Public wisdom: The key to sustainability

Abstract

Human intelligence is the basis for responding to changing and challenging conditions over time. However, the complex societies we have created seem to prohibit the adequate use of individual cognitive capacities to ensure our collective sustainability. This chapter proposes ways to collaboratively engage diverse people’s rational and arational capacities (such as empathy and intuition) with big-picture knowledge and perspectives to generate a more comprehensive form of intelligence - co-intelligence or public wisdom. Seven principles, related to making public judgement wiser are explained, namely: long-term, systemic, inclusive, possibility oriented, empowering, universal, and meaningful. They allow public wisdom to be generated by engaging many people in well-designed, iteratively convened multi-modal conversations which can make reality more comprehensible to all involved with communities and countries learning from how their outcomes can impact the real world. If embedded in cultures and social systems, such activities can have significant impact on sustainability.