46.  Srinivasan, “The Network State,” 32. The origin story of bitcoin has been told elsewhere. See, e.g., Stefan Eich, “Old Utopias, New Tax Havens: The Politics of Bitcoin in Historical Perspective,” in Regulating Blockchain (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), 85–98.

    47.  Balaji Srinivasan, “The Network State: How Every Country Becomes a Software Country,” Startup Societies Summit, September 15, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiLUPvUsdXg&t=3s.

    48.  Srinivasan, “The Network State: How Every Country Becomes a Software Country.”

    49.  E. J. Hobsbawm and T. O. Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983).

    50.  Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living with Uncertainty in a Financialized World (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2022).

    51.  “The Rise of Cloud Cities & Citizen Journalism with Balaji Srinivasan.”

    52.  Tarnoff, Internet for the People: The Fight for Our Digital Future, 36.

    53.  Quinn Slobodian, “Cryptocurrencies’ Dream of Escaping the Global Financial System Is Crumbling,” Guardian, July 5, 2021, Global Newsstream.

    54.  Katie Martin and Billy Nauman, “Bitcoin’s Growing Energy Problem: ‘It’s a Dirty Currency,’” Financial Times, May 20, 2021, Global Newsstream.

    55.  On the frontier myth see Greg Grandin, The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America (New York: Metropolitan, 2019).

    56.  “The Rise of Cloud Cities & Citizen Journalism with Balaji Srinivasan.”

    57.  On the place they ended up see Justin Gaudet, “Paddle Prairie Metis Settlement,” Canadian Encyclopedia, August 3, 2021, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/paddle-prairie-metis-settlement. My great-grandmother Emily Houle is in the photograph.

    58.  See Brenna Bhandar, Colonial Lives of Property: Law, Land, and Racial Regimes of Ownership (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2018); and Eyal Weizman, Hollow Land: Israel’s Architecture of Occupation, new ed. (New York: Verso, 2017).

    59.  Dan Senor and Saul Singer, Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle (New York: Twelve, 2009).

    60.  Balaji Srinivasan, Twitter post, May 13, 2021, http://twitter.com/balajis.

    61.  Quoted in Henley & Partners, “Record-Breaking Global Mobility Grounded by COVID-19 Pandemic,” PR Newswire, April 7, 2020, https://www.prnewswire.com/ae/news-releases/record-breaking-global-mobility-grounded-by-covid-19-pandemic-301034963.html.

    62.  Quinn Slobodian, “How the Libertarian Right Plans to Profit from the Pandemic,” Guardian, June 1, 2020, Global Newsstream.

    63.  Virtual SSF Summit: Startup Societies in a Post-Covid World, May 1–2, 2020. Streamed online.

    64.  Balaji Srinivasan, Twitter post, January 13, 2020, http://twitter.com/balajis.

    65.  Balaji Srinivasan, Twitter post, January 13, 2020, http://twitter.com/balajis.

    66.  Balaji Srinivasan, Twitter post, January 13, 2020, http://twitter.com/balajis.

    67.  Joel Stein, “Bienvenidos a Miami,” Financial Times, February 5, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    68.  Katie Warren and Mary Meisenzahl, “Peter Thiel Bought This Miami Compound on an Exclusive Manmade Island for $18 Million,” Insider, January 20, 2021, https://www.businessinsider.com/miami-real-estate-ford-ceo-compound-photos-2020–10.

    69.  Stein, “Bienvenidos a Miami”; and Chafkin, The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s Pursuit of Power, 34.

    70.  Balaji Srinivasan, “The Start of Startup Cities,” 1729.com, May 3, 2021, https://1729.com/miami.

    71.  Dick Simpson, Marco Rosaire Rossi, and Thomas J. Gradel, “Corruption Spikes in Illinois,” Anti-Corruption Report #13, February 20, 2021, https://pols.uic.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/273/2021/02/Corruption-Spikes-in-IL-Anti-Corruption-Rpt-13-final2.-1.pdf.

    72.  Thomas Burton, “Donald Trump Looking Beyond Traditional Medical Experts for FDA Commissioner,” Wall Street Journal, January 13, 2017, ProQuest.

    73.  Balaji Srinivasan, Twitter post, March 16, 2021, http:/twitter.com/balajis, called the project 1729, a reference to the lowest number that can be created by adding two cubes in two different ways—called Ramanujan’s number after a prodigious Indian mathematician. Srinivasan thought about his project as, in part, a talent finding to the world beyond the industrial core. Like the Hubble Telescope that sought dark matter, he said mobile phones would help find what he called “dark talent.” Kosloff and Srinivasan, “#3 Network State with Balaji Srinivasan, former CTO of Coinbase and Founder of 1729.”

