A man who created a tiny country he can no longer enter | Hacker News Reader

A man who created a tiny country he can no longer enter

bbc.com

198 pointsghosh151 comments

As someone who grew up and lived very close to that area I find this free-state territorial claim attempt deeply disturbing and here are some reasons for that.

Probably most important is psychological one since there was a war and violent clash between disputed sides in the 1990s and that land was claimed in very similar manner like this guy is attempting now. Coming there with such claims is very wrong and locals and authorities from both sides will be irritated by such attempts.

This guy's sad interpretation of current dispute situation would be something like: there is a free piece of land and everyone is invited to claim it. That is far away from reality. There is a dispute about that area but that doesn't mean that it doesn't belong to anyone and that it is not controlled. At the moment land part access is controlled by Croatian police and river access by both sides. Legally that land still belongs to Serbia and that comes from last legal border agreement between two sides which is constitution document of Yugoslavia dating from 1974. Borders between countries were defined back then very precisely but that document is subject of dispute from 1990s till now. Dispute and border changes were caused by war, politics and riverbed changes.

Both river and land were used for years by locals as a result of agreement between disputed sides in order enable local population to access that area without too much hassle by the border police.

Now, thanks to this idiot, locals are banned from using it any more. Besides collecting a lot of money for his agenda from similar people like him around the world, that is the only concrete result of his actions.

> Legally that land still belongs to Serbia and that comes from last legal border agreement between two sides which is constitution document of Yugoslavia dating from 1974.

That was my initial thought also. One side proposed a new border, and the other side didn't accept. That does not mean it's free land; that means that the status quo continues.

It seems to me the moral equivalent of offering $1 for a house, being rejected, then thereby claiming it's free for the taking...

The BBC article claims Croatia doesn't want the land because claiming it would validate Serbia's interpretation of the borders leaving Croatia with less land over all.

I can't find the relevance of years 1974 and 1990 in the wikipedia article[1]. The article describes a long-standing dispute last addressed in 1948. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croatia–Serbia_border_disput...

You are right about the long-standing dispute and arguments from both sides. I was referring to 1974 since that was the last time two countries agreed on document where borders were mentioned although in a very general way. That constitution was also foundation for succession rights and deeds of federal republics after declaring independence.

I mentioned 90s since that was the fist time international commission was involved in trying to help in determining the borders. But it was all in vain since one side states that border is determined by data based on cadastre and one is claiming that the river is the border. The riverbed changed during the years and that created fertile ground for political manipulations.

From what I know about this guy's project, he is more concerned about PR, going around taking money and talking at circlefriendly libertarian conferences than actually doing anything meaningful.

Last I heard him talk at one conference, he was talking about making a Liberland app, that's Uber, AirBnB and ebay in one app, using smart contracts on blockchain. And it somehow connects to Liberland.

So yep, I don't see this as a serious attempt.

Edit: here is the app, I have no idea what is it actually doing.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=cz.liberland.s...

Totally. If he were serious about his libertarian ideals he'd bear arms against the police and declare war between his state and his neighbours - or is he waiting for a pro bono pmc to do it for him, in true quasi-libertarian-but-actually-fascist style?

So you can only be serious about political ideas if you start shooting cops? Nonsense.

Why? One of the pillars of statehood is self defence. His political ideal is founding a state, not promulgating an ideology.

To be clear I'm not suggesting that he should, but if he wishes to found a libertarian state, that would be the correct step.

Can you think of any state that had a non-violent birth?

Brazil became independent without a war.

And the Indians just peacefully gave up their land.

Next falsehood?

That was Portugal, not Brazil.

But Brazil would not exist without that foundation of violence. Do you think that if the Portuguese hadn't invaded Brazil would still somehow exist?

And I'm sure Serbia and Croatia had their fair share of violence in the past, hence by your standard the new microstate already has that foundation.

No, the correct step is finding people to join his cause. Doing otherwise is being dumb, not serious.

And once people join his cause, then what? Serbia go "oh alright then"?

You can built a movement as much as you like but until it actually moves it's just a group of people doing nothing.

You can built a movement as much as you like but until it actually moves it's just a group of people doing nothing.

Yes, until they do something, they haven't done it. #lapalissade

Singapore?

Canada gained its independence without a war.

You can call out the native issue as in the case of Brazil, but then you doom any possible future state to a "violent birth" just by virtue of some cromagnon somewhere beating the last neanderthal to death to establish Homo Sapiens dominion on the planet.

And in any case, so what if every state so far has had a violent birth? Are we doomed forever to repeat the same paradigm?

