Seasteading

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Seasteading is the concept of homesteading the sea. Historically, many cultures have supported ocean-based lifestyles as a libertarian response to the loss of basic freedoms ashore. Seasteads have been based on various types of sailing craft; in the last century most functional seasteads have been modified cruising vessels. Author and cruising sailor Jerome FitzGerald has advocated an ecological libertarian vision utilizing non-auxiliary sailing craft. Wayne Gramlich and Patri Friedman have been working on a new approach involving cities floating above the sea in modified oil platforms.

1 Strategy
2 Possibilities
3 Developments
4 See also
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Strategy

The Wayne Gramlich and Patri Friedman Seasteading project will start small, using conventional techniques as much as possible, and trying to find viable, sustainable ways of exploiting a Seastead. Innovations that enable full time living at sea will have to be developed. Jerome FitzGerald at the Seasteader's Institute in Hilo, Hawaii, teaches boat building, freediving, forage foods, navigation, and other traditional seasteading skills. Students complete an application process and are invited to stay on the 3 acre site free of cost.

[edit] Possibilities

Outside the Exclusive Economic Zone of 200 nautical miles countries can claim are the high seas that know no other sovereignty than the flag a ship (which Seastead is) flies. Examples of organisations using this possibility are Women on Waves, enabling abortions for women in countries where abortions are subject to stricter laws than the Dutch laws, and Radio Veronica, a pirate radio station sailing the North Sea that was aimed at The Netherlands during the sixties. Like these organizations, Seastead will be able to take advantage of the looser laws and regulations that exist outside the sovereignty of nations and be largely self-governing.

[edit] Developments

The design for Seastead is a floating dumbbell in which the living area is high above sea level, which minimizes the influence of waves. During the last couple of years the results of research have been documented in an on line book [1] that covers living on the oceans. On April 15, 2008 Peter Thiel gave the project a headstart by pledging $500,000. The newly founded Seasteading Institute will be focusing on three areas; building a community, doing research and building the first Seastead in the San Francisco Bay.^[1]