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TED Talks Daily

(#5) Elise's Top Ten: The new political story that could change everything | George Monbiot

with George Monbiot

Published September 20, 2025
View Show Notes

About This Episode

Host Elise Hu introduces a 2019 TED Summit talk by journalist George Monbiot, part of her 'Top 10' playlist, about the political stories that shape our societies. Monbiot argues that neoliberalism persists not because it works, but because it has not yet been replaced by a more compelling 'restoration story', and he explains how narrative structures drive political change. He proposes a new politics of belonging centered on human altruism, cooperation, the commons, and participatory democracy to counter atomization and authoritarian tendencies.

Topics Covered

Narrative psychology Storytelling Political polarization Democratic deliberation Sustainability Environmental justice Personal Development Social isolation Community building Entrepreneurship

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Quick Takeaways

  • Monbiot contends that neoliberalism survives despite its failures because no equally powerful alternative political story has taken its place.
  • He explains that humans are fundamentally altruistic and highly cooperative, but current dominant narratives push us into extreme individualism and competition.
  • Political change historically follows a 'restoration story' structure: disorder, villainous forces, a hero, and the restoration of harmony.
  • Keynesianism and neoliberalism are presented as opposing restoration stories that share the same underlying narrative structure.
  • Monbiot argues that despair and political paralysis stem from a failure of imagination and the absence of a hopeful future-oriented story.
  • He proposes a 'politics of belonging' that emphasizes rich, participatory civic life and economics built around the commons rather than just market or state.
  • Commons-based institutions-like community broadband, energy cooperatives, and shared growing spaces-embody a more democratic, equitable approach to resources.
  • Monbiot distinguishes between exclusionary 'bonding' communities and inclusive 'bridging' communities, advocating the latter to resist fascistic tendencies.
  • He calls for representative democracy to be tempered by participatory democracy and for decisions to be made as locally as possible.
  • The episode situates this talk within a broader TED playlist, linking it to forthcoming discussions on institutions and structural racism.

Podcast Notes

Introduction to the Top 10 TED Talks playlist and this episode

Elise Hu welcomes listeners back and frames the series

Reintroduction of the 'Top 10 TED Talks' playlist concept[2:08]
• Elise notes that this is TED's first ever podcast playlist, where a curated list of TED Talks from the archive are shared all at once on the feed.
Shift from inward-focused talks to outward-focused topics[2:16]
• She explains that the first few talks in her top 10 list have focused on looking inward at how we see and relate to ourselves, because that shapes who we are and how we act.
• Now she wants to pivot outward to examine broader systems and narratives in society.

Introduction of George Monbiot and his 2019 talk

Description of Monbiot's talk topic[2:27]
• Elise introduces journalist George Monbiot's 2019 TED talk as being about the political stories that shape everything in our societies.
Why Elise considers the talk vital for the current time[2:43]
• She notes that the world feels like it is in crisis and upheaval and calls the talk a vital frame for understanding the modern world.
• She says Monbiot explains why we are stuck in a system that keeps failing us and offers a potential way out.

George Monbiot's diagnosis of neoliberalism and the sense of entrapment

Opening question about feeling trapped in a broken model

Description of the current economic model's harms[2:57]
• Monbiot asks whether listeners feel trapped in an economic model that is trashing the living world and threatening the lives of our descendants.
• He says this model excludes billions of people while making a handful unimaginably rich and sorts people into winners and losers.
• He highlights that the system then blames the "losers" for their misfortune.
Naming neoliberalism as the dominant model[3:22]
• Monbiot identifies this system as neoliberalism, describing it as a "zombie doctrine" that never seems to die despite being comprehensively discredited.