The modern South Africa. Zambia. 17 African territories in 1960 were made independent without war.

To be fair, Canada's not _actually_ independent yet. The queen is still our head of state, but that probably lasts only until she actually tries to act like it.

She's the head of state, not the head of government. She doesn't have the power even theoretically to make any executive or legislative decisions. Aside from "representing" Canada in a very vague sense, the closest thing to real power that she or her representative (the governor general) has is to "decide" which party to ask to attempt to form a government after an election. This is basically always simply the part with the most seats, barring very rare exceptions.

Anyhow, tl; dr: Canada is most certainly independent, and gained its independence peacefully (although there were minor conflicts prior to that).

I still sort of liked it when a couple of French colleagues, who had moved to Francophone Quebec, eventually applied for citizenship, and took the oath... to Queen Elizabeth II.

This is woefully incorrect.

The Crown is the head of our State; all authority derives from our Sovereign.

http://www.parl.gc.ca/About/House/compendium/web-content/c_d...

He said she was the head of state. I don't know how this disproves the point that the queen has no legislative or executive powers in the Canadian government

The Sovereign may recall the Governor General, or request that their Governor General dissolve Parliament and call an election and the Governor General is compelled to comply.

Ultimately, all legislation requires Royal Assent, and all executive powers are granted by the authority of the Sovereign, who may revoke them at their will and so force an election.

Canada is a completely independent and sovereign state. The fact that the Queen of Canada and the Queen of the United Kingdom are the same person is incidental.

Would you say UK is not _actually_ independent because it's a constitutional monarchy? If not so, why would Canada be any different?

The Crown is the head of our State; all authority derives from our Sovereign.

http://www.parl.gc.ca/About/House/compendium/web-content/c_d...

Read the page you just sent me. I challenge you to find any mention of any country other than Canada.

Yes, Canada is a monarchy, yes, the Queen has the ultimate power in theory, but the head of state is the Queen of Canada, not the Queen of the UK.

I'll repeat myself, them being both the same person is incidental, if you think the fact Canada being a monarchy means it's not independent, does that also mean the UK is not?

I think you're being overly reductive. The Queen of Canada and the Queen of the UK, being the same person who wields Sovereign authority over both, cannot be independent of herself.

Many countries have had a non-violent birth, but generally, it takes a considerable will of actual people actually living there to achieve it.

For instance, the dissolution of personal union between Norway and Sweden, where Norway got independence in 1905.

Malaysia was rather glad to get rid of Singapore in 1965.

Much of the dissolution of the British Empire happened without actual violence in the independence, although there has been considerable violence in many of the places afterwards.

Even the independence of Baltic states and other Soviet republics in 1991 at the collapse of USSR came without real war; there was some violence but you can't really call it a violent birth.

You are talking about places which already had governments and had an orderly transition of power - not a new state being founded from nothing.

To say there was no violence in the Baltics is highly disingenuous - Latvia gained independence through bloodshed, lost it through bloodshed, gained it again through bloodshed, lost it through bloodshed, then finally glastnost - which was largely non-violent. I was quite literally at their independence memorial today in Riga.

Well, an orderly transition of power and a functional government are clearly a requirement for forming any new country, peacefully or violently. If you didn't set up a government, you've got no country because you have no way of managing anything.

As I said, with Baltics I was specifically referring to 1991 which was largely non-violent. Yes, not entirely without violence, but these modern countries were not forged by military power, they were forged by the will of the nation.

So, the war of independence was non-violent? Honestly, learn history beyond the last 25 years before you shoot your mouth off. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latvian_War_of_Independence

Would you please read my post and notice I was referring to the formation of the current Latvian independence, and events of 1991? Not the wars of 1918-1920 of which I am quite well aware, thank you. (I even have some distant family members who were fighting in the related, similar war in neighbouring Estonia at that time.)

Yet none of those would today exist as independent states if not for the earlier conflict - they would have been Russia.

Tell this to the US troops shooting British marines in 1812. Without shooting British "peacekeepers" the US could not get its independence.

What nonsense. The US came into being by the will of the people. There was no bloodshed.

Is that so? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_1812 Also tell that to Mexican people - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_frontier#The_Mexican....

and of course here there was no bloodshed at all https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Revolutionary_War

I suppose this thread exemplifies the problems with using sarcasm in textual discussions.

When sarcasm rubs up against incoherence, who can say where the border actually lies?

Way off to the right - in liberaland.

Facts and reason don't work, so sarcasm it is.

Declaring war on both Serbia and Croatia could make him hero for a moment. But after his assassination, this land will be reallocated anyway.

