Interplanetary Governence - how do we manage off-world colonies?

[RainDreamer]

Say once we are capable of long distance interplanetary travel and colonization of other celestial bodies, how are we going to govern them? Say, for example, when we made a permanent colony on Mars.

Will we leave it an autonomous body that govern itself, or will there be some kind of proxy government of earth over there? What would be the pros and cons of that?

When the colony get large enough to span over the surface of mars, would they breaks off into small countries like on Earth?

Then what would be the relationship between Earth nations and Mars nations? Would they be consider a smaller colony under the sponsored nation on earth?

[Jesrad]

Government is unnecessary. Only justice is, and you can have that in plenty of differing forms, many of them more suitable, more efficient, saner and/or more humane than the form we have now. To put it another way: you're not asking the right question.

[RainDreamer]

I was thinking of economical and political factors. Like what would the relationship of Earth and the Mars colony? It would be like the situation between the New World and the British Empire in the past, with vast distance in between and slow communication (well, 3 minutes, but that is still a serious delay considering how fast our internet works now on earth for important communication, like launching a nuke on mars).

Would Mars secede and became its own planetary government? How would Earth nations deal with it if it happens?

[peadar1987]

Government is unnecessary. Only justice is, and you can have that in plenty of differing forms, many of them more suitable, more efficient, saner and/or more humane than the form we have now. To put it another way: you're not asking the right question.

There is very rarely justice without government, only the strong imposing their will on the weak, and unless the weak unite (in some form of, well, government), there's not much that can be done about it.

That said, anarchism, or some form of collectivism can work quite well on very small scales, when everyone is on first name terms with one another, so similar to the system you might get in a small Mars base. Of course, it can also go very Stanford Prison Experiment, so it flips both ways.

[kerbiloid]

Would Mars secede and became its own planetary government?

Without breathable air, drinkable water and fertile soil outside the cupola?

Getting ten times more salary than their Antartctic colleagues?

No, you won't get them off so easily!

[prophet_01]

Depends on the origins of that hypothetical society. Are we talking about a single organisation/govermant or a tight cooperation of many nations and organisations? In that case it's pretty likely that they will jave a single goverment.

If it's founded by many competetive participants the situation would be drasticslly different. Although it's still questinable if any tenzions back home would have a significant impact over such distances. The outposts on mars would dimply need to help eachother in order to survive anyway.

It would also depend on how regular space flight is at that point, if there are more colonies and how hard it would be for nations on earth to have any impact on them. If just getting there to teact on a declaration of independence would be close to commiting financial suicide, goverments are not going to be able to threaten or control them much.

Earth's influence would mostly depend on the question if a colony can survive on their on production and how independent they might be. It's not likely that a colony would become autonomous within decades and it's not hard to believe that some outposts in the most hostile enviroment are controled by the organisations that gurantees their regular supply.

In a very, very, very distant and highly fictional future when mars could be a mostly independent economy, it still depends if a cooperation with earth is of any use. It's rly far away and regular/comercial interplanetary trade, especislly surface to surface sounds even more sci-fi to me than coloniaation and asteroid mining.

Edited June 5, 2015 by prophet_01

[Nibb31]

Why would any organization make the massive initial investment of setting up a self-sufficient colony if there is a risk of secession?

Historically, colonies have always been a loss in the long term. The return on investment is simply too huge with too much risk involved, which is why colonies are simply not going to happen.

[Camacha]

I was thinking of economical and political factors. Like what would the relationship of Earth and the Mars colony? It would be like the situation between the New World and the British Empire in the past, with vast distance in between and slow communication (well, 3 minutes, but that is still a serious delay considering how fast our internet works now on earth for important communication, like launching a nuke on mars).

Would Mars secede and became its own planetary government? How would Earth nations deal with it if it happens?

Yes, that will absolutely happen. I have mentioned this many times in discussion before: put enough time and distance between two populations of humans and they will grow apart. I view it as one of the biggest threats to humanity after we have seeded to a couple of places.

Why would any organization make the massive initial investment of setting up a self-sufficient colony if there is a risk of secession?

Historically, colonies have always been a loss in the long term. The return on investment is simply too huge with too much risk involved, which is why colonies are simply not going to happen.

You seem to ignore than colonies have been massively profitable before turning sour in the past. What does it matter if things go awry 500 years in the future? Get rich while you are alive and never look back.

[Bill Phil]

Maybe like how the Persian empire ruled a long time ago?

