The proposal below is put forward by Placeholder, an early investor in Aragon and one of the largest holders of ANT. An earlier version of the proposal is available here.
The associated vote was live on Aragon Voice from June 3, 2022 to June 17, 2022.
Proposal Summary
Limit the foundational document of the Aragon Network DAO (AN DAO) to a mission statement, description of the core governance structure/process, and community guidelines.
Set aside funds for the Aragon Association (AA) and Aragon Labs (AL) to continue existing operations up until November 30, 2022. Transfer the remaining funds from the AA to a smart contract address governed through a delegative ANT voting system. Transfer control of the ANT token contract to the same delegative voting system.
All outflows from and changes to the aforementioned contracts, as well as the delegative voting system, will initially be subject to a quorum requirement of 0.3% of ANT circulating, a 60% support threshold, and a minimum implementation delay of 10 days after the end of the voting period. Annual operational expense is initially capped at 10% of the starting (USD) value of the treasury. Annual treasury/yield management is initially capped at 25% of the starting (USD) value of the treasury.
Motivation
The Aragon treasury and the ANT token contract are currently controlled by a centralized organization, the AA. In order to stay true to the project’s ethos, both should be governed by the AN DAO. The objective of the proposal is to further decentralize the AN DAO by transferring control of the treasury and the ANT token contract to a delegative ANT voting system, while securing funding for the AA and AL up until November 30, 2022. As a result, ANT holders are empowered to have a more direct say in how the AN DAO allocates its resources for the long-term success of the project.
Proposal Description
Step 1: Limit the foundational document of the AN DAO, currently the Aragon Network DAO Charter, to a mission statement, description of the core governance structure/process, and community guidelines. The remaining parts of the current Charter are to be reviewed and integrated with the AN DAO documentation, where appropriate.
Finalizing the foundational document should be done in an open and inclusive manner before it can be ratified through an ANT holder vote at any point during the tentative timeline provided below. The same applies to other substantive changes to the AN DAO documentation as it relates to the core governance structure/process.
Step 2: Set aside funds for AA and AL to continue existing operations up until November 30, 2022. The subsequent role of the AA in the AN DAO should be limited to activities that can’t be easily transferred to the various sub-DAOs and guilds of the AN DAO, including but not limited to acting as a legal proxy in contracts and employment agreements with core team members and DAO contributors. After November 30, any funding for the AA and AL from the AN DAO treasury must be approved through the delegative voting system specified in Steps 3 and 4 (and eventually the foundational document of the AN DAO; see Step 1).
Step 3: Establish the AN DAO delegative voting system whereby ANT holders can delegate their voting power to other individuals or entities. At launch, the delegative voting system must meet the following criteria:
- ANT holders can delegate either all or only part of their voting power.
- ANT holders retain the right to override their delegates’ votes at any time.
- ANT holders retain the right to undelegate their voting power at any time.
- Anyone can propose themselves as a delegate on the Aragon Forum.
- All delegates must adhere to the Delegate Code of Conduct.
- Changes to the delegative voting system must be approved by ANT holders according to the requirements specified in Step 4 (and eventually the foundational document of the AN DAO; see Step 1).
At launch, the delegative voting system doesn’t have to support the option for individual ANT holders to distribute their voting power among multiple delegates, but this feature should be added in the future. In case the existing Aragon software doesn’t support the requirements specified in the current proposal, the AN DAO may temporarily rely on external tooling.
The delegative voting system does not preclude the DAO from implementing other voting mechanisms in the future, subject to the requirements specified in Step 4 (and eventually the foundational document of the AN DAO; see Step 1).
Step 4: Create a new contract address for the AN DAO treasury and transfer the treasury (apart from funds specified in Step 2) from the AA to the new contract address. All outflows from and changes to the treasury contract must be subject to a vote through the delegative ANT voting system (specified in Step 3) according to the following criteria (to be included in the foundational document of the AN DAO; see Step 1):
Quorum: 0.3% of total ANT circulating (subject to change)
Threshold: 60% of ANT participating, either directly or through delegation (subject to change)
Annual outflow gap (operational expense): 10% of the starting (USD) value of the treasury
Annual outflow gap (treasury/yield management): 25% of the starting (USD) value of the treasury
Minimum delay between vote approval and execution: 10 days
Transfer control of the ANT token contract to the same delegative voting system.
Approximate Timeline & Voting Requirements
| Description | Date |
|—|—|—|
| Initial proposal forum post | April 15, 2022 |
| Feedback period | April 15, 2022 to April 30, 2022 |
| Buffer (finalizing) | May 1, 2022 to May 20, 2022 |
| Final proposal forum post | May 20, 2022 |
| Finalize/publish the vote text | May 20, 2022 to May 27, 2022 |
| Buffer (vote preparation) | May 27, 2022 to May 31, 2022 |
| Voting starts | June 1, 2022 |
| Voting ends | June 14, 2022 |
| Implementation (soft deadline) | By November 30, 2022 or February 28, 2023 (subject to vote) |
Quorum: 0.1% of ANT circulating
Support threshold: Option with the highest support wins
Add-On and Fall-Back Options
The current proposal envisions the AN DAO to operate as a distributed, on-chain entity that may involve contributions from many individuals and organizations around the world. This is uniquely enabled by decentralized coordination technologies, such as public blockchain networks, and represents a novel form of organization native to the Digital Revolution. However, DAO governance is a nascent and evolving field, and what’s viable or optimal may change over time, requiring the AN DAO to adjust its structure and operations accordingly.
Depending on the future role of the AA in the AN DAO, the current proposal does not exclude the option of ANT holders gaining governance rights inside the AA, even if the AN DAO treasury and the ANT token contract are no longer controlled by it. In case the AA fails to transfer the treasury and the ANT token contract to the AN DAO, as a last resort fall-back option, the system specified in Steps 3 and 4 can be implemented within the AA instead. In such a scenario, individual ANT holders would have the option to either become voting members of the AA, or delegate their voting power to other members of the AA. The exact details of such an arrangement should be discussed and specified in the context of a separate proposal.
In case it is officially revealed that transferring the Aragon treasury from the AA to the AN DAO results in a significant tax liability, a separate ANT holder vote should decide whether that’s an acceptable cost of creating an on-chain DAO or whether the AN DAO should explore alternative options, including the fall-back described above.
Related Efforts and Future Outlook
Outside of what’s explicitly stated above, the current proposal is not prescriptive when it comes to implementation details or alignment with other ongoing efforts within the AN DAO to improve its structure and operations. Similarly, the proposal does not preclude any future iterations of the AN DAO governance system as long as these meet the requirements specified in Steps 3 and 4 (and eventually the foundational document of the AN DAO; see Step 1).