International systems stability, culture and advanced technology

Excerpt

Global systems of information, commerce, politics, finance and natural resources have had both negative and positive consequences for international stability. As I sit down to write this editorial, the largest banks in the USA and UK have been fined a combined total of almost US$ 6 billion dollars for systematically rigging foreign exchange and Libor rates. This behaviour, supported by advanced technologies, has partially contributed to the current international instability in the global financial system. The crisis rumbles on (now it is 7 years old), still threatening to bring down the economies of entire countries, and enforcing new kinds of colonialism, hegemony and creating shifts the implications of which will take decades to truly understand. But it is not just world finance that is unstable. The failures of international political systems have led to the staggering rise in inequality both between and within societies, raising fears of more instability to come. To coin a phrase: society can no longer afford the rich. …