Thibault Serlet
  • Home
  • Book Reviews
  • Contact

Articles

​

Your Next Government?

4/20/2022

1 Comment

 
Picture
Your Next Government? From the Nation State to Stateless Nations
By Tom W. Bell
Published in October 2017
286 Pages
Thibault’s Score: 3/5

This may be the first time that I review a book where I know the author. I met Tom W. Bell in 2014, nearly 8 years ago, and have known him as a professional colleague and acquaintance since then.

I only read the first third before I got bored; but I think that others might get more out of it. To me, almost nothing was new.

Tom W. Bell’s discussion of SEZs is pretty good, especially when he covers US FTZs. He also has a neat little segment where he talks about Fordlandia. However, he focuses way too much on highly theoretical projects like Seasteads. This makes his writing seem like an academic fever dream rather than a practicable solution. This is too bad because there are many very real and tangible case studies - the Holy Roman Empire, Delos, Dejima, Shenzhen, Dubai Multi Modal Commodity Center, the Hanseatic League (which he briefly mentions), the Geneva Freeport, etc…

So far I haven’t found a single book that covers the very real and very useful examples of charter cities; most tend to naval-gaze. I need to write that book. 




1 Comment
Cedric Warny link
5/5/2022 02:12:18 pm

Please write that book. Would also love to hear your thoughts about charter cities throughout history, and any readings you'd recommend around that topic
NB: I got here via your recent excellent CC Atlas podcast

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Thibault Serlet

    Most of my articles are book reviews, but I also write about many other topics.

    Archives

    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
  • Book Reviews
  • Contact