A Recommendation from the G&L Pod for Future KIPs - by Mo, Pamela, and Jeff

Article 0xxxx Meetings

Section 0x1 Regular Meetings

Section 0x2 Special Meetings

Section 0x3 Quorum Consensus

Consensus is a process of building agreement among members for a proposal. Voting is a process by which each individual expresses their support or opposition to a proposal.

Voters - here is where you describe how abstentions are handled and what is and what is not a vote. Voters Approve, Deny, or Abstain.

The key difference is that voting is decided by the majority (typically), while consensus seeks agreement from all (or almost all) members.

Issues with majority rule are obvious in the societies we live in today. The voices of the minority can be marginalized, often resulting in inequitable and inefficient decisions. This can lead to factionalism and inequitable outcomes in which dissatisfied factions within the community feel unheard and unrepresented. For example, if 6 folks in a 10-person group form a voting block, under majority rule they will get their way 100% of the time.

Simply put, traditional majority-based systems create little incentive or drive for compromise.

Consensus systems, on the other hand, are designed to be flexible and deliberative, and to offer groups the opportunity to continually revise proposals until a hyper-majority of the community agrees. The process of consensus-building is typically conducted through a formalized discussion, and we’ve laid the foundation for that through the first version of the proposal process (see KIP-1).

Naturally, this consensus-building process better reflects the views of the community and ensures that minority voices are heard and incorporated. A consensus system, if done properly, should create better group cohesion and solidarity, more group buy-in, and create the potential for more optimal and creative solutions.

Early KIPs that generated heavy debate still passed with over 80% of voters approving them. As such, we are hopeful that high consensus is possible within our community.

For these reasons, we recommend that Kift move from the default Snapshot voting system (where the 51% majority rules) to a consensus-based system where 80% of voters agree to pass something.

Quorum

Quorum is the minimum number of members of an assembly or society that must be present at any of its meetings to make the proceedings of that meeting valid.

The more community members who vote on a proposal, the more reliable those voting results will be as a true representation of the community. For example, there is a wide gap in consensus between 5 community members all approving a proposal and a group of 40 community members reaching 80% consensus. As such, Kift wants to encourage wide and consistent civic engagement when voting on proposals.

Kift is a complex community with varying degrees of engagement, from members that live at our sites day-in and day-out to members/contributors that spend little to no time on-site. It’s clear from our involvement to date that Kift is a hybrid community of IRL and digital participants.

We will continue to evolve and new patterns of involvement will emerge. One of the patterns that we hope to emerge is increased civic engagement through voting and consensus-building. This is essential to the value proposition of decentralization in a community-led organization. Consensus building across our IRL and digital community will require educating community members on the empowering technology embedded within web3. In order to increase civic participation, we need to dismantle barriers through civic and web3 education and prioritizing equity.