The solution I've been thinking of is competitive governance: Allow total freedom for new systems of governance wherever land owners opt in to it. Then, people vote with their feet.
Founders can raise money with a vision for their own ideal society. If they can offer an attractive set of laws and regulations that citizens like, from tax policy, social safety nets, education, policing, etc., then they can grow as more move in or more land owners opt-in to those rules.
This is actually how businesses work. The crucial part is not the corporate governance structure of shareholders and a board of directors IMO. It's that 1. businesses have wide leeway to govern as they please and 2. customers opt-in to paying the business and employees opt-in to working there. If a business stops being effective, customers and employees can switch to a competitor.
The freedom to create and the freedom to opt in are important features of many successful mechanisms. E.g. This is how Manifold Markets works. Anyone can create any question, and you opt-in to bet on it. If someone resolves a question in a way you disagree with, then you just stop betting in their markets. Vote with your feet.
Markets are the ultimate opt-in mechanism: you and another party mutually agree to a transaction. It works because mutual agreement is positive-sum, otherwise at least one side would decline the exchange.
Utilitarians most of all should approve these positive-sum exchanges. The world could do worse than apply this mechanism everywhere. And the one place it's very obviously missing is in governance!
The solution I've been thinking of is competitive governance: Allow total freedom for new systems of governance wherever land owners opt in to it. Then, people vote with their feet.
Founders can raise money with a vision for their own ideal society. If they can offer an attractive set of laws and regulations that citizens like, from tax policy, social safety nets, education, policing, etc., then they can grow as more move in or more land owners opt-in to those rules.
This is actually how businesses work. The crucial part is not the corporate governance structure of shareholders and a board of directors IMO. It's that 1. businesses have wide leeway to govern as they please and 2. customers opt-in to paying the business and employees opt-in to working there. If a business stops being effective, customers and employees can switch to a competitor.
The freedom to create and the freedom to opt in are important features of many successful mechanisms. E.g. This is how Manifold Markets works. Anyone can create any question, and you opt-in to bet on it. If someone resolves a question in a way you disagree with, then you just stop betting in their markets. Vote with your feet.
Markets are the ultimate opt-in mechanism: you and another party mutually agree to a transaction. It works because mutual agreement is positive-sum, otherwise at least one side would decline the exchange.
Utilitarians most of all should approve these positive-sum exchanges. The world could do worse than apply this mechanism everywhere. And the one place it's very obviously missing is in governance!