People can rule themselves as long as they meet certain requirements. If you make these requirements easy to meet and non-demanding, I don't see a problem.

[LN400]

If history has taught us anything, then the most likely scenario would be the growth of independent states, just like we have independent states here on Earth.

Beside, there is a number of problems with the idea itself, that there should be a government here on Earth running the whole show everywhere. Should we have a World Government akin of the United Nations where all nations have a saying? Or should one of the nearly 200 independent governments here run the whole show and in which case, which one of the nearly 200 governments should it be?

Luckily, the chance is very low we will see a nightmare like One Government to Rule Them All. I think human nature will put a stop to any plans of that, like human nature has put a stop to it all throughout history.

[Nibb31]

You seem to ignore than colonies have been massively profitable before turning sour in the past. What does it matter if things go awry 500 years in the future? Get rich while you are alive and never look back.

It didn't take the USA 500 years to declare independence.

Of course, it's hard to compare hypothetical space colonies on barren worlds with Historical colonialism of the past. I don't think that we will ever see a future where massive populations will want to emigrate off-world. The energy requirements are simply unfathomable and there simply doesn't seem to be any economical return on investment.

[Alias72]

It didn't take the United States 500 years to succeed. But Global Empires involved more then just the United States. Britain's Empire gave it the strength in the long run to fight Germany to a stand-still in the first world war and the resources to last the second. Talking about the failures of colonialism is more difficult then this thread suggests.

Just as you could point out the collapse of the Spanish Empire in the early 19th century, I could point out military occupation by Napoleon. Just as you talk about the Decline of the British Empire I could point out two world wars crippling said Empire. Just as you Have pointed out American independence I WILL point out French Dutch and Spanish interference in that independence. And we could come to the conclusion that Empires fail under external pressure, and at the same time those empires help resist that pressure.

So perhaps empires are doomed to fail. But perhaps those empires are merely more fragile then the Imperial state itself. Either way this situation requires more exploration.

[Camacha]

It didn't take the USA 500 years to declare independence.

The USA is hardly the only country with a colonial past. Pretty much all of Africa, South America and plenty of Asia has at one point or another been colonised. Some countries wrestled free from it long ago, some just recently.

Of course, it's hard to compare hypothetical space colonies on barren worlds with Historical colonialism of the past. I don't think that we will ever see a future where massive populations will want to emigrate off-world. The energy requirements are simply unfathomable and there simply doesn't seem to be any economical return on investment.

There is plenty of variation in the vast library of colonized countries. Though mass emigration is not required, if you wait a little while nature will run its course, only adding to the feelings of independence among colonists.

[Bill Phil]

Didn't the 13 Colonies get heavily taxed? Not to mention a few other bad treatments of the people by the Government. The Colonies had no representation in Parliament, or at all. Now, some of the Grievances mentioned in The Declaration were fake, but there was mistreatment.

I'd say that was good cause to start a revolution.

[peadar1987]

Britain, and Europe in general, have come out pretty well from colonialism, all told (okay, not morally speaking). Even if everyone eventually lost their empires.

[AngelLestat]

there would not be government or nothing alike, not sure in a very very distant future.

No country or company will be able to legalize a part of alien land as their own..

I imagine will be only temporaly licenses to do X activity in some place for X companies.

Colonialism, independence, countries.. all that belongs to the past. There would not be such things in other worlds.

[justidutch]

Lawyers. Corporate lawyers will be the ones who set up the governance of any planetary bodies that end up being populated.

Frankly I think if anyone were to set up permanent colonies on other planets (or asteroids), it would be corporations and not nations. It'll certainly be interesting to watch though. Perhaps Google will settle Mars and make it one big server. Microsoft will populate low-orbit Venus, storing all their data in the clouds there. Apple will take Neptune, Facebook can have Mercury, Glencore will do it's best to monopolize all the asteroids. But in the end it'll be the lawyers of the corporations who dictate how the place runs, with policy being steered by the bottom line. Money is, always has been, and always will be the bottom line, and any new settlements will be set up accordingly.

[/cynicism]

[YNM]

There shouldn't be any. Why would you be proud of some nationality or race - when you can be totally proud of independent living in another (non - standard) planet.

[John Nowak]

Depends who does it.

The United States has well-defined steps for areas under Federal jurisdiction eventually evolving into states with direct representation.

[peadar1987]

there would not be government or nothing alike, not sure in a very very distant future.

No country or company will be able to legalize a part of alien land as their own..