Expectation that the 2008 financial crisis would end neoliberalism

Exposure of neoliberalism's central features[3:41]
• Monbiot notes that people might have expected the 2008 financial crisis to lead to neoliberalism's collapse.
• He says the crisis exposed central neoliberal features such as deregulating business and finance and tearing down public protections.
• He adds that neoliberalism throws people into extreme competition with each other, and these aspects turned out to be flawed.
Intellectual collapse versus continued dominance[3:59]
• Monbiot states that neoliberalism did collapse intellectually after the crisis.
• Yet he emphasizes that neoliberalism still dominates our lives, raising the question of why this is so.

The power of stories and narrative structures in politics

Why a new story is needed to replace neoliberalism

Claim that absence of a new story keeps us stuck[4:11]
• Monbiot argues that the reason neoliberalism persists is that we have not yet produced a new story to replace it.
• He underscores that the only thing that can displace a story is another story, not just facts and figures.

Humans as creatures of narrative

Stories as navigation tools[4:17]
• He says stories are the means by which we navigate the world, helping us interpret complex and contradictory signals.
Narrative fidelity versus scientific sense[4:34]
• Monbiot states that when people want to make sense of something, they seek narrative fidelity rather than scientific sense.
• He explains that people ask whether what they hear reflects how they expect humans and the world to behave, whether it hangs together and progresses like a story.
Limits of facts and figures[5:05]
• Despite describing himself as an empiricist who believes in facts and figures, he says facts and figures alone cannot displace a persuasive story.
• He insists that you cannot take away someone's story without giving them a new one.

The restoration story as a dominant political narrative

Introduction of common narrative structures[5:27]
• Monbiot notes that people are not only attuned to stories in general but to particular narrative structures and basic plots used repeatedly.
Definition of the restoration story[5:44]
• He identifies one especially powerful political plot which he calls the restoration story.
• The restoration story begins with disorder afflicting the land, caused by powerful and nefarious forces working against humanity's interests.
• Then a hero revolts against this disorder, struggles against the powerful forces, and overthrows them, restoring harmony to the land.
Examples of restoration stories in culture[6:39]
• Monbiot says this is the Bible story, the Harry Potter story, the Lord of the Rings story, and the Narnia story.
• He adds that this story structure has accompanied almost every political and religious transformation for millennia.
Importance of restoration stories for transformation[6:31]
• He suggests that without a powerful new restoration story, a political or religious transformation may not be able to happen.

Historical restoration stories: Keynesianism and neoliberalism

Keynes's restoration story after the Great Depression

Context of laissez-faire and the Great Depression[6:50]
• Monbiot recalls that after laissez-faire economics triggered the Great Depression, John Maynard Keynes set out to write a new economics.
Structure of the Keynesian story[7:03]
• In the Keynesian restoration story, disorder afflicts the land due to powerful nefarious forces of an economic elite capturing the world's wealth.
• The hero is the enabling state, backed by working- and middle-class people, which redistributes wealth and spends public money on public goods.
• Through generating income and jobs, this state restores harmony to the land.
Cross-spectrum resonance of Keynesianism[7:47]
• Monbiot says that like all strong restoration stories, Keynesianism resonated across the political spectrum.
• He notes that Democrats and Republicans, Labour and Conservatives, left and right all became broadly Keynesian.

Neoliberalism as a rival restoration story

Emergence of neoliberal thinkers in the 1970s[7:59]
• When Keynesianism ran into trouble in the 1970s, neoliberals like Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman advanced a new restoration story.
Structure of the neoliberal story[8:01]
• In the neoliberal version, disorder afflicts the land due to powerful nefarious forces of an overmighty state whose collectivizing tendencies crush freedom, individualism, and opportunity.
• The hero is the entrepreneur, who fights these forces, rolls back the state, and, by creating wealth and opportunity, restores harmony.
Neoliberalism's bipartisan appeal[9:22]
• Monbiot explains that this story also resonated across the political spectrum, with both Republicans and Democrats, Conservatives and Labour becoming broadly neoliberal.
Opposite content, identical structure[8:58]
• He highlights that Keynesianism and neoliberalism are opposite stories that nonetheless share an identical narrative structure.

