A paradox of our age

We live in the age of hyperconnectivity. We have instant access to people from every corner of the planet; we can interact, debate, learn about new cultures, and access more information than ever before. And yet, we have never been so divided.

Discourse has become polarized. Opinions are becoming more radical. And what was once a difference of perspective has now become a moral war.

The question is: why?

The Return of the Tribe

The answer, in part, lies in our most primitive human structure: the tribe. And how digital platforms have reactivated our tribal mechanisms of reactive moral judgment, eroding the delicate agreements that sustained global cooperation.

Networks as Reactivators of Moral Judgment

In our evolutionary development, moral condemnation was a useful tool for protecting the community. By pointing out rule-breakers, we maintained social order. But that judgment occurred in intimate, face-to-face contexts, where impact was measured, and judgment also implied responsibility.

Social media disrupted that balance. Now we can make a moral judgment without consequences, without context, without nuance. We do it in front of a global audience, with a click. Emotion precedes analysis, and reaction precedes reflection.

It's no coincidence that virality feeds on outrage, indignation, and "cancellation." These are the new ways of expelling the offender from the tribe, even if that tribe is no longer a local community, but an algorithm that groups together those who think alike.

The return of the tribes (but without a community)

Digital platforms have not made us more rational or more empathetic. They've made us more reactive, more moral in a visceral sense, less symbiotic.

We've returned to tribal logic, but without the tribe.
Without the commitment that once entailed belonging to a real group, where the consequences of each judgment were experienced, where shared memory and mediation existed.

Today, the tribe is a feed. A space that rewards speed, not depth. That privileges condemnation, not understanding. And that turns differences into conflicting identities.

The price: the collapse of agreements

This reactive digital morality comes at a very high cost. Because global economic agreements, international cooperation projects, and multilateral structures require a basic principle: shared moral trust.

When every cultural difference becomes a moral offense, and every economic decision becomes a "betrayal of identity," there is no longer room for symbiosis. What was once a process of building common rules has become a battlefield between ideological tribes.

This phenomenon partly explains the current fragility of global agreements. We no longer discuss interests: we discuss values ​​as if they were absolute and incompatible truths.

And so, the symbiotic economy—based on collaboration, respect for differences, and the pursuit of mutual benefit—is displaced by a new digital, moralistic, and exclusionary tribalism.

Is a way out possible?

Yes, but it requires a profound transformation.
First, recognize that our moral brain was designed for small groups, not for networks of millions.
Second, educate in the slowing down of moral judgment, promoting mechanisms of pause, context, and Empathy.

And above all, we need platforms—digital, economic, and cultural—that do not reward division, but connection. That do not fuel instant moral punishment, but rather the construction of shared meaning.

This is precisely what Economic Symbiosis proposes: a new ethic of connection, where collaboration becomes superior to conflict, and diversity ceases to be a threat and becomes a possibility of enrichment.

Conclusion

The problem is not that we are tribal. We have always been.

The challenge is that now we are without limits, without context, and without compassion.

Rehumanizing moral judgment—understanding its emotional origin, its protective function, and its need for evolution—is one of the most urgent tasks of our time.

Because only in this way can we rebuild the agreements that unite us.
And to trust again, not in what is identical, but in what is different.