This book is written for the builders of many different social worlds - institutional designers, community leaders, and systems thinkers who sense that our current mainstream models of economics and culture have exhausted their utility. It is for those who understand that the crisis of meaning is not simply a personal failure but also a structural one.
The methodology is one of synthesis. Drawing from sociology, economics, evolutionary psychology and history, to construct a coherent picture of human flourishing. In doing so, the narrative crosses the guarded borders of modern intellectual life, borrowing heavily from both Left and Right thinkers and traditions while refusing allegiance to either.
Citing a source indicates the utility of a specific insight, not an alignment with the author’s entire worldview. A chapter may validate a theorist’s diagnosis of a cultural problem while rejecting their proposed remedies or political commitments. This synthesis demands that we treat ideas as separable components rather than indivisible ideologies. The reader is asked to evaluate these concepts based on their structural coherence and explanatory power, independent of the character or perception of their originators.
This book was created primarily using Google Gemini (Gemini 2/3 + Research). AI served both as a writing tool and a research instrument - brainstorming, challenging and stress-testing concepts, and iterating on articulation.
However the major arguments and ideas in this book were developed by humans. Their synthesis and values guiding them originate from the author and the lineage of thinkers cited throughout.
While the text advances a specific thesis, it aims to integrate multiple perspectives rather than dismiss them. The central arguments are presented most strongly where the evidence is clearest.
In line with the spirit of the book, what ultimately matters is not the text on the page, but the human experience it seeks to describe - and the institutional structures that enable it.