DGF transcendent values

The goal of the DGF project is to create a governance framework for creating DAOs. In particular we believe primary DAOs are a powerful tool for helping humanity to thrive in the long run. The properties of a primary DAO that are valuable are

• Decentralization of power
  

Individuals have autonomy and appropriate power. Appropriate means the DAO is regulated through democratic power weighted by reputation.

• Organization
  

Group harmony is achieved through wise governance

• Individual privacy
  Individual members' information is protected. As much as possible, individuals are in control of their own information.
• Group transparency
  The group's functions and history are as open to public scrutiny as possible. This is obviously in conflict with the goal of protecting individual member's privacy.
• Openness
  

Members are continually free to join and exit the group.

Any organization's long term coherence and integrity is dependent on their members sharing common values. To maintain decentralization, these values should be transcendent in the sense that they are not formally and explicitly described. This prevents the gaming that naturally occurs when people compete for power in the group. Inner group competition leads to differentiation as some win and some lose, which leads to hierarchies of power, which eventually leads to a centralized power structure. Therefore a decentralized group requires its members to serve a set of transcendent values. This page elaborates the particular transcendent values of the DGF project.

Transcendent values

• Decentralized organization
  • Individual power and freedom
  • Group harmony
• Decentralized knowledge
  • Individual privacy
  • Group transparency
• Open decentralized ownership
  • Equity control of essentials
  • Meritocratic competition for inessentials

Comments

Overview

DGF values individuals and groups, and so we seek their good. This is our primary transcendent value, which we take for granted as an idea that cannot be formally codified. This forms the basis of the further elaboration of our values stated above.

We seek to implement decentralized organization in the service of the good of individuals and groups for the following reasons. Individual members have greater average power in a decentralized group than in centralized groups. Individuals have greater average freedom within their group. Individuals have greater opportunity to assert their power and freedom in service to their values and goals.

Decentralized groups are more powerful than centralized groups because they have greater stability in the long term. This is because decentralized groups do not depend on any particular individual members. Individuals are integrated when the group is organized so information at the edge is incorporated, so decentralized organizations tend to make better decisions for the common good.

Decentralized organization requires stable governance. Wise choices are necessary in designing each DAO's governance structure, to serve individual and group interests. Matching governance decisions to a group's values is crucial for the long-term harmony of a DAO. Therefore an analysis of the consequences of governance decisions on the explicit results of the reward mechanism in a DAO is crucial. Such an objective analysis is a major purpose of reputation tokenomics.

Centralized groups are more efficient in short-term behavior because decentralized organization requires maximum redundancy. In a DAO, every member must monitor and regulate the behavior of every other member because there is no central authority. So historically, centralization has outcompeted decentralization in many situations.

The only reason we have the potential to create DAOs at this point in history is because recent advances in IT tools are giving us for personal power over the storage, processing, and communication of digital information. P2P tech is emerging which can achieve this maximum redundancy at scale.

Centralization's very quality of efficiency leads to instability – the lack of redundancy makes it fragile and open to disruption. Decentralization is more sustainable. Its redundancy and connectivity allows information-at-the-edge to be communicated to the entire group. Decisions are made with more perfect information.

Discussion of points

The specific statement of DGF's transcendent values was chosen, at this moment in history, for the following reasons.

Individual privacy is enabled by cryptography. In particular zero-knowledge proofs, including public key asymmetric cryptography and digital signatures, allow DAO members to participate and share knowledge with the group without revealing personal information.

Group transparency is necessary in a DAO. Inasmuch as decentralization of power is enacted, the protocols and software and IP of the DAO must be held as common knowledge, i.e., open source. Transparency of group information is important for preventing group oppression of the individual.

Open decentralized ownership means: 1. anyone can join at any time and use their talents and resources in service to the DAO's goals, and 2. anyone is free to leave at any time, taking their talents and earnings with them.

The term essentials in "equity control of essentials" means all the material or immaterial resources that the group believes are necessary for each member to thrive in the group. What this means depends on the group. For example, from a global perspective on humanity, most people would agree that air and water and food to prevent starvation are essential. From the perspective of a citizen in a developed democratic country, education and access to government power and justice are considered further essentials. In a for-profit DAO focused on a narrow job, equal opportunity to using the REP tokens they own to participate in the work smart contract and governance is essential.

Inessentials are everything not essential. There is competition for all inessentials in free markets. However, the freedom of these markets is limited to protect what the group believes are essential.

Tensions

Each of these values are in tension with their paired opposite. The group and the individual need each other for their very existence. Giving the group greater power makes it possible for them to suppress individual freedom. Giving the individual more freedom threatens group cohesion. The group and the individuals are both served when both are more powerful. But when one side wins, they both lose. Therefore formally defining the distinctions is dangerous.

For example, what is public information that should be transparent vs. what is individual information that should be private. Formally defining the distinction leads to group competition over the definition, which undermines the stability of the group. Instead the members should protect the value of maximizing both – maximizing what is public information and maximizing what is individual privacy.

This essential tension holds on many scales and is a foundational idea for many political theories, from the beginning of philosophy. Aristotle developed this idea as the Doctrine of the Mean, in Book II of his Nicomachean Ethics.

Practicalities

There are metaphysical realities that influence the boundaries between the poles in each of the 3 areas. We give a few examples to illustrate the proper expression of these values.

