The articles in this issue of Eruditio focus on a common theme: Paradigm Change. The need for paradigm change in every aspect of society has never been more pronounced. The COVID-19 Pandemic has made governments and other major stakeholders reflect on the need for an inclusive, multidimensional conception of Human Security to replace the narrow conception of national security which has for long confined thinking and policy to military security. Human Security encompasses all dimensions of human well-being, individual and collective, and the complex interdependencies which link these elements together. The articles in this issue identify and highlight the limits to contemporary approaches and call for new thinking and new strategies to turn challenges into opportunities across all socio-economic dimensions.

The leadership vacuum we face today will pose dire consequences in the near future if a change in thinking and policy is not urgently adopted. For the paradigm shift to be effected, we need catalytic strategies that convert ideas and thoughts into action and do not just remain at the level of rhetoric. The world urgently needs a radical reorientation or reinvention of the multilateral system for world governance, which is still dominated by concepts and strategies which go back for four centuries. There has already been an increasing emphasis on values and ethics post the pandemic, but the social sciences need to become more human-centered and integrate the objective and the subjective dimensions of reality in both theory and application. The advent of blockchain technology has undermined entrenched conceptions of money and how it can be created, opening up unparalleled opportunities to monetarize social value and apply it in a targeted manner for both economic welfare and social wellbeing needs, as examined in the Academy’s project on the Tao of Finance. The marginal importance attributed to Arts in the world community needs to be replaced by one which recognizes their essential contribution as a complement to scientific forms of creativity, and their central role in the development of mind and the process of conscious social transformation.

The articles published in this issue bring out the core themes of the World Academy of Art and Science’s projects, which are interrelated and cannot be dealt with in isolation. Just like the SDGs, they need to be addressed within a holistic framework that sees the connection between the parts and ultimately, their connection to the whole that the Society is.