Civility

Is it a wrong approach, as claimed recently, to start with your favourite quality or value (freedom, equality, justice etc), and then try to imagine what a society would look like if it were arranged to maximise that quality?

Should we, instead, examine the political and cultural institutions we already have and work from there, as failure to do this might lead to incoherence and fantasy?

Not sure...just because most "-isms" are divisive and fail ultimately, should we really give up on all big ideas and hopes of breakthrough change in favour of sheer pragmatism?

Global poverty reduction needs broad support across civil society as much as grand goal-setting, via an international social norm that sees the persistence of extreme poverty in as morally unacceptable.

Some call it The Shift, others call it Blessed Unrest, and still others talk of a "civilian surge" - the idea that around the world people who have hugely different access to opportunities and wealth nonetheless inhabit an increasingly common environment in which mobile and other emerging technologies can tell protestors and poor farmers and street kids about how various aspects of their life could be improved.

Ulrich Beck, a German sociologist, and the man who coined the word "individualisation", showed that as many of us are no longer members of groups (church, union, clubs) and have to construct our own lives, we become mistrustful and aggressive and with no-one to support us, lonely and frustrated.

Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the RSA wondered whether we can adjust over the longer-term, by developing a "truly global model of citizenship".

• Civility/Values - questions of values and norms are moving increasingly from the domain of philosophers and preachers into political and policy debate. 

• Civility - a clear and uncompromisingly bleak view of the future of civilisation.  

• Civility - many, not just conservatives, now believe that encouraging the old-fashioned notion of "character" may be a key to some of the most entrenched social problems.

• Civility/Collaboration - a global consultation process has led to a declaration of fundamental principles for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society for the 21st century.

• Civility/Collaboration - a global consultation process has led to a declaration of fundamental principles for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society for the 21st century.