    74.  Parag Khanna and Balaji Srinivasan, “Great Protocol Politics,” Foreign Policy, December 11, 2021, https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/12/11/bitcoin-ethereum-cryptocurrency-web3-great-protocol-politics/.

    75.  COVID-19 National Preparedness Collaborators, “Pandemic Preparedness and COVID-19: An Exploratory Analysis of Infection and Fatality Rates, and Contextual Factors Associated with Preparedness in 177 Countries, from Jan 1, 2020, to Sept 30, 2021,” Lancet, February 1, 2022, https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140–6736(22)00172–6.

    76.  Ben Tarnoff, “The Metaverse Is a Cubicle,” Metal Machine Music, November 30, 2021, https://bentarnoff.substack.com/p/the-metaverse-is-a-cubicle?s=r.

    77.  Richard Barbrook and Andy Cameron, “The Californian Ideology,” Mute 1, no. 3 (September 1, 1995), https://www.metamute.org/editorial/articles/californian-ideology.

    78.  See Phil Jones, Work Without the Worker: Labour in the Age of Platform Capitalism (New York: Verso, 2021).

  CONCLUSION

    1.  Lizzie Crook, “Zaha Hadid Architects Releases Visuals of Amorphous OPPO Shenzhen Headquarters,” Dezeen, January 31, 2020, https://www.dezeen.com/2020/01/31/zaha-hadid-architects-oppo-headquarters-shenzhen-china-architecture/; Lizzie Crook, “Zaha Hadid Architects Unveils Pebble-Shaped Science Museum for Shenzhen,” Dezeen, December 1, 2020, https://www.dezeen.com/2020/12/01/zaha-hadid-architects-shenzhen-science-technology-museum/; and Lizzie Crook, “Supertall Skyscrapers Linked by Planted Terraces to Be Built in Shenzhen by Zaha Hadid Architects,” Dezeen, January 13, 2021, https://www.dezeen.com/2021/01/13/tower-c-supertall-skyscrapers-zaha-hadid-architects-shenzhen/.

    2.  “The First Building of Zaha Hadid’s ‘Unicorn Island’ Nears Completion in Chengdu, China,” Designboom, January 15, 2020, https://www.designboom.com/architecture/zaha-hadid-architects-unicorn-island-chengdu-china-01–15–2020/.

    3.  “Unicorn Island Will Be Built in Chengdu, China,” https://partners.wsj.com/xinhua/chengdu/unicorn-island-will-be-built-in-chengdu-china/.

    4.  Kanna, Dubai: The City as Corporation, 91.

    5.  Patrik Schumacher and Rahim Taghizadegan, “The Failure of Urban Planning and the Future of Cities,” June 11, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZppWV6w4XA.

    6.  Tom Ravenscroft, “Zaha Hadid Architects Reveals Design for Skyscraper on World’s Most Expensive Site,” Dezeen, September 26, 2020, https://www.dezeen.com/2020/09/26/2-murray-road-skyscraper-zaha-hadid-worlds-most-expensive-site-hong-kong/.

    7.  Patrik Schumacher and Martti Kalliala, “Total Freedom,” After Us, November 14, 2016, https://medium.com/after-us/total-freedom-5ee930676b65.

    8.  Patrik Schumacher and Arno Brandlhuber, “Land of the Free Forces,” ARCH+ (2018): 97.

    9.  Schumacher and Taghizadegan, “The Failure of Urban Planning and the Future of Cities.”

    10.  Patrik Schumacher, “Increasing Freedom and Prosperity by Means of Private Cities,” Liberland Press, July 25, 2020, https://liberlandpress.com/2020/07/25/increasing-freedom-and-prosperity-by-means-of-private-cities/.

    11.  Schumacher and Kalliala, “Total Freedom.”

    12.  Patrik Schumacher, “Liberland’s Prospective Urban Planning Regime,” Liberland Press, February 19, 2020, https://liberlandpress.com/2020/02/19/liberlands-prospective-urban-planning-regime/.

    13.  Edward Ongweso Jr., “Inside Liberland, a Crypto-Libertarian Micronation in Eastern Europe,” Vice, April 29, 2022, https://www.vice.com/en/article/xgdj9k/inside-liberland-a-crypto-libertarian-micronation-in-eastern-europe.

    14.  Patrik Schumacher, “Politics After the Libertarian Revolution, Interview at LibertyCon, Madrid,” March 14, 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh_3yhcxCeY.

