The World Is Changing: DAC Governance

in #dac6 years ago (edited)

It’s not changing fast enough for some and too fast for others. The justification of monopoly control of governance and law by nation-states is beginning to fade away and leave open opportunities for new approaches like Voluntaryism, Aggorism, and yes, even Anarchy which truly means without rulers. These concepts are often misunderstood. Many hear chaos, disorder, or “no rules." When in fact, this new peaceful approach to coexistence embraces voluntary agreements, multi-signature contracts, time-locked transactions, on-chain bonds, and cryptographic security. The world we’re building doesn’t use threats of violence or standing armies to invade, kill, and take. In this new world, code within transparent, immutable blockchains enshrines our commitments to each other, our communities, and our desire for mutual benefit.


한글 번역본: 세계가 바뀌고 있습니다: DAC 거버넌스

中文翻译: 世界正在改变:DAC 式管理


We want to create value for everyone instead of just extracting it for ourselves. Concepts like psychological egoism and long-term rational self-interest over short-term thinking give us a path forward to increase economic freedom and prosperity.

No matter how many great ideas we come up with, we still have to live in the real world right now. This world is controlled by hundreds of years of legal tradition with a wide range of jurisdictional approaches. We can’t build utopian fantasies, pretending all of that will just go away. As we pioneer the smart contracts living on EOS through eosDAC to create decentralized autonomous communities, we still have to interact with the current physical world, with all of its legacy structures.

Unlike a corporation, a DAC has no personhood. It can’t do business or enter into contracts according to the current laws unless it does so as a partnership, club, or association. This would mean the actions of one person can impact everyone, or maybe just those who are public enough to be targets. It’s possible a handful of custodians could be on the hook for the bad action of anyone in the group. If the custodians are protected by the constitution, then the liability may fall on each and every member, or maybe just those members with resources a particularly litigious adversary might go after.

What if we all just hide our true identities with encryption and pseudonyms? The Cypher Punk Manifesto, written back in 1993, talks about the importance of privacy and encryption as a possible path forward. At the same time, we need trust and reputation. I wrote about privacy, identiy, and human flourishing in April of 2017. Dan Larimer also wrote about it in December of 2017 with the post Does Freedom Require Radical Transparency or Radical Privacy? This new world we’re creating may require us to put our real selves out there and stand up for what we believe in.

We can’t hide behind the banner of “decentralization" because if one custodian or one member can be found, then they can be made responsible for the entire DAC. That is unacceptable. We will not put our members at risk, and yet we are not satisfied with the status quo. The risks are great, ranging from defamation, bribery, interference, conspiracy, and other claims arising from the wide area of law known as tort. The damage awards for such claims can be large, encompassing punitive damages, consequential loss, and more. When people engage in worker proposals, that could be considered a form of employment bringing about statutory liability.

A tort, in common law jurisdictions, is a civil wrong that causes a claimant to suffer loss or harm resulting in legal liability for the person who commits the tortious act.

Source: Wikipedia

If we do business as a DAC, we may be considered a partnership among every member meaning every member is at risk based on the actions of every other member.

You didn’t think changing the world would be easy, did you?

So how will eosDAC overcome this challenges? The current plan is to contract with a traditional corporate entity which will be the service provider for the DAC. An organization is currently emerging in Switzerland that is seeking to serve customers organized as DACs, specifically reflecting their structure and their members' needs in how it transacts with them. They will own and control an EOS account and will thus have the ability to use the worker proposal system and pay those who complete proposals in the context of their services to the DAC. The agreements will be between the worker and the service provider, not between the worker and all the members or custodians of the DAC. The DAC will then purchase the relevant resources from the service provider under an agreement that is specifically tailored to the structure of the DAC and will limit the liability of the individual DAC members and custodians much more than the terms of traditional workers or vendors typically would.

We are happy to inform you that eosDAC and the founders of the Swiss service provider, which are also members of eosDAC, intend to work together to foster a lasting partnership between parties who understand what the DAC is intended to be and what its needs are. This, we hope, will give the DAC separation and the DAC's members protection from the terms of typical vendor agreements, but still allow the governments of the world to recognize something they are familiar with in how we source our resources. If at any time the service provider doesn’t meet the needs of the DAC, a new service provider may be found. To many, the idea of entering into a contract with a traditional corporate entity seems like a step backwards. It may include having to go through traditional contract companies such as DocuSign which may not protect the privacy of the members. We’re hoping to eventually push the whole ecosystem forward with on-chain, cryptographic signatures and Ricardian contracts which protect privacy and only require identity in the event of a dispute or legal conflict, otherwise keeping individuals anonymous behind their EOS accounts, if they so choose. This may prove to be acceptable in some jurisdictions or the legal system may not be ready for it altogether and require traditional, signed contracts. Ideally, we want to innovate and get the world on-chain.

