By Sasha Lilley
Against the Grain
August 15th, 2022
Capitalist Paradise
Utopias aren’t unique to the left. The right has labored in myriad ways for a world without fetters on private property. In one striking case, a character called Michael Oliver, with a motley group of associates ranging from English lords to soldiers of fortune, successively attempted to set up a capitalist paradise in the South Pacific and Caribbean. Historian Raymond Craib discusses Oliver and his contemporary techno-utopian equivalents, dreaming up floating cities on the high seas and other private enclaves made possible by authoritarian power.
Resources:
Raymond Craib, Adventure Capitalism: A History of Libertarian Exit, from the Era of Decolonization to the Digital Age PM Press/Spectre, 2022