Post-2008 vacuum and the need for a new restoration story

Failure of neoliberal story and weak alternatives

Collapse of neoliberal narrative after 2008[8:57]
• Monbiot says that in 2008 the neoliberal story fell apart.
Inadequate responses from opponents[9:11]
• He notes that neoliberalism's opponents offered no strong new restoration story.
• The best they proposed, he argues, were watered-down neoliberalism or "microwave Keynesianism."
Resulting political stagnation[9:54]
• Monbiot concludes that in the absence of a new story, society remains stuck with the old failed story that keeps failing.

Despair as a failure of imagination

Definition of despair in political terms[9:37]
• He defines despair as the state we fall into when our imagination fails and we have no story that explains the present and describes the future.
Link between imagination and political failure[9:55]
• Monbiot claims that political failure is, at heart, a failure of imagination.
• Without a restoration story telling us where we need to go, he argues, nothing is going to change.
Transformative potential of a new story[10:11]
• He contrasts this with the idea that with such a restoration story, almost everything can change.

Criteria and scientific basis for a new political story

Desired characteristics of a new story

Wide appeal and cross-political resonance[10:19]
• Monbiot says the new story should appeal to as wide a range of people as possible, crossing political fault lines.
Emotional and cognitive qualities[10:27]
• He says it should resonate with deep needs and desires, be simple and intelligible, and be grounded in reality.
Acknowledgment of the challenge[10:37]
• He admits that creating such a story sounds like a tall order.

Scientific convergence on human nature

Multiple disciplines pointing to altruism[11:05]
• Monbiot notes a recent convergence of findings in psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, and evolutionary biology.
• These sciences, he says, tell us that humans have a massive capacity for altruism.
Balance of selfishness and altruism[11:09]
• He acknowledges that everyone has some selfishness and greed, but says these are not the dominant values in most people.
Humans as supreme cooperators[11:19]
• Monbiot describes humans as the supreme cooperators, having survived African savannas despite being weaker and slower than many predators and prey.
• He credits this survival to an amazing ability to engage in mutual aid.
Cooperation hard-wired by evolution[11:35]
• He argues that the urge to cooperate has been hard-wired into our minds through natural selection.
• He calls altruism and cooperation the central crucial facts about humankind.

How dominant narratives thwart human good nature

Description of disorder and thwarted good nature

Something has gone horribly wrong[11:51]
• Monbiot says that despite our altruistic and cooperative nature, something has gone horribly wrong and disorder afflicts the land.
Role of dominant political narratives[12:05]
• He identifies several forces that thwart our good nature, singling out the dominant political narrative of our time as the most powerful.
• This narrative, he says, tells us to live in extreme individualism and competition with each other.
Social consequences: fear, mistrust, and atomization[12:19]
• Monbiot argues that the narrative pushes people to fight, fear, and mistrust one another.
• He says it atomizes society and weakens the social bonds that make life worth living.
Space for violent intolerant forces[12:35]
• Into this social vacuum, he warns, grow violent and intolerant forces.
Striking phrase: altruists governed by psychopaths[12:41]
• Monbiot sums up the contradiction by saying, "We are a society of altruists, but we are governed by psychopaths."

The politics of belonging and the commons-based alternative

Reclaiming togetherness and belonging

Assertion that change is possible[13:09]
• Monbiot insists it does not have to be this way because humans have an incredible capacity for togetherness and belonging.
Invoking altruism and cooperation[13:07]
• He says that by invoking our capacity for togetherness, we can recover our altruism and cooperation.

Building thriving civic life and participatory culture

Countering atomization with civic life[13:13]
• Where there is atomization, Monbiot proposes building a thriving civic life with a rich participatory culture.
Economics respecting people and planet[13:25]
• Where people find themselves crushed between market and state, he calls for an economics that respects both people and planet.
• He suggests designing this new economics around the neglected sphere of the commons.

