Building Humanity's Future in Space

Launching the Center for Space Governance

We believe that space will become one of the greatest frontiers of this century.

In 1610, Kepler wrote in a letter to Galileo:

But as soon as somebody demonstrates the art of flying, settlers from our species of man will not be lacking. Who would once have thought that the crossing of the wide ocean was calmer and safer than of the narrow Adriatic Sea, Baltic Sea, or English Channel? Given ships or sails adapted to the breezes of heaven, there will be those who will not shrink from even that vast expanse. Therefore, for the sake of those who, as it were, will presently be on hand to attempt this voyage, let us establish the astronomy, Galileo, you of Jupiter, and me of the moon…

120 years ago, we invented the airplane. 50 years ago, we landed on the Moon. 25 years ago, we built the International Space Station. 10 years ago, we achieved the first vertical landing of a rocket. Today, we stand at the dawn of the Space Age.

Space is the fourth domain of warfare, an arena of great power competition, an economy driven by emerging technologies, and a frontier for scientific and social progress. When we have looked up at the sky, we have always wondered at our place among the stars – but with ships adapted to the breezes of heaven, we are now building new infrastructure, exploring new worlds, and imagining new possibilities. From satellites and space stations in orbit around the Earth to settlements on the Moon and Mars, we are expanding the borders of human activity beyond the atmosphere of our planet. And this is just the beginning.

When we launched the Center for Space Governance in July, we were driven by the mission of “advancing innovative solutions to address the greatest challenges and opportunities for humanity’s future in space”. Space provides us with the critical infrastructure to solve many of the most important challenges we face on Earth – from monitoring climate change to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals¹, to providing internet connectivity to billions of people in developing countries². As great as these challenges may be, the opportunities are even vaster in scale and diversity. Space is not only the final frontier, it is also a new ocean brimming with trade routes to navigate, resources to harness, and continents to discover. Our vision for this future is a world in which we work together to achieve security, sustainability, prosperity, justice, and liberty for all.

We define space governance as the process by which government, commercial, and civil society stakeholders govern human and robotic activities in space through an ecosystem of laws, principles, and incentives. Therefore, to govern our transition into a spacefaring civilization, we must be guided by an understanding of the interaction between space policy and the space economy. While space used to be the preserve of governments, today it is being pioneered by a dynamic ecosystem of companies and start-ups, with over $280 billion in venture capital invested in over 1,800 companies since 2013³. Space technologies are the invisible backbone of the world’s largest industries – from agriculture to entertainment – and are playing an increasingly central role in the global economy. This reflects our foundational perspective on technology policy: that there is a feedback loop between commercial industry developing technological capabilities and government establishing laws, principles, and incentives; and that we can leverage this dynamic to guide activities in the right direction – towards progress.

Table of Contents

1. Team and Members

2. Summary of 2022

3. Plans for 2023

4. Opportunities

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Team and Members

We have been joined by an outstanding team of people with experience across research, business, and policy. We are grateful for their contributions and look forward to publishing the results of our work together in the next 6 months.

🏛️ Team

• Stephen Buono, Research Fellow

• Giuliana Rotola, Research Fellow

• Jung-Ju Lee, Research Fellow

• David Jaffe, Research Fellow

• Sama Kubba, Research Fellow

• Daniel Skeffington, Research Fellow

• Quade MacDonald, Research Fellow

• Carson Ezell, Research Fellow

• Theodora Ogden, Research Affiliate

• Andrew Williams, Research Affiliate

• Ian Crawford, Research Affiliate

• Fin Moorhouse, Research Affiliate

We would like to congratulate Stephen Buono for his appointment as an Ernest May Fellow in History & Policy at Harvard University and Jung-Ju Lee for her new role as Director of Defense at the Special Competitive Studies Project!

🛰️ Members

• Robert Montano

• Anja Sheppard

• Chaitanya Kore

• Oskari Sivula

• Paolo Bassani

• Stephan Dalügge

We have also been joined by an initial group of Members who believed in our potential from an early stage and have decided to become a part of our mission. We are grateful for their continued support and look forward to growing this into a community with many more people from around the world.

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Summary of 2022

We have had an incredibly exciting last six months, from establishing a partnership with a national government and initiating a research collaboration with an institute at Cambridge University, to being invited to speak at major events across the United States and Europe.

🏗️ Projects

• Research Fellowship: Launched our Fellowship Program, with 8 Research Fellows and 4 Research Affiliates joining our team this year

• Landscape Mapping: Designed the world’s first map of space governance, including the main issues, actors, and activities across space security, sustainability, economy, science, society, and settlement

• Policy Briefs: Developed a report with 20 policy briefs on current, emerging, and future policy issues including Space for Sustainable Development, Commercial Space Policy, Anti-Satellite Weapons Testing, Space in Modern Warfare, Space and Nuclear Security, Great Power Competition, Commercial Space Stations, Space Resources, Lunar Governance, Planetary Defense, Space and Artificial Intelligence, and Mars Governance

• Latvia Partnership: Established a partnership with the Government of Latvia to advise them on the development of national space law, with a focus on supporting the growth of Latvia’s space industry within the European Union

