No. 33 and related comments above highlight one of the major limitations of CIP-1694 governance. Problems arise from stating that “all members of the Cardano community are expected to abide by this Interim Constitution.” The statement entrenches that the constitution and governance model aim to reduce the number of different voices within the ecosystem, which is a step backwards rather than forwards. Also, there is no way of enforcing how any community member(s) may or may not abide by the constitution. Therefore, making such a statement–while enthusiastic–is unworkable and meaningless. The constitution discusses rights with no genuine capability of establishing responsibilities, which are at least as important.
For example, nothing in the constitution or CIP-1694 governance model can stop the buying and selling of votes from emerging as best practice. Buying and selling of votes seems comparable to the behavior of stake pool operators (SPOs) operating multiple stake pools, which has emerged and continues to occur even at the most senior levels of the Cardano community to erode the ecosystem with no consequences for SPOs who may do so.
Discussion about Cardano governance consistently confuses human values and numerical values.
The lack of discourse related to the constitution is very concerning. 455M ADA in total–about the amount delegated to only seven saturated stake pools–voted on the interim constitutional committee, with about 1950 unique votes. In an ecosystem of 45B ADA, 455M ADA represents literally (the) one percent.
One cannot help wondering whether the Cardano governance effort may produce the unintended consequence of making the governance model and perhaps the whole ecosystem irrelevant. Irrelevance would by far not be the worst possible outcome of CIP-1694 governance.
For CIP-1694 to succeed, the challenge may be building technology that helps people while resisting the temptation to build technology to replace people.
Don’t forget to vote.
CHG Pool opposes CIP-1694 governance, and supports useful and original thinking, such as It Takes a Village.