I’m not much of a story teller, and (even though what I write can sometimes be quite wordy, my apologies for that) I don’t like to waste anyone’s time, so let’s get right to it.
Current governments and governance systems are IMHO outdated, in many places incapable of dealing with the speed of changes, or outright broken. I’m sure you’ll be able to find enough evidence for that by yourself, without me having to elaborate heaps on that.
So I tried to come up with a new governance system that might be a suitable alternative, replacement or addition to existing systems. Please let me know in the comments what you think about the following.
I’m envisioning a new online system that allows users to find solutions to big or small problems, and that creates a reward (crypto token) for entities that implement these ideas.
Any user will be able to create a unique identity (1 user account per ‘real person’) to participate on the platform. Users can create and discuss about ideas (with a system that removes (additional) bias as much as possible by showing randomized & anonymized up-/downvoteable posts); I can post more details about that if you ask for it).
Based on that discussion they can put specific ideas up for a vote, associated with a community-created wikipedia-style summary containing as much information as compact and digestible as possible. Before voting users would need to pass a very basic test to ensure that they have done their due diligence (a very easy test, reading the summary is enough to pass).
Important: as opposed to typical national political votings it is not necessary and even not always desired to have as many people voting as possible, it is much more important to have an educated representation of what is considered as ‘the right thing to do’.
Voting is generally open to anybody, but can be restricted to a limited circle of individuals, e.g. it might be desirable to have only individuals from a municipality voting on something that only effects that municipality. (It will be visible to everybody though).
Votes will be anonymous, and — considering that there will be way too many different ideas & votings available to keep up with all of them — votes can be delegated to any other user for any subset/filter of issues (e.g. delegate votes for all issues that will be found with an ‘environment’ search to a specific user that is trustworthy).
Furthermore, ideas and vote outcomes will always be ongoing, there won’t be a deadline (with some exceptions): at any time votes can be changed and delegations withdrawn. Ideas will usually find an equilibrium after some time, and after big events (e.g. terror attacks, new scientific studies, …) the opinion might shift and with it the equilibrium.
Once an idea was voted on, anyone (individuals, institutions, companies, governments, …) can implement the idea that was approved as ‘good’ for humankind. Whoever implements an issue will receive a reward in form of a newly minted crypto token. This token is a sign that ‘the receiving entity did something good for humankind’ (more on that in the next part below). The amount of received tokens depends on some factors that will need to be worked out in detail, i.e. how stable the equilibrium is, how many users voted, how controversial it is (equilibrium at roughly 50% pro/con), how much work (working hours) was spent etc… .
Entities will only receive the tokens if they file a report about what they did, which includes amount of work done. These reports serve as a proof of work, and simultaneously as publicly visible data about how good a certain idea is (e.g. reports should optimally also include details such as the effect that the implementation had).
The transactions within this system (discussions, voting, reports, tokens, …) will have to be securely recorded somewhere, e.g. on a blockchain or similar technology (holochain? I don’t know enough about this project yet to know whether this might be suitable). Depending on the technology and exact implementation, tokens can be a reward for e.g. miners, or could also be structured as a general ‘basic income’ to all registered users (if i.e. there is a mining process that is computationally so cheap that every device can randomly be used to contribute to the security of the system).
Tokens will be tradeable, and I assume that these tokens will gain value relatively fast (more on that at the end, but mainly because they’re carrying a very valuable intrinsic value: Recognition and acceptance of doing something good). The more value the tokens have, the better, because they can be used as leverage by the community to encourage good behaviour (same as / replacing money).
Other mechanisms of limiting the abuse of this system / ‘bad behaviour’ and encourage ‘good behaviour’ (where ‘bad behaviour’ stands for e.g. faking reports, breaking promises, hiding information…) are conceivable and could be added to the system where necessary. For example, the necessity could arise to be able to downvote entities (but not individual users, except they’re public officials such as president/prime minister), and the system should be set up so that mechanisms like this can be added, removed and modified with the consent of the community.
