Source: Foundation for Economic Education
by Cláudia Ascensão Nunes
“It is a deeply rooted belief in the Western political tradition, from Thomas Hobbes to contemporary interventionist currents, that a successful political community requires a strong central authority capable of imposing rules and guaranteeing order. According to this view, in the absence of such authority, society would inevitably collapse into chaos. History, however, offers a particularly intriguing counterexample. For nearly seven centuries, the Couto Mixto, a small microterritory composed of the villages of Santiago de Rubiás, Rubiás, and Meaus, existed along the border between Portugal and Spain without a permanent sovereign or centralized governmental authority. Despite this absence of formal state power, it developed a stable social order grounded in voluntary self-government and an extensive regime of free trade.” (01/07/26)