13. How We Begin

13.4 Founding a State

The futurities in this book are not all equally influential on our lives and on how well a society functions overall. Moreover, they represent only a tiny fraction of the possibilities for better social systems. Not so much because the number of pages in this book is limited, but because my imagination and capacity to envision such things are.

The one futurity in this book that tries to unlock all of this potential is my concept of the state, the kinotarchy (Chapter 10), with communities as experimental fields for social systems.

The emergence of a kinotarchy from an already existing state would be possible (see: appendix “Constitution Kinotarchy”, section “Transformation of a State”) if the social consensus for it existed. But it seems unlikely to me that the first state of this kind would come into being that way. It is too different, too hard to imagine, for the great majority of an existing state ever to commit itself to this untested gamble, I suspect.

It seems more realistic to me that like-minded people come together if the opportunity arises to establish a new state, and choose this form of state for themselves. In that situation, it has the advantage that different variants of social systems can be established simultaneously within the same state with the help of different communities.
So if ideology is the reason for founding this new state and emigrating to it, a kinotarchy allows for a much broader consensus about how to live together, and thus more allies.
Or, put the other way around: ideological conflicts often put young states under severe strain (for example the question of slavery in the United States). Through the communities, each of these groups can live peacefully in the way it prefers and seek to prove the superiority of its own ideology by example. The central state sets the ground rules all communities must follow (and thus forbids, for example, involuntary slavery).

In the future, new states could emerge, for example through settlement of the seafloor or through artificial floating islands (seasteading). For now, that is international waters and thus belongs to no existing state. As technology advances, settling the ocean will become increasingly feasible. At some point, the threshold will be reached at which founding a state in this way becomes possible for a sufficiently wealthy group. There have already been various attempts to found micronations at sea. But they were all far too small to be viable. This will continue to be the biggest problem of this approach—achieving a large enough area to prosper as an independent state.
In the nearer future, it seems to me more promising to use sufficient money to buy unproductive state territory from an existing state (for example desert regions[78] or tundra), which could be made fertile with enough capital and technology.

In all these cases, the driving force behind founding a state would be the desire to found a different kind of state, to realize a kinotarchy. If the building of consensus (Chapter 13.1) is complete, a developed shared vision for that is ready for use. If enough capital and technology are then added to make one of the variants mentioned possible, then founding a state becomes a realistic possibility.
Whether the new state then has a lasting chance of success depends on how much capital is available, how large its area and population are, how self-sufficient and economically viable the state is, and whether it can hold its own diplomatically and militarily, meaning that it is not simply annexed by a neighboring country.

On the other hand, new states will also emerge in the course of the colonization of space, which I already wrote about in Chapter 3.2. These space colonies will initially be dependent on the states that founded them, but will gradually become more self-sufficient. At the same time, the exercise of military force is only possible to a limited extent because of the great distances involved. Just as Great Britain failed to use its military might to prevent the independence of the United States. And as with the United States, the living conditions, views, and interests of the space colonies will differ radically from those of the states that founded them. All of these are ideal conditions for independence movements, which is why this is also a recurring motif in science fiction.

Lastly, an independence movement in an existing state on Earth may also succeed for entirely different reasons, so that a new state now has to decide on a form of government.

In the case of these independence movements, then, the primary issue was not the form of government. But if, at the time of independence, the idea of kinotarchy is widespread, the software for the public ledger exists and has been tested in public trial runs, then there is a possibility that the newly emerging state will choose this form of government.

These examples clearly show how important the preparatory work of spreading the idea, building consensus, and developing the software is, even before a concrete opportunity for implementation exists. Only that makes it possible to seize suddenly arising chances to realize a radical futurity.

Once a new state has proven that this form of organization, with ledger and communities, can work, that also significantly increases the chances that an already existing state will adopt this new form of government. Just as democracy in Europe received enormous momentum after the United States had proven that this form of government works and is successful.

 

Seasteading and the settlement of desert or tundra are transformations of the Earth (terraforming) that create more living space and more food for humanity. In doing so, they let us push the resource limits farther outward before we succeed in expanding into the solar system (see “3.2 Resource Scarcity”).

If many floating islands or mobile space colonies (orbital habitats and spaceships such as those in Iain M. Banks’s science-fiction series “The Culture”) form a joint state, then that state is not a geographically fixed entity. Instead, its individual elements (the islands) can be rearranged so that similar or friendly communities are adjacent, or to adapt in other ways to changes or new requirements.
A kinotarchy would function even better in such an environment. It could be implemented without the complex system of rule-based central-state leasing (Chapter 9.5). On the other hand, some of the futurities presented in this book could not be realized there as described (especially those from Chapters “8. Infrastructure” and “9. Living”). It would therefore be a rewarding field for the joint development of new futurities.

If terraforming is also financed by private capital rather than only by nation-states, then it can lead to new states. If financed by individuals and corporations, it is crucial that all citizens of the new state have a say in its rules—rather than only billionaires and corporations—for futurities (such as those presented in this book) to have any chance of being realized. For the kinotarchy, that is of course especially true.

As soon as a state has defused its pressing problems through better social systems, and can therefore turn its attention to coming challenges and newly opening potential, such terraforming projects—with their technological challenges, social adaptations, and potential for better systems and better lives—offer excellent goals for free capital and human ingenuity. So that we leave our children and grandchildren not only new technologies, but a better world.

 

So there are various ways in which the futurities presented in this book could become reality. If they have a good core, then it is by no means wasted time to discuss them, develop them further, and do the preparatory work that would make their realization easier.

I have presented you in this book with a complex of mutually reinforcing ideas, all based on the shared core of self-development. I hope that with them I was able to fulfill the expectation raised in the first chapter that this is more than just one of countless nonfiction books that lament the problems of our society.

I have sketched, as best I could, a possible better future, and the paths towards it.

Everything else is up to you!