Governing
We already explored underlying aspects of just that in the previous posts about "Sourcing, Refining, Distributing" and "Signalling" - now we build on these foundations to describe possible models of governance in a good world.
- There are many great examples of governance models that have survived hundreds of years. One of the more prominent examples is the Haudenosaunee Confederacy with the idea of being accountable for seven generations in the future. On a more abstract level, Alexander Bard has a very interesting report on how hunter-gatherer tribes have self-organised (if you can look past the polarising presentation). A final example is the Gada System of the Oromo people which has been put on the UNESCO list of "Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity" in 2016.
What we can gather from these examples, which are just the tip of the iceberg, is that our species already knows very well how to engage in collective coordination at small scales. It could be summed up as systems of social consensus and collaborative economy with a reputation-based peer-to-peer governance protocol (shout out to Kume for this crisp line). Where our coordination breaks down is at the bigger scales of a bioregion, city, nationstate or beyond.
This poses a very intriguing set of questions:
What might a governance system look like at scales where human connection breaks down?
Are there patterns we can learn from indigenous governance system?
Can we transpose these patterns into digital spaces that scale to global levels?
For all of these points i have at least one person in mind who i will invite into a in depth conversation on the topic. If you want to suggest someone, please do so in the comments, in Roam (if you have access) or on the Discord channel. I have decided, it is time to invite all of us into the possibility for an ongoing conversation as me move towards the more concrete and actionable parts of this journey. So, please join here: https://discord.gg/s3ezU33362