After three centuries, post-industrial civilization threatens to shatter. Megacorporations accrue enormous power by linking together nations turned insular in the aftermath of yesterday''''s global multilateralism; a reinvigorated United Nations threatens the crumbling sovereignty of state by enforcing human rights independently of member nations, and the UN and others patrol for mass destruction technologies in the ever-accelerating, ever-democratizing arms race. Another environmental collapse looms, visions of the last haunting memories and consciences of the lower and middle classes around the globe.