Time for Sustainable Connectivity
A think piece for the ESPAS 2016 conference by Pascal Lamy (@PascalLamyEU), President Emeritus Jacques Delors Institute
Increasing connectivity is and will remain one of the main engines of globalisation as it keeps slashing the cost of distance. Hence a growing international integration of production systems and a constant Ricardo-Schumpeterian pressure for efficiencies.
This is fine as long as these efficiency gains are, or perceived to be, fairly distributed. But, as we have seen in recent times, opening may turn to protectionist or isolationist discourse if gains are not equitably distributed.
This is also fine as long as economic development remains compatible with ecological sustainability, which is not the case anymore.
Conclusion: whereas less connectivity would be absurd, more connectivity does not work for sustainable prosperity under any conditions and these conditions need more attention than in the past. They have to do with social and cultural security, different structures of relative prices (capital / labour, environmental externalities), new forms of accountability and democratic choices, approximating global ethics, etc.
A new version of what I called the ‘Geneva consensus’ as opposed to the old Washington consensus.
