The biggest issue isn’t who is in charge, it’s the fact that humans are fundamentally incapable of cooperating across large groups.

I’m not so sure that this is an inherent problem with humanity so much as it is a symptom of our current political and economic systems and culture.

Take you pandemic/mask example for instance. Pretty much everyone was on board with masks, social distancing, etc, until a few weeks/months in when it got politicized. Conservative leaders saw they could rile up their base by take a stance against the science. And they took advantage of our cultural preference for individualism where we could instead have a more collectivist culture.

These systems and cultural norms aren’t inherent to humans. It’s inherent to our shitty half-democracy, capitalism, etc.

But those same salt of the earth workers are going to negotiate climate controls with China?

The oil lobby pays shit loads of money to propagandize the population in the exact same way the tobacco industry did it. Start dealing with that, and the workers won’t buy the bullshit propaganda anymore.