Ownership values example

For example, for the pole between equity control of essentials and meritocratic competition for inessentials, laws of economics suggest that networked technologies should be given preference for being considered as essentials and their products should be shared equitably. The products of networked technologies are not scarce economic goods. Freedom in the development of networked technologies therefore inevitably leads to monopolies due to the network effect. Scarce economic goods follow laws of economics that lead to positive outcomes from free competition. Therefore the design of DGF includes individual rewards for the scarce resource of personal conscious labor (see Work Smart Contract design and DGF workflow).

The decentralization of power is a value, because we believe it will make humanity more effective, more efficient, and more egalitarian. Giving people more power does not necessarily mean that improves their nature, nor their material circumstances, as many political developments throughout history have displayed.

Knowledge values example

Our values concerning the control of information in a DAO breaks along the lines of individual privacy and group (bureaucratic) transparency. As a practical instantiation of these values, consider the case of a judicial action.

When a dispute arises and judicial action occurs, the group is in charge of the outcome, ultimately. Therefore since we value group transparency and individual privacy, the design of the protocols for judicial actions should reflect those values.

Typically, the behavior and statements of the groups should be transparently reported, while the privacy of individuals should be protected. For instance, the information of the proceedings of an arbitration case should be in the custody of the individual unless they are found guilty—and even when they are found guilty, the group should generally err on the side of protecting the individual’s information. (Unless, e.g., the case is between two individuals.) Therefore, the individual should be able to determine whether or not the information from the proceedings is published if they are found innocent. In that case, the individual may publish information about the behavior of the court during the case, but the group should not be allowed to publish the personal knowledge they gained about the innocent individual.

Organization values example

DGF's stated values on organization are for individual power and freedom and group harmony. Here we illustrate a practical instantiation of those values.

The group is always in tension with the individual. In order to exist, a group needs its members to sacrifice their incompatible personal goals to serve the higher goal of the group. At the same time, individuals need the group to give them the power to express their personal goals through the nurturing power of collaboration. A group needs individuals, and individuals need groups. The group has the power to stifle or nurture individuals. Individuals have the power to contribute to or disrupt the group. A healthy group-individual combination has individuals who choose to contribute instead of disrupt, and a group which nurtures its members instead of stifling them.

As one basic example of healthy group/individual behavior, consider the issue of transparency vs. privacy. The ideal individual contributor would use their IRL identity in all their online interactions; on the contrary, the ideal group would protect their members' privacy by providing secure encryption technology to allow people to contribute using pseudonyms without fear of retribution.

When a group governs itself, it is important to continually focus on limiting its natural power to stifle the individual. For individuals to govern themselves, it is important they continually focus on limiting their power to disrupt the group. Occasionally, individuals must disrupt the group; and occasionally, the group must stifle the individual. Those actions are the essence of governance. But they are signals that something is wrong and changes are needed. However, such disruptions and impositions cannot be the norm, or the group will eventually die.

Ideally, laws for personal behavior should be personally chosen, personally enforced, and private. Ideally, laws for group behavior should be group ratified, group enforced, and transparent. Personal laws for personal behavior should be complex and idiosyncratic to each individual. Personal laws for when the individual should disrupt the group should be simple and transparent.

Group laws for group behavior should be short and simple. Group laws limiting the group’s power over the individual should be broad and elaborate.

Applications

Policing DAOs

Main page: Policing DAOs

Every tool ever invented to advance humanity has also been used in malign ways. It is inevitable that DAOs will be formed to commit crime. The DGF project is devoted to creating the tools which give people the freedom to create DAOs in any manner they choose, for any purpose. Given that freedom, it is inevitable that DGF will be used in ways that harm humanity. By decentralizing power in society, it will inevitably accumulate in the hands of those with evil intent. So why participate in the creation of something that can be used for evil purposes?

By spreading power more equitably, the creation of DAOs is intended to make all people more powerful. Bad as well as good intentions will be empowered. Assuming there were more bad intentions, we would not experience stability in our collaborations. Assuming there are more good intentions, empowering people to connect and collaborate to express their intentions will be a net positive. The empowerment of evil collaboration will be overwhelmed by the empowerment of good collaboration. The enabling of criminal markets with DAO tools will be countered by the enabling of DAOs devoted to policing those markets.

The DGF project is devoted to taking responsibility for the malign uses that its tools enable in the following manner. We are committed to developing Policing DAOs to leverage information at the edge to counter and disincentivize any malign uses of DGF technology, intentional or not. We believe the collaboration tools we develop will be capable of preventing more social ills in sum than it creates.

Example

For instance, a Sexual Trafficking Policing DAO can offer rewards for information that leads to the successful prosecution of any sexual trafficking crimes. The pseudonymity of a primary DAO enables the reporting of evidence of crime with less chance of discovery and recrimination. The transparency of a primary DAO proves the protocols for reward distribution are valid, and that the history of reporter security is valid. This creates greater motivation to participate in reporting crimes than legacy institutions of policing can provide. The transparency of a primary DAO structure prevents much of the current corruption that plagues legacy policing. The global openness of primary DAOs allows supranational participation, which eliminates much of the international bureaucratic obstacles to justice.

See Also

• DGF project
  • DGF
  • Contributors guide
  • Governance philosophy
  • Guiding principles
    • Individual code of conduct
    • Group governance code of conduct
  • Ethical considerations
• Transcendent Values
  • Transcendent Values Thesis