If world politics is presently marked by the emergence of new forms of governance without government, what does this imply for the world's citizens who have long been accustomed to governance being sustained by governments? How do they respond to authorities who are not created by constitutions, who are not located in formal governmental structures, and whose legitimacy may be in flux? And whatever may be their responses, can there be profound transformations in the nature of global governance without alterations in the skills and orientations of citizens? That is, if new dimensions of citizenship are likely to evolve in response to the emergent global order, how will they in turn shape the way in which the new institutions of governance develop?

Such are the questions addressed by this concluding chapter. It explores possible relationships between the emergence of a new global order – the foundations of which were laid well before the end of the Cold War – and the changing competence of people throughout the world. In so doing it seeks to demonstrate that such vast transformations as the emergence of a new order at the macro level of politics cannot occur without corresponding, or at least compatible, changes taking place among citizens at the micro level.