'To Bless All Mankind' September 5, 2016 Issue

The impressive rise in global teamwork

<i>The Monitor’s</i> Editorial Board

Adapted from an article published in The Christian Science Monitor, May 22, 2016.

In just the past year, the world community has signed a climate-change pact, made advances in curbing nuclear weapons, moved closer toward mega-regional trade deals, and set goals to end poverty based on previous progress. And it has improved its governance of cyberspace and the global financial system.

Welcome to the worldwide web—no, not the internet kind—but rather what has become an expanding web of cooperation—from the Arctic to outer space—that is tackling humanity’s biggest issues.

This progress in teamwork can be hard to measure. It doesn’t always come with treaties. More often these days it arrives in informal commitments through the spreading overlap of existing institutional structures. It can involve governments, industries, or civil society. The international forum known as Group of Twenty (G-20) is a good example.

Send a comment to the editors

NEXT IN THIS ISSUE

'To Bless All Mankind'

The timeless basis for cooperation