democratic inclusion.

Nine Systems for Life Support 

1. Global Digital Agreement

All nation states should enter into a single network for global governance.

This does not give or imply any loss of sovereignty, because nation states do not have sovereignty, only citizens do.

A transnational digital currency operated by the network may become the final arbiter of material value at the global scale.

2. National Digital Agreements

Each nation state may establish their own national, regional and local governance networks and connect all citizens to these networks.

Each nation state may operate its own single or multiple digital currencies to make trading and valuation easier.

3. Public Systems

All banks and digital currency mechanisms are held publically and for the public interest.

All non-renewable resources are held publically and for the public interest.

4. Prioritisation of Citizen Minimums

Each national, regional and local governance system will identify the minimum resource requirements for all of its citizens.

These requirements include access to clean air, potable water, calorific intake, clothing, housing, energy, medicine, transport, cultural activities and access to nature.

5. Citizen Data

Citizens manage their own governance at all scales of the transparent, open and equitable digital system.

This digital system enables participation by citizens through decision making, voting, data processing, data production, information design and other sorts of scientific research and cultural production.

6. Resource Management