Sounds like simply an online marketplace taking place within the legal jurisdiction of Liberland, if that's possible. Craigslist combined with a more overt refusal to pay any taxes except those to Liberland.

> Combining the features of UBER, Fiver, Airbnb and eBay anybody can offer their service based on their GPS location or address free of charge anywhere in the world.

First time hearing that one.

For a recent (within the last 100 years) example of Terra Nullius, look at Svalbard and the Svalbard treaty. Any citizen of a signatory to the treaty is entitled to live there. In practice it's kind of hard to do, since there's not much economic activity up there and logistics/transport costs and energy costs makes everything very expensive. But theoretically an Afghan citizen could move to Svalbard freely.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svalbard_Treaty

also, no, it does not have any armored polar bears.

Aha, but are there witches?

You are really free to check it out. There is definitely coal and iron ore there.

There will be temporarily when I get the chance to vacation up there!

Fun fact: In Svalbard it's common to see people entering a (the?) bank wearing a balaclava and carrying a gun. Balaclava for the cold, and gun for the polar bears.

Shops, banks etc. have gun lockers just inside the door where you put your gun while shopping.

Just don't tell the polar bears; supermarkets are basically polar bear sardine tins then.

Please let this be real

"But theoretically an Afghan citizen could move to Svalbard freely."

This is the principle, but the local laws require visitors to be able to support themselves and not be burden to the society; if you are unable to do this you will be sent back to the mainland.

Jobs are very difficult to come by, and as 90% of the housing in Longyearbyen is corporately owned, finding a place to live without a job can be difficult. [1]

[1] - http://www.nord24.no/her-skal-ingen-fodes-eller-do-men-etter... (in Norwegian)

For a person from Thailand, Svalbard in winter must really be a "holy shit this is freezing, what the fuck am I doing here???" experience.

The bigger story here seems to be that Croatia is treating the territory of Liberland as its own. I wonder what that means for Balkan relations? Has Croatia now accepted the revised borders?

Edit: Actually Wikipedia says that Croatia's position is that the land belongs to either Serbia or themselves, to the exclusion of any third party. Link: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Croatia%E2%80%93Serbia_borde...

>The bigger story here seems to be that Croatia is treating the territory of Liberland as its own

That's not a big story at all. Ever since around early 2000s the deal between Croatian and Serbian governments was to treat it that way until the borded dispute was resolved.

Vit forgot to read up on a lot of stuff before going on this adventure.

> That's not a big story at all.

I should have looked at Wikipedia first :) Although I do find the arrangement quite odd - Egypt and Sudan don't have a similar arrangement?

Makes me think about Ladonia in southern Sweden. Painter built a tower by using wood lying around on the beach, and proclaimed the 1 km2 area the name of Ladonia. Local authorities see it as a crime due to the area being a nature reserve and had plans of taking it down, but at the same time they can't say no to the increasing amount of tourists.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladonia_(micronation)

The two stories are similar in that both founders seem mostly interested in getting publicity for themselves. Neither project is a real attempt to create a new state.

Came across Liberland about a year ago and filled a citizenship form on their site (https://liberland.org/) out of curiosity. I occasionally get their newsletter. Altogether i find this a an occasional and nice distraction from my work. Maybe this is how all countries came into existence.

Any country you can name came into existence when a collection of warlords established it by force. Ironically, you would expect libertarians to know this better than others.

No, some formed peacefully. Cities joined into commonwealths.

Merchant princes and warlords are kinda the same thing.

Shh, they haven't heard of Carthage, or the Serene Republic, and get tetchy thinking of weaponized grocers. (Although they are, they have press out the wazoo.)

The Vatican City came into existence because Mussolini, a warlord, specifically did not want to move against the pope, and the VC was born out of a sort of gentleman's agreement: you don't denounce me, and you get your own country.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vatican_City#Lateran_treaties

I think it's extremely unlikely that Vatican City would be independent except for the previous existence of the Papal States and the way that they were incorporated into Italy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner_in_the_Vatican

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Question

NZ came into existence relatively peacefully. It was not predominately created by force.

I am not sure when you consider New Zealand to have "come into existence", but wouldn't the Musket Wars and the New Zealand Wars contradict this?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musket_Wars

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Zealand_Wars

You know when it comes down to it, you're probably right that NZ was not an exception. Violence was inevitably going to be a part of its sovereignty

However, a couple things about those citations

1 - to the best of my knowledge the musket wars predominately were inter-tribal warfare b/w Maori. Basically Europeans gave them muskets and they turned them on each other.

