Space colonies under corporate control could recreate medieval power structures with unprecedented control over basic human needs. This paper explores the risks and alternatives.

Image: Space habitat concept art

Humanity stands at the threshold of interplanetary expansion. SpaceX, Blue Origin, and various state-backed enterprises are rapidly developing technologies to establish permanent human settlements beyond Earth.

But as we look toward this exciting future, a critical question emerges:

Who will govern these new worlds, and under what systems of power?

This essay examines how current trajectories in corporate-led space development reveal concerning parallels to feudal power structures. Without appropriate safeguards, interplanetary settlements risk evolving into what I term "dystopian corporate space feudalism"—hierarchical societies where corporate entities assume roles historically played by feudal lords, controlling not just means of production but the very necessities of life itself.

When examining European colonial ventures from the 16th through 19th centuries, a pattern emerges: initial exploration driven by curiosity, followed by resource exploitation for commercial gain, and ultimately socio-political control structures designed to maximize extraction efficiency.

The corporate vehicles that facilitated many colonial ventures—primarily joint-stock companies like the British East India Company—operated as quasi-governmental entities, exercising sovereign-like powers while optimizing for investor returns.

The early Jamestown colony under the Virginia Company offers a particularly instructive case study. As a profit-driven enterprise exercising near-absolute authority, the company established resource allocation systems prioritizing investor returns over colonist welfare. This profit-first approach contributed to the "starving time" of 1609-1610, when approximately 80% of colonists perished—not from absolute resource scarcity, but from systemic misallocation prioritizing export commodities over sustainable food production.

The parallels to potential space settlement governance, where life-sustaining resources would be similarly controlled by non-democratic entities, merit serious consideration.

Contemporary transformations in corporate governance and market concentration provide additional warning signs. The past four decades have witnessed structural shifts in economic and political power relationships, with corporate entities increasingly assuming functions traditionally reserved for governments.

This evolution includes:

• Privatization of Public Functions: The systematic transfer of critical infrastructure and services to private entities

• Erosion of Labor Protections: The methodical weakening of collective bargaining rights

• Surveillance and Workplace Control: Advanced digital technologies enabling unprecedented monitoring capabilities

• Corporate Personhood: Legal frameworks expanding corporate rights while limiting liabilities

• Transnational Corporate Power: Global entities effectively navigating around national regulations

These developments have led scholars to characterize our current trajectory as increasingly "neo-feudal," with corporate entities assuming lord-like roles while citizens are relegated to dependent positions analogous to vassals.

Space habitation creates unprecedented opportunities for control through the fundamental physics and environmental constraints of off-Earth living. In terrestrial environments, even under oppressive regimes, individuals retain some autonomy through access to naturally available necessities. In space habitats, however, every element required for human survival must be engineered, maintained, and allocated through centralized systems.

This creates a "resource-control nexus" of unprecedented leverage:

• Breathable Air: Must be continuously produced and circulated with no natural alternative source

• Potable Water: Must be recycled and distributed through controlled infrastructure

• Food Production: Requires carefully managed agricultural systems in a closed-loop

• Habitable Space: Is inherently limited with no "outside" offering alternative shelter

• Energy: Must be generated and distributed through centralized systems with no possibility for "off-grid" living

• Communication Infrastructure: Would be controlled by habitat owners

The entity controlling these systems would possess leverage over colonists that far exceeds anything possible on Earth. Labor strikes, civil disobedience, or other traditional mechanisms of resistance could be neutralized through restricting access to any of these necessities.

The environmental requirements of space habitats necessitate comprehensive monitoring systems that can be repurposed for population surveillance. All space habitats require sensors to monitor atmospheric composition, temperature, radiation levels, and structural integrity. These same systems could be expanded to monitor human activity with precision impossible to achieve on Earth.

Current workplace surveillance technologies provide a concerning preview. Amazon's monitoring systems track fulfillment center employees' movements with granular precision, creating stress conditions where workers fear termination for taking restroom breaks or failing to meet algorithmically determined quotas. In a space colony, such surveillance would extend to virtually every aspect of existence.

