We live in a complex, globalized and interconnected world.

All the good and the bad concerns everyone, wherever it happens.

Yes, we have still roots in a country and in a culture (not necessarily the same culture of the country..), nonetheless, we know that our potential as human beings is affected by things happening on the other side of the world. We can take it for granted.

AI, as it is being developed in some Silicon Valley start-up, could affect the way my sons are going to study and work. Scientific discoveries, wherever they occur, impact the way I’m ageing. The way we eat, the way we breathe, the weather, all is the result of global forces at play.

And most of the issues our political leaders are trying to deal with are just out of reach for any single state, they are continental, if not global.

Climate change, mass migrations, terrorism. Global issues, requiring global solutions.

And we assist powerlessly in many states to the fragmentation and the crisis of democracy.

It is no surprise to me. It’s just the end of an era – the age of the nation-state – and the difficulty of accepting a new reality. The challenge of creating new democratic formulas and new ways of interacting in the political space for this new world.

It may appear just a theoretical problem: abstract, fuzzy and far from our personal experience.

But what if facing this new reality becomes necessary to your business plan as a company? Understanding how global issues and disruptive technology are going to impact your industry may be crucial.

What if you are trying to design new curricula for your education system?

What if you are struggling to preserve a welfare system in the destructive competitive world?

What if you are just a parent and want to prepare your kids for the world they are going to live in?

What if you are politically active  – in a traditional party or in some NGO –  and just want to know how to make an impact and which level of government is really relevant to you?

These are really the questions I want to answer to, in some way.

I have spent some years now on this topic, which I call supranational democracy: reinventing democracy for the globalized world. But I perfectly know that a single person or even 10 or 100 will not really go very far.

Moreover, I see this challenge as multi-disciplinary and intercultural. And I’d love to be a catalyst for a much wider research and discussion.

Finally, I don’t see this as an academic challenge, period. It’s a challenge for humanity: academicians and businessmen, artists and activists, just everybody, should join forces.

A first attempt is the Supranational Democracy Dialog we are organizing in Lecce in April.

But, believe me, this is just the beginning. Are you with me?