• Cambridge Collaboration: Established a research collaboration with the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER) at Cambridge University on the intersection of space, artificial intelligence, and sustainable development

📄 Publications

• Bartu Kaleagasi (Director) wrote a report on Geospatial Public Policy, published by the Inter-American Development Bank

• Bartu Kaleagasi (Director) contributed to a report on The UK Space Sector Supply Chain, published by the Satellite Applications Catapult

• Giuliana Rotola (Fellow) coordinated a report on The Role of Space in Climate Action, published by the Space Generation Advisory Council

• Carson Ezell (Fellow) wrote a policy brief on Designing Britain’s Future-Oriented Space Strategy, published by the New Diplomacy Project 

• Theodora Ogden (Affiliate) wrote a report on Realising the Ambitions of the UK's Defence Space Strategy, published by the RAND Corporation

• Andrew Williams (Affiliate) delivered a statement at the United Nations COPUOS, on behalf of the European Southern Observatory (ESO)

• Ian Crawford (Affiliate) wrote a chapter in the book The Institutions of Extraterrestrial Liberty, published by the Oxford University Press

• Fin Moorhouse (Affiliate) wrote a policy brief titled Toward a Declaration on Future Generations, published by Oxford University

🌎 Events

• We delivered a lecture on space economy and policy at Oxford University

• We delivered a talk at the EA Global conference in Washington D.C.

• We organized a team retreat to the National Air & Space Museum 

• We delivered a talk at the EAGx conference in Berkeley

Center for Space Governance @SpaceGovern

Last week, our Director @BartuKaleagasi was invited to give a presentation at the University of Oxford on global space economy and governance. This was delivered as a closing lecture for Smart Space, an MBA course organized by @SpaceOxford at @OxfordSBS.

Center for Space Governance @SpaceGovern

Five months ago, our Directors gave a talk on the future of space policy to an audience of researchers and philanthropists in Washington, D.C., informed by recent developments in the United States and Europe.

Gustavs Zilgalvis @GZilgalvis

I enjoyed participating in the civil service innovation workshop at the State Chancellery of Latvia yesterday, looking forward to further @GovernanceSpace cooperation with the State Chancellery, ministries and other international organizations.

Center for Space Governance @SpaceGovern

We are excited to announce a partnership between the Center for Space Governance and the Government of Latvia for the development of national space law. This will serve as a model for space policy in the Baltic region and across the European Union.

latviaspace.gov.lvCOOPERATION: The Center for Space Governance to Develop a Study on the Latvian Space LawThe Ministry of Economics, the Ministry of Education and Science, and the State Chancellery Innovation Laboratory of the Republic of Latvia have reached an agreement with the Center for Space Governance to cooperate in the development of the Latvian space law.

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Plans for 2023

We are even more excited about the next 6 months. This year, we look forward to publishing our foundational materials, building on the fruitful collaboration we have enjoyed with our partners, and attending more great events.

🏗️ Projects

• The Overview: We will be publishing a quarterly summary of the most important developments and insights in the space domain

• Space and AI: We will be publishing a paper titled “Safely advancing a spacefaring humanity with artificial intelligence”, written in collaboration with the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER)

• The Space Atlas: We will be publishing the world’s first map of space governance, based on our Landscape Mapping project

• U.S. Space Policy: We will be mapping the landscape of space policy in the United States, which will be incorporated into the Space Atlas

• The Space Age Report: We will be publishing the Center’s flagship report, with 20 policy briefs on current, emerging, and future policy issues

• National Space Law: We will be publishing a report with case studies on space law in six selected countries from around the world, as well as our recommendations for the development of national space law in Latvia, which will serve as a model for space policy across the European Union

🌎 Events

• We will be attending the SATELLITE 2023 conference in Washington D.C.

• We will be facilitating two workshops on Space and Sustainable Development together with the Center for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER)

• We will be chairing a panel on Global Space Governance at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA)

• We will be attending the Space Generation Fusion Forum in Colorado Springs

• We will be attending the Space Symposium 2023 in Colorado Springs

• We will be moderating a panel on Space Law at the Deep Tech Atelier 2023 conference in partnership with the European Space Agency in Latvia

• We will be attending the Space Foresight Workshop in San Francisco

• We will be attending the Summit for Space Sustainability in New York

🚀 Opportunities

• We will be hosting a workshop on Mapping Space Governance on April 1st

• We will be hosting a workshop on U.S. Space Policy on April 8th

• We will be hosting a workshop on Commercial Space Policy on April 29th

• Apply to join the Center for Space Governance as a Research Fellow or Research Affiliate as part of our Fellowship Program 2023

• Apply to join as a Member of the Center for Space Governance

We would be excited to hear from people who are interested in supporting our work. If you would like to connect with us, join our team, become an Advisor, collaborate with us on a project, or support our mission by funding our activities, we encourage you to get in touch at center@governance.space.

If you would like to stay up to date on our progress, we invite you to follow us on Twitter and subscribe to our newsletter on Substack.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Bartu Kaleagasi, Director

Gustavs Zilgalvis, Director

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1. UN Office for Outer Space Affairs

2. World Economic Forum

3. Space Capital