Initial space settlements will require a range of specialized skills, from engineering and life support management to agricultural expertise and medical care. As automation and AI continue to advance, the need for specialized human labor may diminish, potentially creating a two-tiered society:

• Corporate Leadership Class: Executives, investors, and critical specialists who control colony resources and make key decisions

• Labor Class: Workers who maintain systems but own nothing of the colony's productive capacity or infrastructure

This stratification mirrors the lord-serf division of medieval feudalism, where serfs worked land they did not own and depended entirely on lords to access resources necessary for survival. In space contexts, this dependency would be even more absolute due to the controlled nature of all life-sustaining resources.

Corporate colonial ventures may mitigate resistance through mechanisms creating illusions of ownership and autonomy while maintaining underlying control:

• Internal Property Systems: Allowing colonists to "own" or lease their living quarters while the corporation maintains control of life support

• Credit-Based Compensation: Company scrip redeemable only within corporate-controlled markets

• Pseudo-democratic Governance: Forums for colonist input on non-critical matters while reserving fundamental decisions for corporate leadership

• Purpose Narratives: Framing inequities as necessary sacrifices for the greater mission of human expansion

These mechanisms create psychological buy-in even in objectively exploitative conditions. As Zuboff observes in her analysis of surveillance capitalism, "The aim is to automate us through a global architecture of behavior modification that threatens human nature and the very nub of our humanity: freedom of will."

Preventing dystopian power arrangements in space settlements requires governance frameworks that transcend traditional boundaries. Current space activities operate under the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which designates space as "the province of all mankind" but inadequately addresses private exploitation questions.

Several regulatory approaches deserve consideration:

• International Oversight Bodies: Specialized institutions with meaningful compliance mechanisms

• Colonial Bills of Rights: Non-derogable entitlements for all space settlers

• Mandatory Ownership Diversification: Anti-monopoly frameworks specific to space habitats

• Earth-based Judicial Remedies: Specialized legal frameworks allowing colonists to access independent justice systems

Beyond regulatory oversight, we should explore fundamentally different organizational structures:

• Cooperative Ownership: Resident-owned models where habitat occupants collectively own and democratically govern life-support systems

• Public Benefit Corporations: Specialized corporate forms with fiduciary responsibilities to multiple stakeholders

• Commons-based Resource Management: Application of Ostrom's principles for managing common-pool resources to critical life-support systems

• Hybrid Governance Systems: Mixed models combining market economies for non-essentials with democratic governance of critical infrastructure

These alternatives face implementation challenges, particularly regarding initial financing. However, as launch costs decrease and in-space resource utilization technologies mature, the economic viability of democratic models may increase substantially.

The colonization of space represents humanity's next great frontier. As we extend our presence beyond Earth, we face a critical juncture: will we reproduce and amplify existing exploitative social arrangements, or will we develop governance models that better realize human potential?

The path of least resistance leads toward corporate space feudalism—a system where those who control interplanetary transport and life support exercise lord-like dominion over inhabitants. The resource dependencies, environmental constraints, and closed-system nature of space habitats create conditions for feudalistic power arrangements to emerge and consolidate.

This outcome, however, is not predetermined. Through evidence-based regulation, alternative economic models, and commitment to democratic principles, we can chart a different course.

The stakes could not be higher. The social systems established in early space settlements will influence human civilization for centuries, potentially shaping the development of a multiplanetary species. The question is whether space expansion will recapitulate historical patterns of exploitation, or whether it might represent a fresh opportunity—one that preserves and extends hard-won democratic advances rather than reverting to stratified power structures of the past.

For those interested in exploring these concepts further, these sources provide valuable insights:

• Zuboff, Shoshana. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power. New York: PublicAffairs, 2019.

• Kotkin, Joel. The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class. New York: Encounter Books, 2020.

• Cockell, Charles S. "The Value of Humans in the Biological Exploration of Space." Earth, Moon, and Planets 94, no. 3 (2004): 233-243.

• Morozov, Evgeny. "Critique of Techno-Feudal Reason." New Left Review 133/134 (January-April 2022): 89-126.

• Shammas, Victor Lund, and Tomas Bata Holen. "One Giant Leap for Capitalistkind: Private Enterprise in Outer Space." Humanities and Social Sciences Communications 6, no. 1 (2019): 1-11.

This essay is adapted from a longer academic paper. If you found this analysis valuable, please consider sharing it with others interested in space policy, governance, and the future of humanity as a multi-planetary species.

Author exploring biblical wisdom, philosophy, and technology. I connect ancient truths with modern challenges while occasionally venturing into unexpected territories. Join me for thoughtful explorations at the intersection of faith and innovation.

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