When you announced this series I was personally hoping for an analysis based on changing patterns of trade, resource extraction, transportation / network effects, and geography/climate to identify emerging centres of power and influence - Gitmo and Star Base were interesting to me for those reasons! I presume this would have to be a global series to be really interesting (or maybe its pointless as no new cities are likely to emerge?
Yes I think that’s it. The US is already reasonably optimized. This changes elsewhere. Like for example Somaliland has some pretty obvious spots for new cities. Thai islands. Greek Cyclades. Indonesia has many sports. I will likely do one of these series, but for new states!
Actually, most borders in the world already make quite a lot of sense. Africa is more sensible than we like it to think. Ethnic subdivisions of Africa could be quite interesting indeed, not just because ethnic tensions would diminish, but also because having hundreds of new polities would allow for much more political exploration.
Another set of locations could be currently small cities/towns that could be expanded significant. You correctly noted the incumbent barriers to growth in many larger cities, but how many small towns (10-50k people?) would actually have the political will to expand if they had outside financial support? Likewise a bet if bunch of them have favorable geography (why they exist today) but have some factor why they haven’t grown. Maybe that is just because there is a large city not to far away. But with enough development that isn’t a problem as some of the proposals in this series already note.
Nice series. It was really helpful to understand why cities were built (or not built, in some cases).
Of all of these, the ones that seem convincing to me are Presidio and Satelite cities on the same area. A relevant housing crisis can drive a lot of the investment needed to create these new cities.
Your take on a few of the new cities presented, as well as some of your previous commentary on the birth of nations, and the transition beyond the idea of nation-states is consistent with some of the desired neo-reactionary outcomes, but the tone I get from a lot of your writing is that you see future tech and ideas as catalysts for more expansions of democracy (not a neoreactionary idea) …
So I guess I’m curious as I enjoy your writing, research and analysis… what is your take on neoreactionsim?
It’s a philosophy espoused initially by Curtis Yarvin. Also called Dark Enlightenment. I suggest looking it up. As I won’t do it justice here but It’s an anti democratic Monarchist ideology. (With classist/racist undertones). One outcome is the creation of city-state fiefdoms run like free market commercial enterprises with a CEO. Whereby citizens have the right to move from city state to city state at their will but have no say in the governance. It’s influenced the ideology of “the network state” as proposed by Nick Land. It has associations with or influenced the likes of Andreason (California forever backer) and Peter Theil and their political/professional circles
There’s lots of chatter that this ideology explains the bull in the China shop role of Elon Musk in the new administration.
For the record but not to sway your thoughts, it’s the post-nation state , tech-city-state outcome that I’m really curious about your thoughts on.
The antidemocratic, anti progressive, elitism of the ideology is not encouraging to me. I like to consider myself a techno-humanist (as opposed to a techno-optimist) and techno-humanism is really where I think of you and your writing.
The problem is that there are 2 concepts mixed there, you are in favor of one and against another.
The value of new city-states is to improve global governance. you need more competition at the state level so that states, competing between each other to attract new citizens, optimize their services. That idea is very strong, because it brings the best of capitalism (competition) to state mgmt. I think you agree with that.
Your problem is with the 2nd one, the CEO thing. Personally, I think it’s a great idea, because if you don’t like it, you can just go elsewhere, and founder CEOs have a knack at creating amazing products — in this case, a state. You’re not used to considering that as a product, but it is.
Is the CEO/company the best approach? I don’t think so. My preference is a variant of Futarchy. But I think it’s better than many of our current democracies TBH.
You are correct. The competition for citizens via services, opportunities and quality of life already exists today in America. People move rather freely from state to state, city to city, in an attempt to optimize their livelihoods (by whatever optimization function they deem most valuable… family, job/career,recreation,opportunity, etc). And I value this (I’ve done it myself moving across the US three times in my life already)
And again you are correct that the autocratic notion of a CEO (whose optimizing functions are usually quality of product, or quantity of profit) is what turns me away. If the CEOs values align with mine, I may feel ok having no say in that society since the bulk of what I would say is “no comment, I’m good boss” but what are the odds that that’s the case? Or what if I align 90%. What if I can’t move to another city-state for economic reasons. What if my CEO isn’t altruistic? At least in a democracy leaning society - citizens could affect change. Obviously ideas like a “citizens advisory council” or whatnot could be simple solutions but it’s also just as easy for a CEO to say “you’re an intro level citizen, your thoughts aren’t welcome here”.
We say they can just vote with their feet as a fundamental tenant. But restarting a life is hard.
So as I reread my last paragraph, I think the CEO-governance concerns me with just how easy it would be to lead to tyranny and stratification of society. Two things progressive democracy really try to counteract (mob rule not withstanding)
I need to look into futarchy. Thanks for the insightful comments!
