A paradigm shift is necessary: ultrasociality should be our starting point in understanding international relations and crafting policy. Ultrasociality is a human predisposition to be other-regarding, empathic, and inclined to seek wide-scale cooperation, even among strangers. The scholarly study of international relations, whose theories and prescriptions regularly filter into popular discourse has largely focused on explaining why we cannot trust each other, how self-interest dominates the system of states, and why the miscalculation and fear of leaders regularly triggers brinksmanship, oftentimes spiraling to the precipice of war. But as a species, we are actually not self-interested and power maximizing by nature. A recent groundswell of findings from a range of different fields – including neuroscience, anthropology, evolutionary biology, psychology, and ecology, among others – provides overwhelming evidence that we are actually pre-wired (enabled), hard-wired (compelled), and soft-wired (pre-disposed) to be empathic, cooperative, and socially-oriented. If our theories and worldviews continue to over-determine conflict, we risk creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Ultrasocial Ideas Can Lead to Breakthroughs in International Cooperation
In my 2024 book, International Cooperation Against All Odds: The Ultrasocial World (Oxford University Press), I focus on the role of ideas as the bridge between our ultrasocial nature as a species and our actual behavior on the world stage. Ideas signal the prelude to action. Transformational ideas can lead to breakthroughs in international cooperation. Ideas for policy change that allow us to fulfill our ultrasocial drive are likely to be more attractive than ideas that rail against ultrasociality. Time and time again, societal movements have galvanized citizens across the globe on the basis of compelling ideas that tap into our ultrasocial tendencies and imagine a better future.
To examine how ultrasociality works in practice, consider four major cases of international cooperation: (1) the European integration project, (2) the international relations of space exploration, (3) the global nuclear weapons taboo, and (4) the worldwide climate change regime. They all show that a transformational, ultrasocial idea – European federalism, spaceflight, non-use of nuclear weapons, and net zero carbon emissions – have had significant and enduring impact. The launch of the early European Union rested on a public outpouring of support – the European Federalist Movement – for the idea that a United States of Europe could be the means to end the possibility of war on the continent, for which nationalism was to blame. In the 1920s and 30s, the idea of human beings reaching toward the stars gathered steam and spread across the world through a transnational spaceflight movement. The global nuclear weapons taboo grew out of the world peace movement, successfully championing the non-use idea. And more recently, the efforts of the climate change movement have led to 195 countries and thousands of major companies, pledging to bring their carbon emissions down to net zero by the middle of the 21st century.
They are all pivotal examples of major turning points in how we have tackled global security problems: centuries of war in Europe, the space race, the advent of nuclear weapons, and catastrophic levels of global warming. Each is typically considered to be in the realm of high politics, controlled by state interest or elite decision-makers. But rather than just focusing on great power competition or the ins and outs of diplomatic summits, an ultrasocial lens shows that the impetus first comes from global society. Strong social support for eradicating previous policies of national self-interest – even rising to the level of a social movement – is noticeably present in the lead-up to significant and lasting policy change. Each of these issues emerged as unexpected examples of widespread, international cooperation are central to showing why taking ultrasociality into account is so valuable. Ground-breaking cooperation emerged because of transformational ideas that resonated with ultrasociality, inspiring the power of possibility across the world.
We live in an ultrasocial world. On September 11, 2001, people around the world watched in horror as the twin towers of the World Trade Center fell and collectively expressed their strong support for the US. When the 2004 tsunami hit 14 countries across Southeast Asia, killing over 280,000 people, the international community raised tens of billions of dollars in aid almost overnight. In 2014, when Boko Haram kidnapped more than 270 Nigerian girls from Chibok Government Secondary School, social media was ablaze with the #bringbackourgirls campaign. In 2019, as Notre Dame cathedral burned, people expressed their sadness from all corners of the Earth, not just at the destruction of a French monument, but for a part of human history. The Olympic games, the United Nations, global transportation, the Montreal Protocol, the Women’s March, Black Lives Matter, are just a few more examples of how we come together as a species. Ultrasociality does not mean we live in a utopia, but it does mean that there is an underlying structure to our shared humanity – with important implications.
The Basis of Human Ultrasociality
Research into the nature of human cooperation using lab experiments, big data analyses, neuro-imaging, and extensive field observations consistently reveals that we are remarkably oriented towards our fellow humans, and not just in a tit-for-tat, transactional way. Evolutionary biologists actually define a cooperator as “someone who pays a cost for another to receive a benefit.” For them, cooperation truly entails altruism and “restraint from competition.”
On a physical level, neuroscientists, biologists, and cognitive psychologists have discovered that the brain’s default mode is to think socially, whether we intend it to or not. On a psychological level, individual humans fail to thrive if they do not have social interaction, the absence of which leads to documented illness, and even death, in infants. It has been established that the need to be social is a stronger requirement for human flourishment than even food and water. Ethnographers and anthropologists have compiled a list of thousands of human universals, defined as, “those features of culture, society, language, behavior, and psyche for which there are no known exception.” Every society across the planet regards cooperation – with kindness, empathy, and altruism – as virtues and cruelty towards others as immoral.
And yet, even the most socially oriented of international relations approaches only considers the possibility that we may be moved towards empathic cooperative behavior away from what they still consider to be our default of self-interest. But this has it exactly backwards. In actuality, we are anchored in cooperative behavior. And this is not just any cooperation, but empathic cooperation. While biology does not cause outcomes of human behavior, innate qualities of our species play an important role in setting the parameters around what we are able, willing, and aspire to do.
This is a hopeful story of human capacity, but not a naïve one. Our individual agency means that there are many pathways leading away from our socially oriented nature and towards a world outside of the ultrasocial landscape. Corrupt leaders can manipulate followers towards tribalism. A natural desire to feel part of a group can become warped into an us-versus-them dynamic. Deep-seated political disagreement, a sense of in-group disaffection, a lack of good leadership, or a focus on transactionalism can work against ultrasocial ideas. But given new and important discoveries about the nature of human interaction and behavior, I argue that the complexity and nuance of all politics should be examined within a context of ultrasociality. For example, instead of asking “why did we overcome self-interest?” we should be asking, “why did we deviate from ultrasociality?”
Implications of Ultrasociality in International Relations
It has been popular for some time to focus on the drama of crisis and demise, and not the numerous successes made possible because of human empathy, altruism, and sociality. The impact of this bias is far more embedded in our governance structures and institutions than we realize. Policymakers can capitalize on ultrasociality and use its logic to make empathic cooperation and new forms of global governance more likely. Ultrasociality can be more embedded in educational and social institutions, especially through the liberal arts. Encouraging broad questions and big-picture answers, rather than narrow, procedural and technical questions, leads to inclusivity and creativity. Socially intelligent political leaders can help an engaged citizenry identify when our shared humanity is at stake and when policy solutions can be found through a common approach.
Learning how to recognize ultrasociality’s impact is the first step in developing awareness of what works in our efforts to foster a more cooperative world order. Transformational ideas are at various points nurtured, diffused, challenged, and condemned before they are ultimately embraced. In following the path of ultrasocial ideas and the people who champion them, we can learn how ultrasocial outcomes tend to prevail over tribalistic alternatives.
About the author
Mai’a K. Davis Cross is the Dean’s Professor of Political Science, International Affairs, and Diplomacy and Director of the Center for International Affairs and World Cultures at Northeastern University. Her work investigates the long-term driving forces behind breakthroughs in international cooperation at both the elite and societal levels. She is the author or editor of six books, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
This think-piece is based on the author’s book International Cooperation Against All Odds: The Ultrasocial World (Oxford University Press, 2024).