2 - the NZ Wars actually occurred after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, which occurred in 1840, and is the same year when NZ was claimed as a sovereign country.

Power of the state comes from its ability to engage in coercion and hence generally it is true that you can't expect to have a country without someone at the top with power to beat up the citizens into submission.

But generally the warlords are powerful only to the extent the underlying nation is engaging in extensive co-operation and wealth creation out of their free will. Nations are truly created by those ordinary people.

I am reminded of a powerful Indian tyrant named Muhammad Bin Tughlaq. He for some reason decided to move his capital to a different geographical area. By moving he literally wanted to move everything including the people to this new geographical area. Not only he failed miserably his name Tughlaq is synonymous with "idiotic behaviour high on power".

"There is more to the transfer of capital than what is generally written. It is believed that Tughluq wanted to make Daulatabad an Islamic cultural centre, thereby helping him to have better control over the region, reducing the number of "Hindu" rebellions. His efforts to bring Ulema and Shaikhs from provincial towns and make them settle down in that city give a clue to his true intentions. The view of Muhammad Tughluq was that something like the above had to be done in the Deccan to strengthen the Muslim position in that area.

As regards its remote effects, the Deccan experiment of Muhammad Tughluq was a remarkable success. The boundaries which had separated the North from the South broke down. It is true that the extension of the administrative power of the Delhi Sultanate into the Deccan failed, but so far as the extension of the cultural institutions was concerned, it was successful."

> But in the mind of Vit Jedlicka, its first president, it's the fulfilment of the libertarian dream - a land with no compulsory taxes, no gun control, with Bitcoins as currency.

Too true: A country that sounds great on paper, but is really an infrastructure-free swamp that no-one actually wants to live in. It is indeed libertarianism at its finest!

It is, I encourage Libertarians & Anarchists to go live their dreams, you can live in a community or lack thereof that shares your values, and if you are unwilling to live in a community that shares the values you advocate and support, you should seriously rethink your values.

This is why I can't respect people like Peter Thiel, he would rather take all the benefits he can accrue from a society he so loathes, but he refuses to live in any of the Libertarian communities that exist. What kind of person can't even stand up for their core beliefs? An unrespectable pile in my experience.

I know I will get downvoted for this comment, and I encourage you to respond.

I'm no fan of Peter Thiel's politics, but where are these libertarian communities you speak of [1]? I can't think of any libertarian government that currently has power any where.

[1] I'm excluding anarchist communities.

Maybe someone should spread the rumor that Liberia is the ultimate Libertarian paradise (I mean, it's in the name and the flag looks similar enough to the US).

Indeed there are none. If there were, I'd gladly move there.

One of the biggest challenges that arises when the concept of true libertarian societies comes up is how the democratic governments of the world would respond. I think they'd be overly envious and embargo the libertarian societies. Of course, the democracies would try to justify this by arguing that, 'If you want to isolate yourself from us, then don't even bother trading with us'. However, this argument totally misses the point; secession and libertarianism don't advocate for protectionism, only free trade.

Nonetheless, I suspect there'll be a wave of secessionist movements that will take over the world in the 21st century. This is the only hope (or is it Hoppe) that anarcho-capitalism has.

Thats why I think an association of corporations with huge trading power will be the first one to successfully pull this off.

Yes,that would work but only if the 'Liberlands' aren't set up as tax havens. Doing this would only antagonize the democracies.

Governments see tax heaven everywhere. In the governments eye, they dont tax you 40% - they let you keep 60%. So any drop in tax revenue would certainly antagonize them.

Thats why I said the trading power is neccessery for governments to stomach the harsh reality : They get power from the commerce not the other way around.

What the? Democratic nations aren't jealous teenagers. If they envy your living standards, they try to trade with you, not embargo you. Unless there's a lot of human rights violations going on (eg north korea, apartheid-era south africa), democratic nations are up for trade.

The libertarian echo chamber produces some truly bizarre ideas.

Go see the history of all recent attempts in creating new countries, including guys willing to build islands from scratch... all of them ended badly, even bombings happened.

Thank you. That's exactly my point. If no envy exists, why stop someone from creating soverign territories. It is no wonder Keynes said, 'In the end we're all dead'. He might as well have added, '...so long as it is all of us'

How about using the definition of 'envy' that is the one English-speaking people used? 'Envy' does not mean 'desire to maintain power'.

Significantly redefining a word is one of the worst aspects of libertarianism (eg, the redefinition of "violence"), and it's done intentionally in order to confuse the issue and put other people offside.

