There can hardly be a more lurid case of bad government in the world than the catastrophic misrule in the "Democratic Republic" of Congo -- where another weak peace is being tried this week. In truth, however, it is hard to say what's worse: the villainy of the Congolese wars or the predictable insufficiency of the world's response. When we in the rich democracies watch another atrocity unfold, or tolerate another unnecessary famine or environmental ruin, we conspire in misrule on a global scale. That is what many of the protesters in Washington the past few days were saying, if only we would stop and listen. The world needs new ways of governing. We know this, because the old ways are failing -- in wars of grievance and greed, in the backward course of de-development in poor countries, in the altered chemistry of the climate itself. These are, in the main, failures to govern the turmoil and seize the opportunities of globalization. All confound the capacity of any state to govern alone, even inside its own borders. But they are not inevitable. It remains within our power to distribute the great gains of globalization more fairly, and to remedy its harms. Globalization can be turned to the common good. Here's how: First, understand the failures. Most of us think of the state as the natural and predominating unit of the international system. We take for granted, even when we know better, old assumptions of sovereignty and impenetrable borders. This is risky imagery, rooted in a past far different from the present world of global finance, global media, global norms of human rights. And it fosters a lethal defeatism when old approaches fail. These are habits of mind, and they can be changed. As well, let us acknowledge that considerable numbers of powerful people flourish in the current circumstances -- those who sit comfortably in the prevailing institutions, and particularly those who are selling what the world is buying. This is a crucial fact of globalization: It is not, for the most part, an inevitable force of nature or of history. For good and ill, life's current conditions reflect in large degree the deliberate actions and reactions of corporations, organizations and governments -- all interacting -- whose leaders are pursuing their own separate interests. There is nothing new in the phenomenon of multiple unco-ordinated decisions producing unintended harm. That is what traffic jams and overfishing are all about. What globalization introduces, along with its wealth of opportunity, is a new intrusiveness -- and a new destructiveness -- in the damage done. The democratization of globalization is one necessary corrective. The virtue of democratic governments is not that they invariably do the right thing, but that they are held accountable when they do the wrong thing. But in global politics, how accountable is the World Trade Organization? Nortel? Greenpeace? People are entitled, by right, to a meaningful say in the institutions that govern their lives. Besides which, no institution can succeed for long without the consent of those who are governed by it.

That's what the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are realizing. Former World Bank chief economist Joe Stiglitz said yesterday that "if the people we entrust to manage the global economy don't begin to dialogue and take criticism to heart, things will continue to go very, very wrong." The technology of globalization itself -- the Internet especially -- equips activists anywhere in powerful new coalitions of peaceful resistance. They are only just starting to exploit it. Globalization generates wealth and boundless possibility. But globalization will defeat the attempt of any people to protect their security, their prosperity, or the air they breathe or the water they drink, except in co-operation with others in the global community. Recognizing this, we should work together on three imperatives. Preventing deadly conflict: It is true, but only half true, that most wars today are civil wars. In cause and effect, war has been globalized -- in the global arms trade, transborder affinities of kinship and tradition, the self-interest of foreign governments, and the influences of business, media and non-governmental organizations. Preventing deadly conflicts such as Congo's gruesome war demands a new understanding of the norms and practicalities of international intervention, new networks for action at the United Nations, a stronger "culture of prevention" linked to strategies for development. Providing opportunities for the young: Earth's population has just passed six billion, and is likely to reach eight billion by 2025. Some 98 per cent of that growth will occur in the poor countries, mostly in cities. Giving these people the chance for a humane life is a commanding imperative of governance. That means relief from preventable disease, universal primary schooling, expanded access to the Internet (and so to a more fortunate future). All this demands co-ordination, of a kind only achievable through the UN. Managing climate change: Earth's climate is changing, and some part of global warming is human-made. The damage can only be abated by the joint action of states, industry and others -- in a thorough transformation to low-carbon economies. What's needed, what's possible, is a grand bargain between rich and poor countries (and their industries) to cut greenhouse-gas emissions and increase Earth's capacity to absorb them. Fulfilling the 1997 Kyoto protocol would complete that bargain -- but it still requires will and concerted decision. This year offers an extraordinary chance to act on those imperatives. The Millennium Summit, at the UN in September, can itself constitute an exercise in good governance -- a democratic reconstruction of our future. But the leaders there will have to decide: They can settle for the usual champagne and platitudes. Or they can start, with straight talk and real decisiveness, to exploit the great possibilities that globalization provides. The benefits of globalization are available. The evils are neither inevitable nor ungovernable. And good governance can still save us from our failures. To that end, the Millennium Summit can mark a timely new beginning.

Gordon Smith, former deputy minister of foreign affairs, is chairman of the International Development Research Centre and director of the Centre for Global Studies at the University of Victoria. He is co-author, with Moisés Naím, of Altered States: Globalization, Sovereignty and Governance, a book on United Nations reform.