Defining the commons and giving examples

What the commons is and is not[14:01]
• Monbiot explains that the commons is neither market nor state, neither capitalism nor communism.
Three main elements of a commons[13:38]
• He says a commons has three main elements: a particular resource, a particular community that manages that resource, and the rules and negotiations that community develops to manage it.
Illustrative examples of commons in practice[13:33]
• He points to community broadband and community energy cooperatives as examples.
• He also mentions shared land for growing fruit and vegetables, called allotments in Britain.
Rules about ownership and sharing benefits[14:05]
• Monbiot notes that a commons cannot be sold or given away, and its benefits are shared equally among the community's members.

Reviving politics and democracy

Recovering democracy from capture[14:41]
• Where people have been ignored and exploited, he proposes reviving politics and recovering democracy from those who have captured it.
New rules to prevent financial power dominance[14:25]
• Monbiot calls for new rules and methods of elections to ensure that financial power never trumps democratic power again.
Balancing representative and participatory democracy[14:29]
• He argues that representative democracy should be tempered by participatory democracy so that people can refine political choices.
Subsidiarity: deciding issues at the most local level[14:49]
• Monbiot says that political choice should be exercised as much as possible at the local level.
• He adds that if something can be decided locally, it should not be determined nationally.

Naming this framework the 'politics of belonging'

Introduction of the term[15:59]
• Monbiot states that he calls this overall approach the politics of belonging.

Belonging, community, and types of social networks

Why belonging can appeal across left and right

Shared values around belonging and community[15:15]
• Monbiot argues that belonging and community are among the few values shared by both left and right.
• He concedes that people may mean slightly different things by these terms but notes that they at least share common language.
Politics as a search for belonging[16:33]
• He suggests that much of politics can be seen as a search for belonging.
Fascists' version of community[16:07]
• Monbiot observes that even fascists seek community, but one that is frighteningly homogenous.
• He describes this fascist community as one where everyone looks the same, wears the same uniform, and chants the same slogans.

Bridging networks versus bonding networks

Definitions of bonding and bridging[17:05]
• Monbiot defines a bonding network as one that brings together people from a homogenous group.
• He contrasts this with a bridging network, which brings together people from different groups.
Goal of creating rich bridging communities[16:45]
• He believes that if sufficiently rich and vibrant bridging communities are created, they can thwart people's urge to retreat into homogenous bonding communities.
• He notes that such bonding communities often define themselves against an 'other' they feel they must defend against.

Summarizing the proposed new restoration story

Monbiot's narrative summary of the new story

Identifying the source of disorder[17:50]
• Monbiot restates the restoration formula, saying disorder afflicts the land due to powerful and nefarious forces of people who claim there is no such thing as society.
• He says these forces tell us our highest purpose is to fight like stray dogs over a dustbin.
Naming the heroes and their strategy[18:12]
• In his version, the heroes of the story are "us"-ordinary people.
• He says we will revolt against this disorder and fight the nefarious forces by building rich, engaging, inclusive, and generous communities.
Restoration of harmony through community[18:34]
• By building such communities, Monbiot says, we will restore harmony to the land.

Call for agreement on the need for a story

Whether or not this is the right story[18:47]
• Monbiot acknowledges that people may or may not feel his suggested narrative is the right one.
Insistence on the necessity of some restoration story[18:58]
• He expresses hope that listeners at least agree that we need a new restoration story.
• This story should guide us out of the current mess, explain why we are in it, and describe how to escape it.
Potential for cross-spectrum influence[19:21]
• Monbiot says that if told correctly, such a story will infect the minds of people across the political spectrum.
Final call to action[18:52]
• He concludes that our task is to tell the story that lights the path to a better world.