When you announced this series I was personally hoping for an analysis based on changing patterns of trade, resource extraction, transportation / network effects, and geography/climate to identify emerging centres of power and influence - Gitmo and Star Base were interesting to me for those reasons! I presume this would have to be a global series to be really interesting (or maybe its pointless as no new cities are likely to emerge?
Yes I think that’s it. The US is already reasonably optimized. This changes elsewhere. Like for example Somaliland has some pretty obvious spots for new cities. Thai islands. Greek Cyclades. Indonesia has many sports. I will likely do one of these series, but for new states!
New states would be good - a post-European world where borders actually make sense!!!!?? :D
Wdym post-European? Post European colonialism?
Actually, most borders in the world already make quite a lot of sense. Africa is more sensible than we like it to think. Ethnic subdivisions of Africa could be quite interesting indeed, not just because ethnic tensions would diminish, but also because having hundreds of new polities would allow for much more political exploration.
Another set of locations could be currently small cities/towns that could be expanded significant. You correctly noted the incumbent barriers to growth in many larger cities, but how many small towns (10-50k people?) would actually have the political will to expand if they had outside financial support? Likewise a bet if bunch of them have favorable geography (why they exist today) but have some factor why they haven’t grown. Maybe that is just because there is a large city not to far away. But with enough development that isn’t a problem as some of the proposals in this series already note.
A bigger city nearby is a death sentence.
Rocky Mountains area.
Nice series. It was really helpful to understand why cities were built (or not built, in some cases).
Of all of these, the ones that seem convincing to me are Presidio and Satelite cities on the same area. A relevant housing crisis can drive a lot of the investment needed to create these new cities.
Tomas
Your take on a few of the new cities presented, as well as some of your previous commentary on the birth of nations, and the transition beyond the idea of nation-states is consistent with some of the desired neo-reactionary outcomes, but the tone I get from a lot of your writing is that you see future tech and ideas as catalysts for more expansions of democracy (not a neoreactionary idea) …
So I guess I’m curious as I enjoy your writing, research and analysis… what is your take on neoreactionsim?
I don’t know what it is! If you tell me I’ll tell you.
It’s a philosophy espoused initially by Curtis Yarvin. Also called Dark Enlightenment. I suggest looking it up. As I won’t do it justice here but It’s an anti democratic Monarchist ideology. (With classist/racist undertones). One outcome is the creation of city-state fiefdoms run like free market commercial enterprises with a CEO. Whereby citizens have the right to move from city state to city state at their will but have no say in the governance. It’s influenced the ideology of “the network state” as proposed by Nick Land. It has associations with or influenced the likes of Andreason (California forever backer) and Peter Theil and their political/professional circles
There’s lots of chatter that this ideology explains the bull in the China shop role of Elon Musk in the new administration.
For the record but not to sway your thoughts, it’s the post-nation state , tech-city-state outcome that I’m really curious about your thoughts on.
The antidemocratic, anti progressive, elitism of the ideology is not encouraging to me. I like to consider myself a techno-humanist (as opposed to a techno-optimist) and techno-humanism is really where I think of you and your writing.
The problem is that there are 2 concepts mixed there, you are in favor of one and against another.
The value of new city-states is to improve global governance. you need more competition at the state level so that states, competing between each other to attract new citizens, optimize their services. That idea is very strong, because it brings the best of capitalism (competition) to state mgmt. I think you agree with that.
Your problem is with the 2nd one, the CEO thing. Personally, I think it’s a great idea, because if you don’t like it, you can just go elsewhere, and founder CEOs have a knack at creating amazing products — in this case, a state. You’re not used to considering that as a product, but it is.
Is the CEO/company the best approach? I don’t think so. My preference is a variant of Futarchy. But I think it’s better than many of our current democracies TBH.
Thanks Tomas!
You are correct. The competition for citizens via services, opportunities and quality of life already exists today in America. People move rather freely from state to state, city to city, in an attempt to optimize their livelihoods (by whatever optimization function they deem most valuable… family, job/career,recreation,opportunity, etc). And I value this (I’ve done it myself moving across the US three times in my life already)
And again you are correct that the autocratic notion of a CEO (whose optimizing functions are usually quality of product, or quantity of profit) is what turns me away. If the CEOs values align with mine, I may feel ok having no say in that society since the bulk of what I would say is “no comment, I’m good boss” but what are the odds that that’s the case? Or what if I align 90%. What if I can’t move to another city-state for economic reasons. What if my CEO isn’t altruistic? At least in a democracy leaning society - citizens could affect change. Obviously ideas like a “citizens advisory council” or whatnot could be simple solutions but it’s also just as easy for a CEO to say “you’re an intro level citizen, your thoughts aren’t welcome here”.
We say they can just vote with their feet as a fundamental tenant. But restarting a life is hard.
So as I reread my last paragraph, I think the CEO-governance concerns me with just how easy it would be to lead to tyranny and stratification of society. Two things progressive democracy really try to counteract (mob rule not withstanding)
I need to look into futarchy. Thanks for the insightful comments!