It's magical of sorts to be living in an era with such rapid technological transformation unfolding before our eyes.
Our hunter-gatherer and agricultural ancestors could only dream of times when individuals could work from almost anywhere and transact across borders near instantly.
Now, this is a reality and modern people are beginning to realize they have more options than ever before in how they live, work, and organize their lives.
I did manage to pick up The Sovereign Individual book again yesterday for a read before going to sleep because the urge to read the book has been tickling gradually in the background of my mind for awhile now.
I first heard of the book a couple of years ago, just before 2020 while reading one of the famous books of Robert Kiyosaki.
He recommended reading the book to prepare for the transition from the old system to new systems built on digital technology and individual empowerment.
What I'm realizing now is that I did read the book at the time but most of the contents passed from one ear to another, so to speak.
I couldn't retain or realize the magnitude of much of what was said in the book in terms of concepts, predictions, and implications simply because my mind at that time was way less structured than it is now.
This realization is kind of surprising to me because I did now understand that the same piece of content can be understood differently by the same person at different timeframes and/or state of mind.
It's like peeling the layers of an onion, which is a metaphor that I've heard used with regards to understanding the nature of reality.
I've so far only read the first chapters of the book and most paragraphs gave me a lightbulb effect while reading them.
Perhaps, the wording is a bit different. I presently understand nation-state from Balaji's work with regards to network states and digital communities.
However in the book, nation-state is basically a country in its present form with traditional borders, centralized government control, and the ability to tax and regulate citizens within those boundaries.
One of the concepts I'm still pondering upon is "denationalization of the individual," which is the idea that technology will allow people to become less dependent on any single government and governments having to treat them as customers, and not merely as citizens.
How this reversal from subjects to customers of sorts is quite unexpected to me, in terms of the old guard having to compete for the allegiance and economic activity of individuals.
I guess the tables can turn for everyone even for those who make and set the table themselves.
From Citizen To Customer
This concept of denationalization really strikes me as profound, partly because I've read a bit from an unusual source of a similar concept called "global citizens", i.e individuals who identify themselves as citizen of the world instead of a specific country.
Throughout history, people have been tied to specific locations and governments more so by necessity.
You were born somewhere, you lived there, you paid taxes there, and you followed the rules of that place whether you liked them or not.
But the authors predict that technology changes this relationship near completely.
Based on the premise that when your income can come from anywhere in the world through the internet and you can store your wealth in digital assets that no government can easily seize, then you presumably can work from any location(with good WiFi!), which not so suddenly makes the governments have to compete for you.
This is the magical of sorts I was referring to about this era.
It just seems absolutely magical to me that instead of being stuck with whatever government you happened to be born under, you become like a customer who can choose which government offers the best "package".
If one country treats you poorly, or taxes you too heavily, you can simply move your economic activity elsewhere.
To a certain extent, this is happening already. Individuals have been moving to Dubai because of some of the reasons stated above.
I'm more interested on the extent at which this will spread, in both scale and magnitude, across the globe and the obvious plays governments will employ to stop it from happening.
Goliath Vs David
On the other side of the spectrum, the book acknowledges that existing power structures won't go quietly, which isn't surprising at all to me.
Losing this much power over a relatively large number of people is unnerving at best and an existential threat at worst.
There will be all sorts of conflicts between the old system trying to preserve itself and the new system trying to emerge.
This is also already playing out to a certain extent, a recent example that I'm aware of is the ongoing debates about cryptocurrency regulation.
Thankfully the underlying technological forces seem unstoppable. So most resistance efforts will just be a waste of time and resources.
I think it's quite remarkable how a book written decades ago can feel so relevant to the changes happening right now.
Also and from what I've gathered so far, the journey from citizen to sovereign individual is still at the beginning part, maybe only a quarter or two away from the end of the beginning, and I feel very fortunate to be living through this crazy historic transition!
Thanks for reading!! Share your thoughts below on the comments.