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Everyone's excited about rockets to Mars, and each SpaceX launch brings that dream closer to reality. Musk and others are putting a lot of money and brainpower on the technical problem of getting people to Mars. Less sensational topics, such as surviving on Mars, receive less attention — but plenty of money and serious thought, because there's no way to get around them.
But there's another important question which isn't getting much attention:
Who will own Mars, and how will it be governed?
Does Mars belong to the people who get there first? To the highest bidder? To all the people of Earth?
Does Mars belong to Earth, or does Mars belong to Mars? Does it belong to the Sun? To the Martian microbiome, if there is one? (What are the indigenous rights of microbes, I wonder?)
Who will be in charge of Mars once the colonists arrive? If Mars turns out to have valuable resources, who gets them? And if a Mars colony is to govern itself, what kind of government would it have?
The Mars colonization project is driven by the ultra rich. And those who want to stake their claim on Mars may rather the rest of us didn't think too much about the little problem of who owns the planet next door, and why.
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Friday March 31 2017, @07:07PM (1 child)
Initially, the companies that send people there. Whatever international treaties say, it will be companies, because modern governments are incapable of thinking past the next election cycle. But that doesn't matter in the long term.
Why? Because long-term, Mars is too far away for Earth to impose anything Mars doesn't want. Once any colonies are capable of producing whatever they need locally, the game will be up, and they will be functionally independent.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 31 2017, @08:12PM
The next election cycle is still longer than the next quarterly earnings update.