We live in an increasingly "connected" world. This connectedness runs deeper than the Internet; it is about the growth of international air links and the fading of national borders; about global supply chains for businesses large and small; and about the massive global movement of energy.
Yet all these connections also have a dark side. Organized crime and terrorism depend on the Internet. Infectious disease loves air travel and porous borders. Piracy depends on long supply chains.
In a society as safe as Japan, it is easy to forget that the first obligation of a government is to protect citizens from threats to their security. Yet in a connected world, where almost all threats are cross-border, nations can no longer just go it alone; they need to find ways to work with each other — to be multilateral, rather than unilateral. And the Group of Seven meeting at Ise-Shima this week is an enabler of such international cooperation.