    15.  Hoppe, Stone, Kinsella, Dürr: Discussion, Q&A (PFS 2017), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4-negu-E0E.

    16.  Schumacher, “After the Libertarian Revolution.”

    17.  Schumacher and Taghizadegan, “The Failure of Urban Planning and the Future of Cities.”

    18.  Mertha, “‘Fragmented Authoritarianism 2.0’: Political Pluralization in the Chinese Policy Process.”

    19.  Will Doig, High-Speed Empire: Chinese Expansion and the Future of Southeast Asia (New York: Columbia Global Reports, 2018).

    20.  David Pilling, “Djibouti Row with DP World Embodies Horn of Africa Power Struggle,” FT.com, October 30, 2018, Global Newsstream.

    21.  Degang Sun and Yahia H. Zoubir, “Securing China’s ‘Latent Power’: The Dragon’s Anchorage in Djibouti,” Journal of Contemporary China 30, no. 130 (2021): 683.

    22.  Jonathan E. Hillman, The Emperor’s New Road: China and the Project of the Century (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2020), 157.

    23.  Kathrin Hille, “The Chinese Companies Trying to Buy Strategic Islands,” FT.com, April 11, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    24.  Carrai, “China’s Malleable Sovereignty Along the Belt and Road Initiative: The Case of the 99-Year Chinese Lease of Hambantota Port.”

    25.  Hille, “Strategic Islands”; and Hung, City on the Edge, 37.

    26.  Maximilian Mayer and Xin Zhang, “Theorizing China-World Integration: Sociospatial Reconfigurations and the Modern Silk Roads,” Review of International Political Economy 28, no. 4 (2021): 988.

    27.  See Umut Özsu, “The Ottoman Empire, the Origins of Extraterritoriality, and International Legal Theory,” in The Oxford Handbook of the Theory of International Law, ed. Anne Orford and Florian Hoffmann (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 124–37.

    28.  For the connection to earlier Ottoman practice see Moritz Anselm Mihatsch and Michael Mulligan, “The Longue Durée of Extraterritoriality and Global Capital,” Culture, Theory and Critique 62, no. 1–2 (2021): 1.

    29.  Vivian Nereim, “Saudi Arabia Is Planning the Largest Buildings Ever Constructed,” Bloomberg, May 31, 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022–05–31/saudi-arabia-is-planning-the-largest-buildings-ever-constructed.

    30.  Ian Palmer, “Is Saudi Arabia’s New Climate City ‘Neom’ Future or Fantasy?,” Forbes, February 28, 2022, https://www.forbes.com/sites/ianpalmer/2022/02/28/a-new-climate-city-in-a-big-oil-state—saudi-arabia—is-it-future-or-fantasy.

    31.  Simon Robinson, Samia Nakhoul, and Stephen Kalin, “Exclusive: New Saudi Mega-City Will Be Listed Publicly, Crown Prince Says,” Reuters, October 26, 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-saudi-economy-mbs-interview-exclusive-idUSKBN1CV0ZM.

    32.  Merlyn Thomas and Vibeke Venema, “Neom: What’s the Green Truth Behind a Planned Eco-City in the Saudi Desert?,” BBC News, February 22, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-59601335.

    33.  Bill Bostock, “Saudi Arabia Announced a Wild Plan to Build a Floating, 8-sided City,” Business Insider, November 18, 2021, https://www.businessinsider.com/saudi-arabia-oxagon-floating-eight-sided-city-2021–11; Reem Walid, “MENA Project Tracker: Contractors Prepare for Two Libyan Drilling Projects; Bids Invited for $500bn Saudi Oxagon Project and Alinma HQ,” Arab News, May 9, 2021, https://arab.news/5m3ty; Vivian Nereim, “Saudi Prince’s ‘Neom’ to Expand Port to Rival Region’s Biggest,” Bloomberg, November 24, 2021, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021–11–25/saudi-prince-s-neom-to-expand-port-to-rival-region-s-biggest?sref=apOkUyd1; and Osama Habib, “NEOM Project Has Been Fast Tracked to Meet Deadline, Says Top Executive,” Arab News, February 19, 2022, https://www.arabnews.com/node/2027996/business-economy.

    34.  Tracy Alloway, “Saudi Arabia Gives Citizenship to a Robot,” Bloomberg, October 26, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017–10–26/saudi-arabia-gives-citizenship-to-a-robot-claims-global-first.

    35.  Richard Partington, “P&O Ferries Owner DP World Loses Status as Partner in Solent Freeport,” Guardian, April 7, 2022, ProQuest.

