The Consequential Frontier: Challenging the Privatization of Space

by Peter Ward

This in-depth work of reportage dares to ask what’s at stake in privatizing outer space.

Earth is in trouble—so dramatically that we’re now scrambling to explore space for valuable resources and a home for permanent colonization. With the era of NASA’s dominance now behind us, the private sector is winning this new space race. But if humans and their private wealth have made such a mess of Earth, who can say we won’t do the same in space?

In The Consequential Frontier, business and technology journalist Peter Ward is raising this vital question before it’s too late. Interviewing tech CEOs, inventors, scientists, lobbyists, politicians, and future civilian astronauts, Ward sheds light on a whole industry beyond headline-grabbing rocket billionaires like Bezos and Musk, and introduces the new generation of activists trying to keep it from rushing recklessly into the cosmos.

With optimism for what humans might accomplish in space if we could leave our tendency toward deregulation, inequality, and environmental destruction behind, Ward shows just how much cooperation it will take to protect our universal resource and how beneficial it could be for all of us.

Peter Ward studied journalism at the University of Sheffield before moving to Dubai, where he reported on the energy sector. After three years in the Middle East, he earned his master’s degree in business journalism from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. His work has appeared in GQ, Bloomberg, The Economist, and Newsweek. He lives in New York City.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Space

224 pages, Hardcover

Published October 1, 2019

About the author

Peter Ward is a British business and technology reporter whose reporting has taken him across the globe. Reporting from Dubai, he covered the energy sector in the Middle East before earning a degree in business journalism from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. His writing has appeared in Wired, The Atlantic, The Economist, GQ, BBC Science Focus, and Newsweek.

Reviews

[Kusaimamekirai · Rating 3 out of 5]

Recently, entrepreneur, adventurer, and sometimes asshole, Richard Branson became the first person to travel into space via a privately funded rocket. It was the culmination of years of planning, tragedy, excess, and everything in between.
What it was not however was the culmination of a dream. For Branson, Elon Musk, and super asshole Jeff Bezos, flying in space is only the tip of a terrestrial asteroid.
Peter Ward’s “The Consequential Frontier “ takes a closer look at these men and their ambitions, and what it means for the future of space, as well as for the 99% of us who will be left behind.
While Ward touches on the inequality of billionaires providing millionaires with tickets off the planet and onto potential Martian colonies someday (not mention the staggering amount of space debris they leave behind to collide with other space debris which creates...more space debris), he is ultimately sympathetic to their goals.
He sees men like Bezos and Musk as ultimately good intentioned men, not motivated by profit so much as wanting to help mankind. Where he gets this image of Bezos in particular is as hard to fathom for me as quantum physics (very hard).
It’s one of the many things that is both intriguing and yet frustrating about the book.
Most chapters end with some kind of dire warning about possible abuses in space by corporations motivated only by profit, but are preceded with semi-hagiographic chronicles of self made men, altruistic men with the best interests ultimately of the planet at heart.
Perhaps I am getting cynical in my old age but when someone tells me that a James Bond-esque villain billionaire like Jeff Bezos is motivated by anything other than his own wealth and power, I’m reminded of the episode of the office where Jim tells Michael Scott how well he takes constructive criticism. To which he responds: “Ha! I am not known for that!”
Jeff Bezos is not known for that.
I don’t mean to make this all about Jeff Bezos though. Japanese billionaires looking to mine the surface of the moon, the Chinese looking to extract hydrogen from it, the space debris, there are a lot of bad actors here jostling each other to grab all the cash they can before someone else does.
If there is one analogy the author nails it’s comparing this new era of space tourism and militarization (space force!) with the California Gold Rush. People swarmed large swaths of land and over the series of a few short years managed not only to ravage the landscape but fight and kill each other as well.
It was not humanity’s finest hour and one can only hope that the gold people see today in outer space doesn’t have even more wide reaching and devastating consequences.

[Max Burke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall solid and readable survey for general readers on the history, present and future of commercial space travel. I am casually interested in the topic and knew a bit, but there was a lot of solid information here, presented in a very readable and straightforward manner. Quick and worthwhile read if you are interested in the subject.

[Miska · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’ve heard a great conversation with the author about this book in a podcast and the topic seemed quite fascinating. Indeed, he describes very well the past and present developments of space exploration as well as the attempts to dominate space by private actors. However, contrary to the subtitle of the book, apart from the 5 page conclusion, I see little effort from the author to challenge the status quo of the privatization of space exploration.

[Phoebe Spahn · Rating 3 out of 5]

*2.5 stars*
This is a good jumping off point to getting some basic information on the rise of private space travel companies and efforts over the last few years. But overall I found it dry, and given the rapid growth and change in this industry its information will soon be outdated.

[R.M. Hughes · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read my wife's copy of this. Having paid a great deal of attention to space travel since I was a child, I was amazed at some of the new things I discovered in this book. The detail is considerable. I was particularly alarmed by indicators that the history of the world in terms of rapacious capitalism on our oceans is now being repeated beyond the Earth's atmosphere. Flags of convenience? Did you think the heroic conquest of space could not follow that pattern? Think again. While never using science fiction as a comparison, the author does a great job of painting a direction of travel that, if not checked and regulated by firmer treaties and law than we have now, could lead to a cut-throat, feudalistic and thoroughly unpaleatable situation "out there". Who of us would like to see conglomorates like Weyland-Yutani - the multi-national conglomorate in the "Alien" movies that put profit over human lives and risked all life on earth - in charge out there in outer space? As I said, the author does not go into that sort of thing, but presents strong evidence we might be headed in that direction. Brilliantly researched and presented, I highly recommend anyone interested in a serious read on the subject of space travel to take a look at this book.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

A potentially niche interest, offering a useful history of the private sector development of space, and a polemic against allowing the unfettered commercialization of space exploration. The history is more useful than the polemicizing but the author makes good points about the danger of allowing lower earth orbits and the moon or asteroids to be overtaken by the same kind of rapacious capitalism that has resulted in the destruction of ecosystems and human rights on earth.

[cameron mcwilliam · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating and thorough analysis and outlook on the privatization of space written with an enormous amount of research. The book is factual, educational, engaging, and thought-provoking with many insights and opinions from the world’s leading scientists, space experts, and entrepreneurs - with some very quirky characters divulging first-hand recollections. A very enjoyable read and timely. This being the author’s first book, I eagerly look forward to his next.

[Leticia Vieira · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall good survey of the topic. As the more recent events show, the author overestimated the good intentions of billionaires. There could be more criticism about the capitalistic implications of privatizing space

[Alex Nagler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very much a beginners primer

[Luc · Rating 4 out of 5]

Effective as a quick introduction or catch-up on what's happening beyond the confines of Earth. Accessible read though, as others have pointed out, will likely become outdated in short order.

[David Hakimi · Rating 1 out of 5]

Anti-private sector arguments against SpaceX and Blue Origin. Companies without which NASA would probably still be in hibernation and America wouldn’t even be in the space discussion.