I imagine will be only temporaly licenses to do X activity in some place for X companies.

Colonialism, independence, countries.. all that belongs to the past. There would not be such things in other worlds.

There totally would be countries. If you have a large group of people, spread over the surface of a planet, it's inevitable. They're not going to be directly ruled from earth, they're going to want to control their own destiny. At first, this will probably simply be that the laws on Mars are decided by the people on Mars. But then you get settlers in outlying places, maybe a few tens of thousands. They have completely different needs and wants to the people in the more established areas. They resent that they are being dominated by a group of people they no longer feel affiliated to, they want to make their own decisions, so they break away. It's fundamental human nature, and it's not going to change just because we're terraformed a planet.

In the short term, bases will presumably be administered as the territory of the country that established them.

[AngelLestat]

owning is not the most efficient use of resources. And you will need a very efficient use of resources if you want to live in other planet.

The country system we have in earth brings more problems than solutions. Eventually, these will be also vanish in the future, but it would take a lot of time because we are already hooked with this system.

First, nobody will allow that a piece of alien land would be owned by a country or someone.. No matter if that country put all the money and effort to achieve that.

Earth is very globalized, and that globalization is increasing, this mean all is related with all, you can not take decisions without affect others anymore.

So there will not be countries or nothing alike, it will be a new system which I can only predict some of their properties based in the most efficient thing to do.

[Jonboy]

owning is not the most efficient use of resources. And you will need a very efficient use of resources if you want to live in other planet.

The country system we have in earth brings more problems than solutions. Eventually, these will be also vanish in the future, but it would take a lot of time because we are already hooked with this system.

First, nobody will allow that a piece of alien land would be owned by a country or someone.. No matter if that country put all the money and effort to achieve that.

Earth is very globalized, and that globalization is increasing, this mean all is related with all, you can not take decisions without affect others anymore.

So there will not be countries or nothing alike, it will be a new system which I can only predict some of their properties based in the most efficient thing to do.

The problem is that countries very rarely act in a "rational", farsighted manner. They do not choose the most "efficient " way to do things. Rather, they are driven by shortsighted self-interest. In the last 8,000 years of human civilization, you will be hard-pressed to find a nation that in the overall greater good.

As far as nobody allowing land on Mars to be owned, if colonization is profitable (which is debatable), nations will have great interest in making sure that they CAN control as much of the surface as possible. And since colonization will be limited to whichever nations have the technology to get there and survive, nationalism will most likely continue (unless something drastic occurs to make the nation-state completely obsolete.)

[peadar1987]

owning is not the most efficient use of resources. And you will need a very efficient use of resources if you want to live in other planet.

The country system we have in earth brings more problems than solutions. Eventually, these will be also vanish in the future, but it would take a lot of time because we are already hooked with this system.

First, nobody will allow that a piece of alien land would be owned by a country or someone.. No matter if that country put all the money and effort to achieve that.

Earth is very globalized, and that globalization is increasing, this mean all is related with all, you can not take decisions without affect others anymore.

So there will not be countries or nothing alike, it will be a new system which I can only predict some of their properties based in the most efficient thing to do.

As Jonboy has said, it's not got to do with what's the most efficient way of doing things, it's what people will do. Humans act in their own self-interest. Billy Marsface isn't going to care that it's not efficient for him not to own his own home, he's going to want the security that home ownership brings. Settlement 5-X mightn't like the fact that they have to give their titanium away in exchange for the bare basics, when they could get a better standard of living if they bartered it to Settlement 7-M. You are always going to get people who don't want to be part of the plan, for whom the greatest global efficiency isn't necessarily the best outcome. These people are going to want to go their own way eventually.

It's like the current obsession with GDP growth. It doesn't matter a jot if the GDP increases 10%, if 99% of the population don't see the benefit of that increase in real terms. Your colonists aren't going to care about meeting their iridium quotas and making money for a shareholder back on earth, they will want to make life better for themselves.

[Bill Phil]

The worst problem would probably be the people on a space colony having ties to Earth countries. War would be a pretty bad outcome.

[LN400]

The worst problem would probably be the people on a space colony having ties to Earth countries. War would be a pretty bad outcome.

My pure and wild guess is, the industrial backbone needed for war and the population needed for that industrial level would come long after the colonists' descendants have started identified themselves as people of whatever planet they live on. Whether they would, after countless generations, form multiple nations on that planet is another story entirely but then the people there would most likely identify themselves as citizen of their home country.