This is the path forward we’re exploring. A world without threats of violence, but instead mutual support and voluntary agreement. It won’t be easy, and it won’t be perfect. The lawyers may not be happy because they might still see liability concerns for the DAC and the courts may not be happy because we’re not doing everything in ways they already know how to deal with. The risks we’ll take will be calculated. If we succeed, the pressure we’ll put on the traditional systems via our success might just make the societies of tomorrow a better place for our children to live.

I hope you join us on this adventure.

If you have EOSDAC tokens, you can register as a member of the DAC today. If you are being asked to lead by the communities that support you, please consider becoming a custodian candidate and join us we shape the future.

I’m not at all a lawyer and much of this I still don’t understand, but I’m learning from some very intelligent lawyers who are working to make the DAC successful. As an individual, I can’t speak for the whole DAC, but I do have a voice, just like you. If you have something to contribute, please join us in our discord server: http://discord.io/eosdac

  • Luke Stokes (with some modifications made by our lawyers) :)

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Thanks for sharing this with us. Very interesting and informative.
You wrote:
If we do business as a DAC, we may be considered a partnership among every member meaning every member is at risk based on the actions of every other member.

I don't understand this can you please elaborate a little more.
Great post.
Joy

Again, I'm not a lawyer, but as I'm working to understand how this works, it seems if we're not a corporate entity like a normal government-created legal corporation, then we'll be seen by governments as an association. In an association, everyone is responsible and liable for everyone else. That means if we had a DAC of 100,000 people and one person did something bad, then all 100,000 people could be considered responsible. If any of those 100,000 are publicly known, they could be targets for litigation.

So we do need the steem monitors after all......wonderful.
And wonderful...lol
joy

It won't be a partnership as the maximum for most states is 100 partners.

Nice. Well done Luke.

TIMM includes eosdacserver in the mentormarket proxy vote. Keep up the great work.

We can’t hide behind the banner of “decentralization" because if one custodian or one member can be found, then they can be made responsible for the entire DAC.

I'm glad you have eventually talked to some lawyers to figure this out. Actually it is much worse than that. As administrators for the DAC you put yourself at risk. Not every state is benevolent in this world and some could possibly hold you ultimately responsible for the DAC regardless of how far you distance yourself from it using country based incorporation for the admin side. This would apply to Blockmaker too whose T & C would not be considered enforceable as the goal is the creation of transnational entity. Other countries would almost definitely say that they are only applicable to the country of origin.

I'm guessing this Swiss entity is going to be based in Zug. This will close as many doors as it will open.

The only bodies beyond governments that have ever manged to push through any form of transnational constitution have been unions. Although they may be far from perfect you may well learn something by speaking to some of them.

The DAC itself in its current form with no co-operative forms of legal protection would make it unwise for anyone except for political activists who do not worry about being extradited to take part. I know that I will be relinquishing my membership.

I'm glad you have eventually talked to some lawyers to figure this out.

I think you may be mischaracterizing the process up to this point. We've worked hard with lawyers from the very beginning to create the current constitution which does outline the risks involved, and we've always planned to minimize those risks as much as possible with a service provider entity using the traditional corporate structure. The first iteration hoped to use a service provider in Anguilla as eosDAC Ltd, but they (from what little I understand as some of that was before I joined) had trouble getting access to effective banking which was one of the primary needs for an off-chain entity to begin with regarding traditional contractual relationships and fiat agreements. A service provider in Switzerland should hopefully solve that concern.

When you say "administering the DAC" what do you mean? The service company will have legal contracts with everyone who wants to do business with the entity. The DAC will have no agreements, other than with the service provider (ideally). The service provider will take recommendations from the custodians of the DAC, as any service provider does when they provide services. The service entity is responsible (and will have appropriate insurance in place) for the contracts they agree to and that is separate from the DAC. They certainly will have to contextualize those agreements based on the jurisdictions of the people involved. I've been following https://www.mattereum.com/ a bit, and I'm encouraged to know these challenges are being worked out.

I'm sorry to hear you will not be participating in this approach to decentralized, non-violent, on-chain governance. I really do think it's an important path forward for our species, and you do seem to be passionately involved in these discussions both here and on Discord. I think you have a lot to offer, including the recommendation to consider Union equivalents to what DACs are working to accomplish.

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