Planetary Commons Governance
Description
Clement Vidal:
"* Geosphere governance addresses climate change, carbon management, geological resource extraction, the maintenance of planetary physical systems within habitable parameters (Rockström et al. 2009; 2024).
- Biosphere governance addresses biodiversity conservation, ecosystem
management, and the minimization of matter-energy pollution. However, if governing about the geosphere and the biosphere covers the matter-energy component of a system,
- the governance of information systems is as critical.
Planetary commons thus must also include a new, informational commons. The related informational governance is the most novel and most urgent domain to addresse the global information environment: misinformation and disinformation, artificial intelligence regulation and cooperation (Glenn 2025), internet infrastructure governance, and the epistemic foundations of democratic deliberation. The integration of these three spheres into a coherent holospheric governance architecture constitutes what can be understood as the management of the planetary superorganism (for a discussion about levels of Earth integration and governance, see Vidal 2026).
All living systems functions themselves should become commons, and thus the living systems index (Vidal 2026) assessing the degree to which 20 fundamental living functions are operational at the planetary scale is a natural extension of planetary commons. For example, no single individual or entity should manage any single planetary living function, a principle of distributed stewardship. The current situation in which a unique space-based internet infrastructure is controlled by a single individual represents a profound vulnerability in planetary governance. As we noted, the extension of commons governance to informational systems does not require centralized control, and could also succeed with (non-manipulated!) distributed mechanisms such as reputation systems or networks of fact-checkers."
(https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Planetary_Cooperation_Barrier)