Semi Autonomous Zones

The concept of a semi autonomous zone is inspired by existing gated, restricted communities and homeowner’s associations

The idea is this: maintain the rule of law in respect to the rights and privileges outlined in the US constitution and the principles of universal rights of sentient beings, while maximizing individual freedom.

We start with laying the foundation of a SAZ. These are: contract law, and the constitutional limitations on government and law enforcement

And then there is the actual physical foundation of an SAZ: a privately owned chunk of land, preferably in an urban area. Needed will be an existing structure, or the funds to erect one, preferably a high-rise apartment building. This building will have a few twists though…

The building will be designed in a community cohesion oriented manner [details] with many common areas. The building will have some special features – the entire structure will be soundproofed and have some degree of electromagnetic shielding integral to the design. All private and public areas will be serviced by a network, at the least a gigabit Ethernet setup. Electricity, water, bandwidth etc. would be bought in bulk; utilities would be flat rate within reasonable usage limits.

All public areas will be under video and certain areas audio surveillance 24 hours a day. Any resident can access all public area surveillance feeds at will. Access to the building will be restricted to residents and guests, who will have to show photo ID to gain admittance. The property would be protected by 360 degree video surveillance, and large no trespassing signs would be erected. In particular, any members of law enforcement agencies, on duty or off, would be prohibited from entering the premises without a search warrant. A building wide alarm system would be installed – the entrance of law enforcement would trigger the alarm, and the door guards would first verify the warrant with the court before allowing the police past the lobby, giving all residents at least a 1 minute heads-up.

In every private room there would be inactive video and audio surveillance; this would be activated in the event of an emergency by a key chain ‘panic button’ device. Of course being that these SAZ’s are expected to be pioneered by transhumanists, likely the building would contain features such as rooftop solar panels and such.

Access to community resources and private residences would be through biometric means. The network would keep no logs, and all traffic would be behind a NAT firewall; anonymizing services would be standard.

There’s more I could say about possible features of the physical layer, so to speak, but I’ll leave that up to you :)

The crux of the SAZ concept is contract law. Each resident signs a contract obliging them to observe the local laws of the SAZ. The basic laws will be simple human rights and basic do-not-hurt-others laws. Anything else will be up to the founders of each SAZ.

The setup I envision as being ‘optimal’ is this. The central contract states that the basic rights and laws exist within said SAZ. Additionally, a governmental structure would be specified. It would include a statement of the goals, values, and general mission of the SAZ. There would exist a democratic government that would handle minor disputes, form volunteer committees to carry out functions, and create new laws. The power of this government would be limited by the ‘constitution’ i.e. central contract. These would be explicit limits as well as ‘checks and balances’ modeled after the us constitution. This government would be able to collect taxes, limited to say 2% of income. This would be used for all sorts of things, which would have to be approved by the citizens. In addition there would be the internal contract law, in which individuals would be able to enter into contracts with others, which could be linked to the central contract. In essence, a breach of a SAZ internal voluntary contract would be a breach of the central contract, with defined penalties for such action, up to and including expulsion from the community.

The whole point of this is simple: by eliminating outside intrusion and observance, and providing anonymity, the laws of the government are effectively void.

Certain laws, such as those against murder, will be followed and enforced. All victimless crimes are a ok. Do whatever you want. If you inform on another resident, you’re out.

Now we’ve eliminated the problem of overbearing, rights-violating government social laws. And we’ve done it by clever use of the very legal system the government relies on.

To get the government out of our economic lives, residents will be encouraged to share resources, buy and sell from each other, etc. The real magic comes when there are more than one SAZ out there. By relying on untraceable cash transactions and barter system style ‘payments’, and creating wholly private ‘banks’ and other such institutions, a parallel, minimally regulated, untaxable economy can be created.

As SAZ’s spring up all over the place, the government will be in a tough position. Either it accepts the new way, and willingly shrinks to a fraction of its former size and ubiquity, or it becomes a draconian police state. The second will not happen; it is political suicide.

If this all sounds very libertarian, it is. But I do not advocate eliminating govt. Those that wish to live under its oppressive ways have the right to do so. Gov. services like the military, public works, emergency services, some social welfare, universal education, etc etc. are necessary. I don’t advocate changing anything, except for one thing: you can opt out.

2003 J. Standley