The Future: City-States and Corporate-Feudal Principalities? (Plus: a new map of the United States)

[JackRiddler]

I read the following article:

The Next Big Thing: Neomedievalism
The world is fragmenting, badly. Gird yourself for a new Dark Age.
BY PARAG KHANNA | APRIL 15, 2009


Many see the global economic crisis as proof that we live in one world. But as countries stumble to right the wrongs of the corporate masters of the universe, they are driving us right back to a future that looks like nothing more than a new Middle Ages, that centuries-long period of amorphous conflict from the fifth to the 15th century when city-states mattered as much as countries.

The state isn't a universally representative phenomenon today, if it ever was. Already, billions of people live in imperial conglomerates such as the European Union, the Greater Chinese Co-Prosperity Sphere, and the emerging North American Union, where state capitalism has become the norm. But at least half the United Nations’ membership, about 100 countries, can hardly be considered responsible sovereigns. Billions live unsure of who their true rulers are, whether local feudal lords or distant corporate executives. In Egypt and India, democratic elections have devolved into auctions. Delivering security and providing welfare aren't just campaign promises; they are the campaign. The fragmentation of societies from within is clear: From Bogotá to Bangalore, gated communities with private security are on the rise.

This diffuse, fractured world will be run more by cities and city-states than countries. Once, Venice and Bruges formed an axis that spurred commercial expansion across Eurasia. Today, just 40 city-regions account for two thirds of the world economy and 90 percent of its innovation. The mighty Hanseatic League, a constellation of well-armed North and Baltic Sea trading hubs in the late Middle Ages, will be reborn as cities such as Hamburg and Dubai form commercial alliances and operate "free zones" across Africa like the ones Dubai Ports World is building. Add in sovereign wealth funds and private military contractors, and you have the agile geopolitical units of a neomedieval world. Even during this global financial crisis, multinational corporations heavily populate the list of the world's largest economic entities; the commercial diplomacy of emerging-market firms such as China’s Haier and Mexico’s Cemex has already turned North-South relations inside out faster than the nonaligned movement ever did.

There are positive sides to a world where every man can be a nation unto himself. Postmodern Medicis such as Bill Gates, Anil Ambani, George Soros, and Richard Branson take it upon themselves to cure pandemics, run corporate cities, undermine authoritarian regimes, and sponsor climate-saving research. But the Middle Ages were fundamentally a time of fear, uncertainty, plagues, and violence. So, too, their successor. AIDS and SARS, terrorism and piracy, cyclones and rising sea levels -- it is no longer clear how to invest in the future, or what future to invest in. Figuring out how to respond to this new world will take decades at least. The next Renaissance is still a long way off.

(More at http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/04/15/the_next_big_thing_neomedievalism)

I can think of ways I object or would relativize that analysis, but that's not why I'm posting here.

Rather, it reminded me of the following fascinating page by a talented graphic artist:

http://fakeisthenewreal.org/statesmetros/

The fifty largest metro areas (in blue), disaggregated from their states (in orange). Each has been scaled and sorted according to population. The metro areas are US-Census defined CBSAs and MSAs.

In other words, the page divides the United States into 100 units, rather than the 50 states: the top 50 metro areas and then what's left of each state once the metros are subtracted. It displays these new units in order of population.

The method is not arbitrary, given that each of the metros has a center and its own largely distinct economy. Also, most states with large metros tend to have well-known contradictions and conflicts between the interests of the metro(s) and those of the rest of the state. (Quite aside from that there are also the class conflicts amplified by ringing metro centers with separately administered suburban enclaves, as we all know.)

The three most populous units by this method are metros, followed by four rump states. The 11 least populous units are rump states, most of these actually whole states without major metros. (That's 22 senators, right there.) Looking at these, you can figure out the states, but many of the metros are not readily recognizable and I wish the artist had made use of labels, and also added the populations for each.

I happen to live in the biggest unit by this method. It is carved out of three states and should be recognizable to readers of this thread:

[Bullet1987]

1. I think it's clear we're moving in the direction of less liberty and more control

The rise of gated communities and private security firms shows that the elite are fearful of public backlash.

[Speck Tater]

2. The article is from last year and holds up Dubai as a shining example of the future.

I'd say those predictions are already obsolete. The big shiny new cities like Dubai are NOT going to rule the world as the new feudal centers. It ain't going to happen that way. The big shiny cities are already crumbling.

[JackRiddler]

3. Come on please, read what I actually wrote.

As I said, I don't agree with the article, but it prompted me to remember the metro areas map.

The author may be wrong about Dubai, but he does represent a point of view that believes that the future lies in disaggregated feudal regions competing for the favor of international capital. Dubai may be dead, but this "dream" unfortunately lives on (and is already true in many parts of the world).

[Lydia Leftcoast]

4. You know, I'd LOVE to disengage Minneapolis-St. Paul from the rest of Minnesota

We might actually end up with sane government.

[JackRiddler]

5. A lot of people are thinking the same, but alas it's barely conceivable.