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

[Kryten]

It hasn't been very long (several hundred years) since sovereign states didn't even exist - people were loyal to an individual. Several hundred years from now "nations" may be as irrelevant to politics as royal titles are to politics today.

As a British person, I must note to my regret that this is probably true, just in the opposite form from what you clearly meant.

[Kibble]

As a British person, I must note to my regret that this is probably true, just in the opposite form from what you clearly meant.

Your British? *looks two inches to the left* Yorkshire, huh.

Honestly, I have no idea how important royal titles are to politics - that was more of a thought experiment than trying to make a point! They certainly are less important today than they were seven hundred years ago though.

[AngelLestat]

@AngelLestat:

People in the 1950s were predicting a global Utopia by the year 2000. Human nature always stands in the way of pipe dreams like this.

My point is that your "efficiency" is very "big picture" view. In terms of producing resources, individual nation states and devolved powers aren't the best way to go. In terms of people making life better for themselves and their immediate family and neighbours, some form of devolved decision making is almost always going to be more popular. Martian colonists aren't going to like being told what to do in order to make money for someone else any more than we are.

I doubt they'll go to war over it, as the costs would be too high, but civil disobedience and withdrawal of labour are completely realistic possibilities unless they're given a say in how their lives are run. That's generally a road that leads to something resembling an independent nation.

Aghh, I dont like this topic because I will need to write a lot to explain with detail.

First try to not change my words, I am not mention any utopia here... in fact as I said.. I dont believe in utopias. There is not such thing as a perfect system or idea, the world is always changing and if the system does not change (evolve) with it, dies.

The things that I am talking about are not dreams. As I said you will find many evidences that these steps are already being taken more often each day.

Also the globalization path where all is connected/related with all will lead us to that, there is not other possible prediction to the globalization effect.

Nibb31 already mention the Outer Space Treaty, which is only a small part of the evidence why I think this way.. The second part is how the world works today.. Country --> Colonization is part of our past, it can not happen today. Also by many reasons that I explain in my previous post.

One thing that I am not sure is how it will be organize.. this new group of people working and living in an alien world.

How it will be the politic structure. Not sure.. But it will be very different from what we're used.

[MrZayas1]

Well considering that planetary bases on other celestial bodies are called human "colonies" a colonial system is in order (I believe) whether it's part of our past or not. Maybe not such a strict uniform set of policies but one nonetheless. There really is no way for one on Earth to govern one on another planetary body, especially with today's technology, maybe in the future with warp drive, but it just isn't feasible. Any way of communicating may be viable, even on Mars, but if someone committed another crime on another planet or moon, how would they be punished by the government? It's not possible atm, travel to Mars takes 3 months fastest, and to the moon 3 days. And it costs a lot of money to get there. The prospect of "colonies" in space is heavily flawed at the moment.

Perhaps one form of familial punishment could be arranged. If a crime is committed in outer space by an astronaut/cosmonaut, his or her family is punished. This is still loose however. The consequences of actions outside of Earth are minimal. As such I believe that any "colony" on another body is in and of itself an independent government. Organized or not. The decisions that the astronauts/cosmonauts make are their own entirely, completely out of Earth's jurisdiction. Now whether they are "governed" or not is their own decision. An oligarchy would be probable based upon their training, but again, there is no governing in space right now, even based on the Space Treaty. That's my input

[ChrisSpace]

Baseless speculation. Predicting borders, names, and flags at this stage is ridiculous. The geopolitical landscape and balance will be as different in 200 years as it was 200 years ago. There is no way you can predict how political structures will work that far in the future.

All the borders and flags were completely made up, just to show an example of what I am saying.

[Windspren]

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]

Storing data in the Cloud