Denis Bider reflects upon the founding of the United States 200 years ago as an "experimentation with systems of government".
He blogs about the dilemma of the founding fathers:
You know that there must be some good system of government, but you don't know what it is. So what do you do?
And answers:
You do the reasonable thing: create competiton. Instead of creating one country and enshrining a certain system into law, you create dozens of separate states; you say little about the organization of their internal governments; but you pit them to compete against each other to attract citizens.
That was 200 hundred years ago. Perhaps, it is time for another experiment?
Citizenship brings certain privileges and government provided services to people in defined geographic area.
But people are now beginning to relocate outside their country of birth for extended periods, if not permanently. Also restrictions on foreign nationals acquiring property are reducing the world over.
Then why should citizenship (or nationality) be closely based on a geographical territory?
Rather it should be more like membership to a club, that comes at a price and provides services to its members.
The Citizenship Provider would negotiate with large territory owners (nations, which may themselves be citizenship providers through their state) for residency rights for its members.
In time a market for citizenship, much like for insurance or credit cards should develop.
And the territory owners would have interest in developing their property in the hope of attracting more residents and charging appropriate rents.
Would it be too difficult to make this market work? If not, we have an alternative to expensive elections and the consequences of living with other people's choices.
