ENDING THE FLAG WARS--A Proposal for Decentralized Justice Regarding Flagging, Fraudulent Behavior, and User Disputes on Steemit
I joined Steemit a few days ago, so bear with me if anyone has come up with this idea already. Carrying on with the concept of Steemit's decentralized infrastructure, Steemit needs to develop its judicial system. As a second-year law student interested in topics of anarchism and the law, I thought I would propose an idea that I have.
From what I understand, Steemit moderation is already decentralized. If a post violates Steemit community rules--written or unwritten--that post will be flagged by another user. Again, the more Steem Power that a user has, the more power they have to strike down certain posts with their flagging power. That is fine with me, and I think that is the way it should be.
However, since being flagged can have serious financial consequences for users, I am proposing a system of "due process" along with a decentralized judicial system with alternative dispute resolution for flagged material, and for other disputes that arise on Steemit.
In order to create this system, some users (probably whales/dolphins) should assert themselves as judges, or make it known that they will mediate disputes between users. The litigants my represent themselves, or hire an advocate. Before trial, all parties must agree on a judge, and must agree before the mediation that they will accept the judgment.
As this Steemit legal process gets more established, certain judges will become known for their fairness and ability to produce agreeable judgments. The Steemit team will have to decide how judges will be able to assume the power needed to enforce their judgments, and how the trial system would work. Of course, anyone with good community standing could become a judge (judges and hired advocates would get steem for their work). In regard to that, I'd love to elaborate, but would need more intimate knowledge of how Steemit works.
I apologize if this idea has already been presented, or if I am fundamentally misunderstanding the issues facing Steemians in regards to flagging. I know this concept would steepen the learning curve, but in its current form, Steemit's flagging process is street justice, without any kind of judicial process. Anarchy doesn't mean no rules, just no rulers.
In practice, I imagine this system would work like it does in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. We could even establish common-law precedent, which would create a decentralized body of law for Steemit. The concept is very exciting, and I hope that you guys can join me in that excitement! Also, me being a young attorney, I think it would be really cool to help develop this and/or represent Steemians with their future disputes.
I would urge that Steemit presents us all with a very unique opportunity to test theories of decentralized justice in a controlled environment. This could be huge!
Let me know your thoughts in the comments, and give me a follow @libertyweekly https://steemit.com/@libertyweekly/
Image Credit to Pixabay
I would love to read more about this kind of thing as you get to know Steem more and perhaps develop an idea of "due process". I find the idea of judges to be instantly disagreeable, but the idea of some kind of justice which is not based solely on stake power will appeal to a lot I know.
I'll keep an open mind for the moment 🙂
Also I had a question about something semi-related
How can you have rules without an authority to enforce them? I have been wondering about that for a long time.
I agree that the rules should be just, and the authority limited, but surely there must be some government or group of people with the authority to enforce some rules. Right?
But regardless, great post my friend.
Keep steeming :D
One concept is holacracy. Not sure if or how it would work for the steem block chain, but it looks interesting. I posted about it a few days ago - https://steemit.com/business/@remlaps/7-videos-about-holacracy-a-social-technology-for-human-self-organization
Yeah, definitely, but the distinction lies within whether or not those rules are voluntarily agreed to. One must voluntarily agree to respect the rule of law. Acceptance of the rule of law is almost always within a party's best interest because without accepting some rule of law, they will receive no protection from others by those laws in return. Does that idea make sense?
Yes, it makes sense, but once rules have to be enforced someone has to do the enforcing, you will say this will be done by the community, but as has been proven time after time someone will always take it upon himself to be THE enforcer, and there we go again we end up eventually having a government. So basically to me anarchism is merely a chimera, a very nice topic of conversation but ultimately unobtainable.
As for your idea which is basically a trial could be a good idea but I think it could waste too much time.
I think it would be a waste of time for flagging stuff, but the hassle of taking it to a trial would prevent people from flagging out of spite. It would also open the door for alternative dispute resolution.
In terms of Anarchy, the state is already THE enforcer, what I am talking about getting rid of the state's monopoly on justice. no one has the power to enforce rules against you unless you voluntarily agree to them. If you want to protection of the law for yourself, you would have to agree to respect the law as applied to others. A monopoly on enforcement only comes when people passively or actively accept the government's monopoly on violence and justice.
It is very much possible that the free market can provide for all the services that we "need" the state for. Denying the state, or one single entity of that monopoly would be anarchy I am talking about.
I appreciate the interaction here!
Yeah, put the State on the free market! Justice, police, welfare, education, and so on :)
Perfect democracy is also unobtainable. No need to be maximalist.
There are many kinds of anarchism, more or less utopian, some leaning right, some left. I think we're talking about ancap here. How do you abolish State? Really complex and pretty illegal because State already exist and has power, so it's dangerous being an active revolutionary anarchist.
But I think we can agree on anarchist principles like: reduce use of force to minimum, reduce monopoly / concentration of power to minimum, federalism, and so on.
I think a pragmatic libertarian is similar to a classic liberal on steroids, but I could be wrong here.
It is an interesting concept.
I am not sure if it is needed for flagging as such but I do find the idea of a blockchain based legal system a fascinating model.
It doesn't necessarily have to apply to a traditional legal model either - it could involve arbitration and dispute resolution.
When I was involved in the DAO last year if I remember correctly Andreas Antonopoulos suggested something along these lines.
I would be interested to see if you could flesh this out a bit more (in plain language since most of us aren't legally trained).
Ahhh yeah I could see flagging as being a bit mundane, unless the amount lost is super significant.
I also love ideas of arbitration and ADR--it would open justice up to a free market.
I'll definitely flesh it out, just gotta spend more time on Steemit and figure out the nuts and bolts. Should be fun!
For sure. I look forward to it:)
thanks for the RS, bud :)
You're welcome:)
I like it.
Make it open and transparent. I wonder how we can do that ? Oh waiiiit the blockchain! s/
So, yes bring the dispute out , have a judge/moderator get paid via post rewards , if the community loves his judgement. This can all be done on the fly. Have the dispute page spun out of a flag. Win-Win all around!
Sounds interesting. A due process would be nice. Would there be a specific place on the site for settling disputes?
Yes, I think Steemit would have to provide an open "courtroom" of sorts to facilitate legal proceedings. I have faith those specifics could all be worked out.
I really like the idea of a decentralized justice system, but the problem currently is that any whale has the power to appoint themselves an unofficial judge, which some certainly are doing. Once someone has reached whale status they don't really have to participate in any private legal system, since they are powerful enough to defend themselves from most flag attacks.
Things could be worse here, I don't know exactly how to make it better but the private solutions you discussed are definitely the kind of thing that should ultimately prevail.
I understand that, but if a flag can only be enforced through an order from a judge then it would even the playing field. Of course, a judge would have to have the endorsement of both parties before trying the case.
New to steemit so will follow - still trying to understand it all before making any judgement or comment.
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