The one luxury indulgence you have in semi-retirement is the time to reflect and make sense of all the changes swirling around you.

In my lifetime there has never been certainty of outcome. For those of us born after the Second World War what was portrayed as a golden era of peace neglected to mention that with the advent of the nuclear bomb, one wrong diplomatic misstep, as had happened before, and we were within four minutes toast! The only advantages were the agony was not drawn out, and the result was crystal clear. Nevertheless, we stumbled on.

There were various aberrations along the way, some good and some bad, but overall, over two and a bit centuries, we have made significant progress.

Slavery, discrimination, colonialism, and powerful dictatorships fell out of favour through progress. It was to be replaced with human rights, parliamentary democracies, international mercantile trade, an industrial revolution and dare I say it organised labour.

International protocols and treaties encompassed in such matters as in 1815 The Vienna Conference designed to bring peace and stability into Europe after the Napoleonic Wars; 1933 The Montevideo Convention to do the same in the Americas; 1934 The doomed League of Nations to be replaced by the more robust 1945 United Nations Charter. Even the doctrines of ‘Balance of Power’ were promulgated.

To promote free trade various economic groupings were created such as the North American Free Trade Agreement, European Economic Area, Asean Economic Community, Bric’s Organisation, Latin America Integration Association, Southern African Development Community, and many others.

Codes of conduct and import tariffs were introduced to regulate fair trade and countering of export dumping.

This was driven by the Industrial Revolution between 1820 and 1860 by combining technology and access to cheap sustainable energy supplies. Edmund Phelps (Nobel Laureate in Economics) in his book ‘Mass Flourishing’ explains how grassroot innovation created jobs, challenges, and change on an unprecedented scale never seen before. Essentially physical tasks were mechanised and the introduction of division of labour produced massive productivity gains.

We are now entering a second phase called ‘Artificial Intelligence.’ I regard the title a little misleading, it is in effect what the Industrial Revolution did for manual tasks to our mental capacities. Even the brains of the Oppenheimer’s and Einstein’s are not able to cope with the capacity and complexity of the mental tasks before us.

Again, as in history, we repeat the stumbles of progress of the past limiting progress at a high price. Formation of imperialistic states, dictatorships, abandonment of the structures for international order, regulation and accountability, even personal respect, and social manners.

Where may you ask is the missing link?

It is simply this. In our pursuit of progress, we have throughout the two and a bit centuries failed to ensure wealth creation does filter through the social hierarchy in a fair and equitable form. In the past organised labour played a valuable part in addressing this but even this noble pursuit was corrupted by communist doctrines and the irresponsible use of monopolistic power as it does in any field of activity.

Some measure of this is the dominance of digital technology mainly based in the USA. Of the total global gross domestic product digital companies account for 40% and their activities controlled by a minute band of people. Even sovereign states have been unable to regularise their activities. They do bring enormous benefits, and this will increase exponentially over the next two decades, but they also create major challenges to democracy, social interchange, truth, social well-being, and law enforcement.

Somehow, we need a framework that whilst recognises outstanding contributions, does ensure that the rewards created by the masses are also shared with individuals within the masses.  

Our brains might struggle with that one but perhaps AI will aid us in that quest?