Decentralisation at Work: Cooperatives on the Blockchain - dGen Blog

While many crypto startups have successfully made their users into owners by following the Progressive Decentralization playbook, a number of founding teams feel compelled to step back from their projects at the time of token launch to reduce the risk that their tokens will be deemed securities. An alternative path may allow founders to stay involv... See more

-Cryptonetworks and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) as the future of internet-native co-ops: Such networks address two major issues that have prevented traditional cooperative businesses from becoming pervasive: access to capital and complexity of governance. With the issuance of a token, cryptonetworks can benefit from market specula... See more

The idea of a decentralized organization takes the same concept of an organization, and decentralizes it. Instead of a hierarchical structure managed by a set of humans interacting in person and controlling property via the legal system, a decentralized organization involves a set of humans interacting with each other according to a protocol specif... See more

Decentralized organizations enable work to be distributed to the community members instead of being entirely driven by top-down decision making hierarchies. While tokens financially align participants to contribute value to such a network, it is grassroots community leadership and ownership that enables the long-term success of a token network.

I’m all for peer-to-peer collectives, but what is preventing people from implementing these kinds of org/governance structures off the blockchain? Basically I’m sold that the world needs decentralized autonomous organizations. Why do we need the blockchain to make them reality?

At the end of the day, the best framework for an organization may not be a choice between a cooperative or DAO model, but a blend of both. Incorporating cooperative values into crypto networks could take the form of a traditional cooperative that bootstraps its network through on-chain tokenized contributions. Alternatively, a DAO could decide to a... See more