Michael Strong Talk: Free Zones And The Cambrian Explosion In Government

Michael Strong’s talk at Seasteading 2009 is now online:

He talks about his personal history, which should resonate with many of you:

“One of the things that bothered me as I became sold on more or less libertarian arguments is that the libertarians wanted to use the public choice mechanism to achieve libertarian ends. The problem with being converted to libertarianism in part through public choice theory is that if it’s impossible for left-liberals to get their way, why on earth should it be possible for libertarians to get their way by means of public choice?”

And then discusses free zones, as he’s written about earlier, as the best strategy he’s seen to get support for economic freedom and legal experimentation. He points out that free zones can operate according to different legal systems, including new legal systems (as is done in Dubai), which provides the competition in rules that we all want to see. In decades, this can lead to the atrophy of the nation state system and the achievement of our Nozickian Utopia of Utopias.