How is this 'envy'? The UK hasn't stomped on Sealand, and isn't envious of it.

How about giving some examples of these supposedly envied places, rather than just leave it to the imagination?

By using the word 'teenager' in your reponse, you're simply employing an argumentation tactic referred to as reductio ad absurdum. This can only mean one of two things; you're either too emotional about the subject at hand or you're underestimating the role of envy in the formation of societies. I'll only address the reason that matters, which is the latter.

I'll refer you to an excerpt from 'Envy a theory of social behavior'.

'envy has played a large part in forming human society, and that, secondly, the role of envy often remains hidden'

Also

'socialism and democracy were put forward as ideas by members of society who were not able "to deal with their own envy"'

In the US, you are pathetic if you just leave rather than fight for your values. There is a point in having free speech and elected representatives.

Then get out in the streets and protest and organize a movement. This isn't rocket science, if Trump, Obama, Bernie, MLK, etc can do it, Peter Thiel can sure do it. Kicking back in your armchair and doing jack isn't a plan, it is defeat.

He sponsored a politician who he believes (rightly or not) that can move things his way, and pressumably other efforts.

Not everything is about protesting in the streets. Besides, protest against what? Tons of people that want to live in a different way that what you suggest? The only real way would be to convince them...

>This is why I can't respect people like Peter Thiel, he would rather take all the benefits he can accrue from a society he so loathes, but he refuses to live in any of the Libertarian communities that exist. What kind of person can't even stand up for their core beliefs?

A pragmatic, as opposed to batshit-crazy, person?

Standing up for what you believe the country/society in general should be run is not the same as creating some bizarro micro-community that is not an actual country and living there...

The same reason why people e.g. against racism don't go live on made-up non-racism communities, but try to make the community they live in less/no racist.

First of all, you're right about trying to correct the wrongs in the society you live in - as Thiel had done.

I do however disagree that creating new sovereign territories is bizarre and unwarranted. Thiel himself has partnered with Milton Friedman's grandson to establish the sea steading institute which is very commendable.

There is a real danger of the whole world turning socialist and communist before the inevitable collapse on it's own weight. Where would you run to if government turned against you? Where would you run if you were Snowden? If you look at the EU and UN, these are just signs of what's to come; one wolrd government that eventually collapses due to inherent inefficiencies.

I for one am really glad Brexit happened. More territories need to follow the same route.

To answer your question, Libertarians are self-interested people [1]. They would only move to a location that increase their purchasing power.

Frankly I dont want a Libertarian US but 3189 micro countries each experimenting with different mixture of laws. May the best win. Everyone know big corporations are to be avoided but they fail to extend the argument to mega-states.

[1] Like everyone else. Libertarians are just honest enough to admit it.

> you can live in a community or lack thereof that shares your values

The thing is, as a Libertarian you literally can't.

One principal idea is to live without coercion, but as long as you're part of a tax collecting state, you are to "share" part of the fruits of your labor with authorities you do not recognize or else...

Secondly, the rights and laws (such as really free speech or free contracts) are overridden (e.g., by hate speech, minimum salary, anti-discrimination laws, ...), so there is no way you can meaningfully establish a libertarian society within a current nation state.

Finally, there are other (possibly quasi-) monopolies (such as monopoly on violence, Taxi licenses ~ anti-Uber, Hotel Services ~ anti-AirBnB) that you cannot get rid of unless you get rid of the controlling entity.

Note the difference to e.g. communist societies where you can just start sharing everything (much like you might already be doing within your family).

The monopoly on violence doesn't go away in libertarian-land, they just try to hide it. How to solve disputes? Courts. And if you don't submit to the court's will? Um... oh yeah, we need state "violence" after all, same as the democracies we mock.

Yes and no. Yes we need courts and no, we can choose them (unlike now). Same for enforcement.

Violence yes, monopoly no.

Re: choosing courts.

Depends on the jurisdiction, doesn't it? In some jurisdictions, judges are elected. In others they're appointed by representatives who are elected. At least I believe those are the common cases in democracies. (And there's another couple of assumptions.) Or am I misunderstanding? Wouldn't be the first time.

Yes and no:)

Currently and generally a single jurisdiction doesn't allow for competing courts.

In libertarian land everyone has (or is?) his own "jurisdiction" for his private property (and there is no public property). All other courts are defined in contracts.

Note the latter is the generalization of the former where entering other people's property entails an implicit agreement to the owner's terms (and jurisdiction if you will.)

So everyone can define his own abortion/marihuana/uber free zone at will and/or just rule out the public completely.