Some additional mechanisms such as ‘challenges’ or ‘promises’ can be introduced to that system to incentivize a broader audience using it: challenges can be put up to reward individual users with tokens for everyday action (riding bike, using the better product/service, …); promises of politicians could be recorded and tokens could be handed out for fulfilling these promises within a timeframe (after which they’d be considered as ‘broken’ and publicly noted as that on the profile)
The value of reward tokens
I tried to avoid having to create yet another of a plethora of new cryptocurrencies, but I do acknowledge the importance of a reward mechanism to have a means of incentivising good usage of the system. In order to have some power, the token needs to have a recognised value. This value will for one be the intrinsic value of the recognition to have done something good, but also comes from a variety of other factors listed below:
- Reputation: The more tokens an entity/individual has, the more good they’re doing. This gives them a good reputation and makes individuals feel good
- Certificate: Products can display the amount of tokens associated with it (similar to ‘energy star rating’ etc) increasing sales and profit. (The famous 16th of existing 15 standards that will replace them all, … but this time for real ;-) (Users that participate (discuss & vote about ideas) will certainly be familiar with the logo, so cheap products can’t just replace it with their own, and due to its universal applicability (less specific) it has the potential to be soon a well known, trustworthy and easily identifiable token.
- Proof of work: tokens will be received based on the total working hours spent on an issue (amongst other criteria). Theoretically this should be valued as such (I’m not an economist/financial analyst/whatever and don’t know whether that’s likely to be true, please help me out here and let me know if I have a wrong idea here!!! But my hunch is that this is how it should work).
- Accessibility: Challenges, mining and implementing ideas earn tokens. They will be widely distributed and associated with ‘doing good (work)’; and thus recognized & acknowledged (many people will have a personal relationship to what it means to earn those tokens)
- Tradeable: Having tokens — a sign of ‘doing good’ — tradeable might sound like a contradiction if you can just buy it. However, I think by buying tokens from companies that sell them for doing good work we’re supporting those ‘good’ companies, and thus doing something good ourselves (and thus we deserve those tokens as a reward for something good). It might be reasonable though to impose a (relatively high?) tax or better even ‘dissolving’ of traded tokens to represent the ‘distance’ from doing good in a first instance. I.e. during every trade the token might lose 10% of its value. (dissolving tokens for trading may have a value-decreasing effect, so this has to be balanced and thought about carefully and in the starting phase trading may not cause dissolving of tokens.)
- Scarcity: There should be an inbuilt token decay, which is linked to a total maximum amount of available tokens; e.g. 1% of tokens per year would disappear in order to counteract inflation and create a market cap. Scarcity usually increases the value of a token
- Official Use: Tokens could become mandatory for some things. I hope that some partnering governments or entities will require these tokens at some point; e.g. only cars that have a certain amount of tokens for their reduced CO2-emissions will be allowed to drive in major cities, or a company pledges to use only energy from the provider with the most tokens. (Again, this might seem to contradict with ‘doing good’, since energy providers could simply buy more tokens. But because they’d support something good upstream that should be ok. And it would not be applicable in the car example, because a product can only ever have the tokens directly associated with itself, and not with the company.)
I hope I didn’t forget any of the main mechanisms. I do have a more complete version of this idea here, if anyone is interested in more details. I wrote about this for the Global Challenges Foundation, that’s why it comes in that format specifically addressing the main challenges we’re facing these days. (And yeah I know, the names I have given different aspects of the framework may not be the best… I’m sure you can ignore that ;-) )
Let me know what you think, whether this sounds like something that might have a chance; and possibly what you think the effects of it would be. (I think it might reduce the role that money has in our society and how value is created, and it might get rid of the current voting system, with that political parties and party affiliation, and potentially change the whole governing system as we know it)!
Ps: This is my first post on Medium, please guide me to more appropriate forums to talk about a system like this if you are aware of one.
