Sociocratic Pluralism: Governance for Blockchain Ecosystems

Abstract

We propose a framework for the governance of blockchain ecosystems composed of three components: plural voting, self-sovereign identity, and sociocratic administration, which we call Sociocratic Pluralism. The need for such a framework grows out of the challenges for Level 1 blockchains to continuously evolve the technical and socioeconomic capabilities of the network in a manner that is both globally inclusive and competitively effective. The complexity of the ecosystems emerging from blockchain communities requires innovation in the governance of technology evolution, economic policies, community engagement, security, and many other areas. Combinations of established public, democratic and private, capitalist institutional methods are being applied to blockchain governance. Nevertheless, more innovative decision-making methods are required to meet the requirements of polycentric, global communities. For large-scale, on-chain decisions, we examine how quadratic voting can protect against the formation of controlling parties and facilitate more efficient, robust decision-making that integrates a plurality of community perspectives. For off-chain administration in blockchain ecosystems and their associated Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, we examine consent-based decision-making facilitated by sociocratic circles. A requisite for applying these institutional innovations is the need to define citizens of a blockchain community via self-sovereign identity. 

Keywords: blockchain governance, plural voting, sociocracy, Ostromian analysis, social choice theory