Often there is a misunderstanding that this entails a "free for all" but municipalities in today's sense would still exist and have their own laws / courts and the streets there would probably belong to a company consisting of a number of the municipality's inhabitants.

This doesn't mean that there is only one such company, so you can "choose your court" by walking the streets of company A and avoiding the streets of company B. Or you dislike them both and just move to some other town a few kms away.

Thanks for the clarification. I appreciate it.

I have a disagreement with my neighbor, I'm taking him to court. The court of me, overseen by me, the court finds in my favor. Now I appoint myself to enforcement, with my deputies Smith and Wesson.

Letting people choose their own court is a terrible idea. It's basically binding arbitration for the masses.

Many flavors of libertarian agree that in order for any court's decision to be binding, all parties to the dispute have to agree to grant it jurisdiction.

This, like most parts of Libertopia, is completely dependent on a robust reputation system. Otherwise, you wouldn't be able to determine whether the proposed court is likely to be fair and impartial for your specific case.

If you can't find a single judge that you can both agree on, you basically become Hatfields and McCoys, and then the rest of the county pulls their own guns, and decides which gang gets to be out in public on which days of the week.

In a government court, jurisdiction is just assumed. In Libertopia courts, you can never skip that step. You also can't skip the part where the litigants post cash bonds to the court, to pay the judge and jury, and guarantee some of the judgment award.

Filing suit as plaintiff in your own court seems like a slam-dunk until you realize that no defendant with an IQ higher than broccoli would ever be insane enough to grant you jurisdiction to hear your own case against them. And they definitely wouldn't pay you to do that.

My neighbor claims that my fence is over the property line, so he is taking me to court.

Turns out there are no courts that I feel are acceptable for resolving this dispute.

Having total freedom to do anything you want only works until other people exist.

There is always karma. At some point you will have a hard time leaving your property and people will avoid entering yours. That's when you dearly pay for everything bad you did.

And of course, there's also violence, just as today.

Once you are depending on karmic justice to enforce your laws you no longer have laws.

You don't depend on it and it is illegal. Just like today.

The original idea is to limit power. Now if you require an enforcer that is stronger than every entity in the system, the enforcer becomes part of the system. Then you need another enforcer that enforces stuff on the original one, ad infinitum. So you cannot ultimately enforce everything, not so today and not so in libertopia.

There are still solutions / mitigation mechanisms to this, and I'll just sketch a few:

- Embargos - fully legal, you just stop trading with the bad guy and revoke access to your property. The more people do it, the more expensive his life becomes. If the embargo is respected by enough people in the municipality, he'll lead an expensive, lone life with little to no access to food, health care, energy ... Note this is a current mechanism in international politics where there is no ultimate enforcer.

- Karmic violence - fully illegal, yet it was practiced throughout history to deal with perceived injustices, starting with killing Cesar, the plots to kill Hitler until today's violence between gangs. Each instance represents a failure of the enforcement system, still it is very common. Note this is equivalent to war in international politics.

- Coalitions: Groups of people embargoing or enacting karmic violence against a specified individual. Note this is again very common in international politics.

So the solution is to form a government to punish the person who is acting badly.

'Finding a court you both agree on' sounds like a system designed by someone with no experience in law.

You designate them upfront.

Just trade with someone else if you don't like that guy's court.

There'd most probably be an app for that ;)

But what if the app author doesn't agree with your court choices?

Then you use another app that you think is better or just develop one yourself.

Jandrese's original comment was about a disagreement with a neighbour, not a trade issue. Are you supposed to pick up and move if you don't like your neighbour's court?

Most things that hit the courts are not trade issues, for that matter.

> Are you supposed to pick up and move if you don't like your neighbour's court

No you aren't. Maybe you check this guy's reputation or you make a contract before you buy a property close to him. Good neighborhood contracts (I don't recall the name right now) are common international politics, see the original article. If the guy's a reasonable person, he'll want to resolve it as well. If he's a villain, you'll have supporters throughout your community because you won't be his first victim. Start your embargo if you want.

> Most things that hit the courts are not trade issues, for that matter.

They aren't today because municipality / state laws act like additional clauses to your contract even if they are not mentioned in the contract. But if you make this stuff explicit, many things become contract (not trade) issues.

There's btw no reason not to have a property that has exactly the same laws as the US today and allow people to enter it unless they disrespect the laws. The current system can live within a libertarian land, but not the other way round. Libertarian land is the more general one.

Maybe the asshole moves in next to you and recognizes none of your courts.

This solution is insane and will never work in real life.