    36.  Richard Partington and Gwyn Topham, “P&O Ferries Owner to Benefit from at Least £50m of UK Freeport Scheme,” Guardian, March 21, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    37.  Eamonn Butler, “Freeports Will Be a World-Leading Policy—as Long as the Treasury Isn’t Allowed to Water Them Down,” Telegraph.co.uk, March 3, 2021, Westlaw.

    38.  Gwyn Topham, “P&O Ferries Boss Admits Firm Broke Law by Sacking Staff Without Consultation,” Guardian, March 24, 2022, ProQuest.

    39.  The national living wage in 2022 for people over age twenty-three is £9.50, https://www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates; Topham, “P&O Ferries Boss Admits Firm Broke Law by Sacking Staff Without Consultation.”

    40.  Simeon Kerr, “DP World Wins $2.5bn Investor Boost,” Financial Times, June 7, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    41.  Jeff Deist and Stephan Livera, “Economic Freedom vs. Personal Freedom,” The Human Action Podcast, May 13, 2022, https://mises.org/library/economic-freedom-vs-personal-freedom.

    42.  He Huifeng, “China Bets on Hainan Duty-Free Shopping Mecca to Boost Spending at Home,” South China Morning Post, July 13, 2020, Global Newsstream; and He Huifeng, “China Creates Hainan Special Health Care Zone to Tap Growing Medical Tourism Market,” South China Morning Post, July 14, 2020, Global Newsstream.

    43.  UNCTAD, Handbook on Special Economic Zones in Africa (Geneva: UNCTAD, 2021), xvii.

    44.  Claire W. Herbert and Martin J. Murray, “Building from Scratch: New Cities, Privatized Urbanism and the Spatial Restructuring of Johannesburg After Apartheid,” International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 39, no. 3 (May 2015): 475. See also Benjamin H. Bradlow, “Weapons of the Strong: Elite Resistance and the Neo-Apartheid City,” City & Community 20, no. 3 (2021): 191–211.

    45.  “Steps Announced for SEZs in Budget Will Promote Growth, Boost Exports: EPCES,” Economic Times (New Delhi, India), February 2, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    46.  Dorit Geva, “Orbán’s Ordonationalism as Post-Neoliberal Hegemony,” Theory, Culture & Society 38, no. 6 (2021): 77.

    47.  Joshua Oliver and Philip Stafford, “Why the UK Joined the Race to Woo the Crypto Industry,” Financial Times, April 28, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    48.  Edwin Heathcote, “Too Rich and Too Thin? Welcome to Manhattan’s Newest ‘Skinnyscraper,’” Financial Times, May 6, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    49.  “World’s Ultra-Rich Flee to Dubai to Escape Pandemic,” Economic Times (New Delhi, India), May 6, 2021, Global Newsstream.

    50.  Mogielnicki, A Political Economy of Free Zones in Gulf Arab States, 205.

    51.  Thibault Serlet, “How Special Economic Zones Are Quietly Advancing State Capitalism,” FEE.org, February 25, 2022, https://fee.org/articles/how-special-economic-zones-are-quietly-advancing-state-capitalism/.

    52.  Yi Wu, “Subcounty Administration in Rural Southwest China (1950–2000): Changing State Spatiality, Persistent Village Territoriality and Implications for the Current Urban Transformation,” Culture, Theory and Critique 62, no. 1–2 (2021): 40.

    53.  Peter Thiel in James Dale Davidson and William Rees-Mogg, The Sovereign Individual: Mastering the Transition to the Information Age (New York: Touchstone, 2020), 6.

    54.  Max Read, “Peter Thiel’s Latest Venture Is the American Government,” New York, January 21, 2020, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/01/peter-thiel-conservative-political-influence.html.

    55.  Chafkin, The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s Pursuit of Power, 290.

    56.  Madhumita Murgia and Sarah Neville, “Palantir Gears Up to Expand Its Reach into UK’s NHS,” Financial Times, June 9, 2022, Global Newsstream.

    57.  China Miéville, “Floating Utopias,” in Evil Paradises: Dreamworlds of Neoliberalism, ed. Mike Davis and Daniel Bertrand Monk (New York: New Press, 2007), 255; see Tyler Cowen’s influential idea of “state capacity libertarianism.” Tyler Cowen, “What Libertarianism Has Become and Will Become—State Capacity Libertarianism,” Marginal Revolution, January 1, 2020, https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/what-libertarianism-has-become-and-will-become-state-capacity-libertarianism.html.