Outro: contextualizing the talk within the playlist and next topics

Elise Hu closes Monbiot's segment

Identification of talk and event[19:28]
• Elise notes that the talk was delivered by George Monbiot at the TED Summit in 2019.
Placement in the Top 10 sequence[19:50]
• She states that this is the fifth of ten talks from the TED Archives being reposted as part of her first podcast playlist of top ten talks.

Link to upcoming talk on institutions and racism

Narratives leading into structural issues[20:00]
• Elise says that considering world narratives and systems leads naturally into the next talk on institutions and institutionalized and structural racism.

Mention of TED's curation guidelines and production credits

Pointer to curation guidelines[20:11]
• She invites curious listeners to learn more about TED's curation at ted.com/curationguidelines.
Production team acknowledgment[20:14]
• Elise notes that TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective and credits producers and editors Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green, Lucy Little, and Tansika Sangmarnivong.
• She mentions that the episode was mixed by Lucy Little, with additional support from Emma Taubner and Daniela Balarezo, and signs off as Elise Hu.

Lessons Learned

Actionable insights and wisdom you can apply to your business, career, and personal life.

1

Systems and ideologies persist not just because of institutions or data, but because they are embedded in compelling stories; to change a system, you must offer a stronger replacement narrative rather than only criticizing the existing one.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What dominant stories or narratives are shaping how I see my work, community, or country right now?
  • • How could I reframe a harmful or limiting narrative I see around me into a more constructive 'restoration story' that people might actually want to follow?
  • • What is one concrete context (at work, in my neighborhood, in my family) where I could start telling a different story about what is possible and desirable?
2

Humans are fundamentally capable of altruism and cooperation, but when we are told to see ourselves as isolated competitors, our behavior and institutions drift toward mistrust, atomization, and authoritarianism.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Where in my life do I act as if everyone is a rival, even though collaboration might serve us better?
  • • How might my choices change if I assumed that most people around me are more cooperative and altruistic than selfish?
  • • What is one specific relationship or group I'm part of where I could deliberately encourage more mutual aid and shared purpose?
3

Building commons-based and participatory structures-where communities co-manage resources and decisions-can counterbalance the dominance of both unchecked markets and distant state power.

Reflection Questions:

  • • What shared resources in my environment (physical, digital, or social) could be better managed collectively rather than left to individual or purely market control?
  • • How could I participate in or help create a small-scale 'commons'-like a shared tool library, community garden, or cooperative project-in my own context?
  • • Which decisions that affect me are currently made far away, and what steps could I take to bring at least one of them closer to local, participatory control?
4

Despair and political apathy often stem from a failure of imagination; articulating a credible, hopeful path forward is a practical antidote that can re-energize engagement.

Reflection Questions:

  • • In which areas of my life or society do I feel most resigned or hopeless, and what 'future story' am I implicitly telling myself there?
  • • How could I sketch a simple, believable path from today's problems to a better state, even if it's only a first draft of a new story?
  • • What small experiment could I run this month that embodies a more hopeful narrative about what is possible?
5

Communities built on bridging across differences are more resilient and less prone to extremist, exclusionary tendencies than communities that only bond people who are already similar.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Who is missing from my current circles of belonging-what perspectives, backgrounds, or experiences are not represented?
  • • How might I redesign one group I'm involved in (a club, team, or project) to intentionally include and connect people from different backgrounds?
  • • What is one action I could take this week to build a 'bridge'-a conversation, invitation, or collaboration-between two groups that rarely interact?
6

Localizing decision-making wherever possible increases people's sense of ownership and can make democracy more responsive and less dominated by financial power.

Reflection Questions:

  • • Which decisions that affect my daily life are currently made without any input from people like me at the local level?
  • • How could I become more involved in at least one local process-such as a school board, neighborhood association, or city consultation-where my voice would matter more directly?
  • • What is one change I'd like to see in my local area, and what first step could I take to bring that issue into a local decision-making forum?

Episode Summary - Notes by Morgan

(#5) Elise's Top Ten: The new political story that could change everything | George Monbiot
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