Most likely, you would have to deposit a cash bond with a reasonably reputable court system advertising jurisdiction over civil disputes under some commonly published standard, and you would have to explicitly agree to grant them automatic jurisdiction over claims not exceeding a threshold amount, before anyone would put any of their own money at risk to deal with you.

You would have a hard time getting a job or obtaining credit without some demonstration that you can be responsible and individually accountable for your actions.

If your neighbor won't go to court, you have to weigh the consequences of possibly violent escalation. There is no cure for bad neighbors, with or without government-run courts.

I have heard of stories of people who move deep into the woods, disappearing from standard society, and actually successfully manage to live completely off the land. So, technically, this would certainly be possible.

Few people are willing to do pursue things on this level however. When more than one person gets involved, politics can easily enter the equation.

Personally, I find the libertarian philosophy a bit naive for that reason. The natural state of humanity is tribal in nature. "No rules" is a bit of a fantasy; eventually, some foundation will have to be established. Inevitably, people will disagree on this foundation.

Technical achievements aside (the blockchain will live on), Bitcoin actually is a great example of how something with somewhat idealistic libertarian underpinnings ended up turning into the usual tribal politics in the end.

Moving into the woods is certainly a way but libertarians are big fans of the market and a far away single man show is not a market, so there is no division of labor and consequently no prosperity (relative to what is possible).

Well, all libertarianism is based on ownership and contract law (plus some other stuff like homesteading as initial means to acquire ownership). So rules there are, they are just not forced unto someone.

Consider the opposite - maybe you are in favor of Uber or abortion or against taxation. Yet somehow your state assumes that you implicitly agree to everything the state mandates, such as laws and sharing the fruits of your labor.

You can think of Libertarianism as a way to have many many states instead of just a single one the size of the US. In this way, you can choose with your feet what rules you accept because you have a choice. And you have this choice without travelling thousands of miles and leaving your family, friends and job behind.

You can avoid Donald and Hillary by moving a few miles, you can avoid paying taxes or your personal nemesis law (like abortion) because you have a market of possible states (I'm simplifying here) and not just a single one.

Bitcoin is indeed a great example of Libertarianism (or rather the market) because if the BTC guys don't adapt to what people need, another crypto-currency will eventually take over. You now have a market of semi-anonymous currencies and that's not the problem but the solution to BTC's tribal politics.

There are many visions of "libertarian", and I do think that the decentralized version is more realistic than the anarcho-capitalist one. :)

The main problem I see with this vision is that, in order to achieve it, I feel that a large portion of humans would need to develop the ability to respectfully disagree with personal opinion differences, without resorting to conflict. This actually is difficult as it does not seem to be default human nature. Even Bitcoin showed this -- DDOS were reportedly used as a "weapon" against some of the forks.

I do agree that, whenever possible, it is a good idea to have some degree of state / municipal / etc. flexibility such that one can experiment with what works and what doesn't.

> I feel that a large portion of humans would need to develop the ability to respectfully disagree with personal opinion differences, without resorting to conflict.

If we could do this, we wouldn't need libertarianism, or any other kind of -ism.

This is so crazy. Just out of curiosity, is there a list of places around the world which are claim-able yet still unclaimed?

I think this Wikipedia article covers most of that situation in a quick-to-read format:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_nullius

There are some other articles out there describing these areas, but I can't recall where to find them.

The only other place, that is actually colonizable is Bir Tawil, but the land there is so terrible, but so terrible, that noone actually made a serious attempt (a bunch of people made bogus claims, for example one guy proclaimed himself king, just so his daughter could be a princess).

Even for desert standards, Bir Tawil is desolate, and it has no decent natural resources, so literally noone wants it.

The reason Bir Tawil is unwanted is more subtle: claiming it would discredit a claim made to the more desirable neighbouring region: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hala%27ib_Triangle

I am talking about people like the guy in the article... not the countries that created the situation.

I see, I did misinterpret your point somewhat. The situation is still relevant to individual would be claimants, though. Even though Egypt and Sudan don't want to claim the region I don't think they're too keen on random third parties staking a claim either. You'd be surrounded unfriendly governments.

Forgive me for only doing basic research into this, but couldn't one set up some solar panels for electricity, dig some shelter, and recover water from the atmosphere? Wouldn't that do a decent job of allowing at least some degree of livability there?

I think it's technically possible, but it would be expensive, and then what do you have? A hole in the dirt, powered by solar panels you have to maintain forever so you don't die of hunger and thirst.

No, you wouldn't get a meaningful amount of water from the air (I think it is safe to assume the air is quite dry there). And you'd still need food, at least.

