Bas Lansdorp is no stranger to big ideas. Prior to Mars One, he co-founded Dutch energy start-up Ampyx. But Lansdorp’s current goal of putting humans on Mars makes the jump from big ideas to gargantuan ones.

What Lansdorp and the team at Mars One are proposing is a human landing on Mars using only current technology and private financing by 2023.

The catch? It’s a one-way trip. A one-way ticket lowers the cost and technical difficulty enough to make the ambitious time line possible, according to Lansdorp.

The plan would unfold in multiple stages, the first of which are designed to remotely establish a base camp. Human arrivals would begin with the 2023 mission, followed by two more settlers every two years thereafter.

Upon arriving, colonists keep themselves busy with the necessities of survival. Maintaining solar arrays, cultivating plants in special greenrooms, and servicing life-support systems are full-time jobs.

Additionally, the daily upkeep would double as an around-the-clock research project in biology, alternative energy, and space technology.

As for financing? Reality TV.

The idea is pretty ingenious, actually. A venture this audacious, this singular in the record of human history, could hardly fail to generate interest–and that’s what Lansdorp is counting on.

If everything goes according to plan, monetizing the TV rights would cover the initial investment and then some. The settlement is also designed to gradually become self-sufficient, meaning costs should decrease over time.

The potential media exposure could also help attract partners and affiliates.

After all, who wouldn’t want to say their company helped humanity traverse the heavens and descend upon Martian soil like conquering Olympian Gods? Charmin Ultra — proud sponsor of Interplanetary Colonization since 2023.

Laboratories of Government

But assuming the technical and financial hurdles are surpassed, one still has to wonder how a future network of Martian communities would be governed.

Settlers would not only need to adapt technologically, but also socially to create a society of any size or complexity.

Just as technologies like cars or planes would be completely useless as-is, so too would many forms of existing social technology — cultural and governmental institutions.

Groups like The Free Cities Institute and The Seasteading Institute are already working on creating more responsive, more adaptable models of governance using entrepreneurially-created law, governance, and community as the building blocks.

Common among these projects is not only the belief in implementing better sets of rules, but also placing governments in competition over citizens.

The theory is that by having a number of small political units — with residents and businesses free to relocate as they please — competitive pressure would force cities to adopt better and better legal and political practices as they compete to attract a mobile population.

Competition between political units already exists on some level. Multinational businesses and investors already migrate toward the most favorable legal and political environments, applying significant pressure on governments in the process.

Mobility for most people, especially the poor, is impeded by national immigration laws. Competitive governance seeks to give the same mobility enjoyed by multinationals and the wealthy to all members of society, thereby increasing government responsiveness across the board.

Perhaps some of these projects will produce concrete results for future generations, and perhaps the results would be useful if Mars One succeeds.

Rules for ‘Martians’

But more interesting is to wonder what types of governmental and cultural practices might develop independently on Mars — and how instructive they might be for rethinking our own institutions.

Given the current prohibitive cost of a two-way trip, Martian settlers would likely be safe from either corporate or colonial oppression.

Instead what comes to mind is Robert Heinlen’s classic novel about a future society on the Moon. Heinlen’s work depicts alternative legal, commercial, and even familial institutions emerging from humans adapting to an unforgiving environment.

Settlers in a Martian colony might be subject to very similar circumstances.

Destruction of either persons or property could easily end a fragile human settlement, so one could expect non-violent dispute resolution to be the norm.

And even if multiple settlements were to take hold on the planet, the extreme risk associated with violence would strongly deter inter-settlement war.

Social norms developing under these conditions might greatly curtail political violence out of the societal habits ‘locked-in’ during the earlier, formative period.

Of course, all of this assumes that Mars One is able to get its vision off the ground– figuratively and literally.

Either way, we’ll know within a decade if everything is going according to plan.

And while I wont hold my breath until 2023, I’ll definitely keep a hopeful eye on the project and maybe watch some reality TV while I wait.

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A guest article by Jeff Fong. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and writes about the intersection of politics, economics, and technology.