The amount you would need to reclaim is related to the efficiency at which you recycle the water you have. You would need to invent a real-life culture like the Fremen of Arrakis.

Of course, if you got efficient enough, you could simply buy water to be airdropped into a catch pond. Then you drain the pond and pipe the water into your recycling system. It would likely be cheaper than trying to dehumidify desert air.

There no permanent settlements, but people do use the land, e.g. nomads pass through. Presumably, they'd notice if someone tried to wall it off.

I've been following this for a while now - I actually met this guy in a pub a few years ago, a friendly chap. While I don't subscribe to his ideology, I do wish him luck. As long as they are not harming anyone, I encourage people to push the limits of all sorts of established ideas, including big things like starting a country.

I'm still not sure - and nobody is I guess - if it's sincere, a PR stunt, or a scam, I guess it will take a while longer for us to find out. In the meantime, let's hope it's resolved in a friendly and peaceful manner and all the best to his new family (both literally and figuratively).

They forgot the most important part, without which a country can't be created: the army that protects the borders

Lichtenstain, the Vatican and San Marino disagree. Unless you count in fervent catholic bodies as an army

You forget the Vatican Swiss Guard.

San Marino has a military.

Lichtenstein and the Vatican have contracts with other nations, effectively "renting" their protection.

You don't need a standing army, but having military protection of some kind is vital to maintaining your sovereignty.

All that aside, the only real way to have a nation is to have other nations acknowledge its existence. Good luck claiming sovereignty when not a single member of the UN is willing to say you exist.

> the only real way to have a nation is to have other nations acknowledge its existence

I always think of Taiwan / Republic of China.

While most countries don't officially acknowledge it (and, slightly amusingly, Taiwan doesn't officially acknowledge communist China), it is without a doubt its own country with its own military and democratic government, etc.

But yeah the only reason is that there is water between China and Taiwan and China never bothered to attack.

The onky reason Taiwan is there is that it has US support for it's existence.

Somaliland keeps trying.

Costa Rica permanently abolished its army in 1949. OK, they probably had one when the country was created, but they seem to do well these days without one.

You might want to do a little fact checking before making bogus statements: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_without_arme...

Right? They don't necessarily need their own army, but they need some military might with vested interest (whether through treaties or outright monetary payments or culture or whatever) in their sovereignty.

I've been thinking about it lately with regard to Trump's talk of isolationism and withdrawal from NATO and whatnot. There are predictions that Russia will annex more Eastern European states, but at some level if the state can't protect itself what business does it have being considered one? That's kind of the only real obligation or definition of the state.

Those countries are currently protected by the US, so they are currently filling that obligation, but I'm not sure I see why it's in my interest as an American to enforce this arbitrary political line. We don't have much cultural history or overlap with them. It seems in their and the rest of Europe's best interest to band together through treaties to protect themselves.

I know this comes across as "might makes right", which I don't agree with at the local level, but at the sovereign level I'm beginning to think that's all that matters.

I for one don't see a point in these micro countries - they are philosophically inconsistent, nothing more than a make believe game for adults. What if I came to said Liberland and claimed one of the corners of the island for myself?

> a land with no compulsory taxes, no gun control, with Bitcoins as currency.

There's a name for this: "wildlife". Humanity knows it very well. We escaped it as soon as possible.

This is really interesting and reminds me of legal grounds for Lacota Republic in the middle of the US. Lacotas insist that white people did not fulfilled the contract that was with their forefathers, so Lacota current lands use legislation framework is void. However, Lacotas do not have enough nukes to enforce the consequences of white people misbehaviour, so the illegal use of their lands by the self-proclaimed "The United States" continues.

This guy very much reminds me of Dave from the Republic of Dave in Fallout 3. A little quarky but he thinks he can do it. It's interesting to see if he can do this as it would set an interesting geopolitical precedent for the area.

Just applied for the citizen application form :)

http://liberland.org/en/request/

Let us not forget Ziqistan!

http://www.zaqart.com/zaqistan/zaqistan.shtml

"he can build a temporary settlement on houseboats on the Danube"

Reminds me of the movie "Crna Macka, Beli Macor (Black Cat, White Cat)"

Obviously its not a real state because it doesn't have a `Monopoly on violence`.

Obviously, and non ironically, yes. Seeing that what makes a state a state, is the ability to keep others who want to run it/claim it for themselves, outside which takes (among other things) violence.

Yeah! Basically these days you need a nuke and to demonstrate that you are ready to use it.

Not necessarily a nuke, but you need an army or friends with armies otherwise someone else is going to march their army in and take your land.

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