# Articulating Symbiocracy

## Project description (500 words or less)This question is required.

Since late 2021, our cluster of Brazilian researchers, artists, and developers have been discussing different concerns over the direction of Web3 governance. We see practices emerging that yet remain too heavily influenced - structurally and culturally - by legacy institutions. While this may reflect the expedience of the status quo, we believe that it is crucial to expand on countervailing and contrasting perspectives if we are to achieve the regenerative potential of Web3.

In search of inspiration, we looked to nature and its stewards, conceiving an exploration around “Biogovernance” and “symbiosis”. Simultaneously, we reached out to our peers around the world to convene the InterComVerse (ICV) Cycles.

ICV proposes to investigate paths for broader conception of governance and organization in communion with the more-than-human pluriverse in the form of cycles of (1) bibliographic studies and (2) prototyping of artifacts and practices.

This new framework has already yielded many advances. For example, a week-long ArtScience residency in Morretes-PR (Brasil), culminating in the setup of the YXR Life lab, and the seeding of "Symbiocracy" as a concept, originated from the crossing of resources listed under "proposed study materials", two of which came from collaborators within the extended MetaGov community.

**Currently, we are studying the governance structure of honeybees and Margulis' seminal work on symbiogenesis.**

Articulation of such integrative living paradigm with the potential to shift human activity towards more regenerative regimes requires new sensing and sense-making.

*Symbiocracy is a concept aiming to create this habitable multispecies landscapes, (re)imagining the coordination of human governance with sovereignty exercised by an intimate, organismal life-togetherness across and among different species, symbiotically relating to each other and to the environment they share.*

**Through the interface with Metagov, we aspire to gather funds for comprehensive qualitative bibliographic research to root the concept of Symbiocracy**.

We propose a 6-fullmoon-long investigation of a handful of selected materials (novels, papers, books, movies, models), with the intention of answering the question: **What are the characteristic patterns that can craft "Symbiocracy"?**
So to inform future designs in and across Web3, specially DAO's governance models.

**Activities include**:

- Open study cycles focused on selected study materials. Each cycle producing:
1) an artistic audio-visual “summary of perceptions” around the studied materials;
2) a Practical Governance Concepts Workshop to the MetaGov community. Also distributed via [DAOcast](https://daocast.io/);
- Co-authoring speculative fabulations that explores the conceptual and experiential contours of a Symbiocracy inspired governance model, from which a SymbioDAO framework is emergent.

**Proposed study materials**:

- Stigmergy as a universal coordination mechanism I: Definition and Components - paper by Francis Heylighen;
- Honeybee Democracy - book by Thomas D. Seeley, & model by Uri Wilensky (cycle in progress);
- Simbiogenesis - Lynn Margulis; Anna Tsing; among others (cycle in progress);
- Camille Stories - Donna Haraway;
- WarmData - Nora Bateson;
- Indigenous Protocols and AI - Jason Edward Lewis et al. (indicated by MetaGov member);
- Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants - book by Robin Wall Kimmerer (indicated by MetaGov member).

### How does the project contribute to the Metagov community, Metagov's mission, and/or the Gitcoin community?

In essence, this project attempts to coalesce the ongoing digital/web3 revolution and a emerging paradigm of interdependece, symbiosis, and relational evolution. In the words of Donna Haraway we strive for "the intricate weave of organic, technical, textual, mythical, economic and political lines that constitute the flesh of the world".

Therefore, metaphorically speaking, this project has the potential to "memetically" disperse currently rare spores (derived from indigenous epistemologies and/or the scientific symbiotic view of life) in web3 ecosystems and communities, such as Metagov’s and Gitcoin’s.

More specifically, considering that Metagov builds standards and infrastructure for digital self-governance, we argue that finding inspiration in such unconventional roots is important to indicate novel design practices and principles.

This argument seems to resonate within the MetaGov community, based on the conversations we have been having with other members. Some of which have contributed to the making of this proposal and will participate in the proposed research cycle. Therefore, this project is catalyzing new connections within and out of MetaGov and this might continue to happen, as we will certainly collaborate with people who would not know of MetaGov otherwise.

### Requested funding (in USD). This question is required.
USD $ 10,000.00

### How will the funds be spent? This question is required.

Considering the project's breadth, depth and length, we have decided to ask for the maximal funding, so as to guarantee that eveyone involved will be equitably compensated and that unexpected/emergent costs are safeguarded. Our predicted expenses would include, but are not limited to:

- Compensation for the co-creators of the project;
- Research materials, such as: books, movies, gadgets, etc.;
- Compensation for possible interviewees along the process, especially the authors of the works we will be engaging with;
- Contribute to TaoDAO's decentralized shareable fund to access content production skills.

And the most sensible way we have found to go about bugdeting all of this is to treat the funds as the treasury of a "soft DAO". Most especifically, we would be operating with the Empathic Access protocol (http://ovn.world/index.php?title=Empathic_access), which has been tested for two years via taoDAO, a culture-driven DAO co-created by the initial authors of this proposal.

In the principle of transparency we will post on ICV's website a live spreadsheet that publicly shares our expanses along the investigation.

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## NOT FOR METAGOV PROPOSAL

### Inspiration +

> "A crise de habitabilidade de nossos tempos,entretanto, é algo diferente — e é essa diferença que é sinalizada no termo Antropoceno. O Antropoceno não marca a aurora da perturbação humana. Como venho mostrando, a perturbação humana pode fazer parte dos ecossistemas resilientes do Holoceno, como as matas camponesas. O Antropoceno marca, em vez disso, uma quebra nas coordenações, algo que é muito mais difícil de corrigir".

> "O assunto de nossas colaborações é o mutualismo multiespecífico que faz uma terra habitável — então é outra simbiose metafórica. (...) lidar com os outros, seja humano ou não humano, é frequentemente brutal e hierárquico, ou ambos. Quando o mutualismo se desenvolve, é um pequeno milagre e nada pode ser dado como certo. Isso raramente é planejado. A simbiose se desenvolve em uma inesperada conjuntura histórica; ela emerge da situação, à medida em que as partes não planejadas estabelecem novas coordenações. (...) É igualmente fundamental nas simbioses metafóricas que mencionei — colaborações entre tradições de conhecimento, por um lado, e paisagens multiespécies habitáveis, por outro".

**Anna Tsing** - *Em meio à perturbação: simbiose, coordenação, história e paisagem*

*Fig 1 - Symbiocray roots of investigation*


// TK //

Our purpose now is to deepen our understanding around the topics described in the outter circles, BioData, Scientific Knowledge, and Indigenous Wisdom to propose *Symbiocracy* as a type of governance that includes human and non-human realities in the reasoning behind emerging protocols of the digital and non-digital worlds.

---
##### Danilo's version:
Since late 2021, a cluster of Brazilian researchers, artists, and developers have been discussing the issues they have encountered with web3 governance. In their aggregated view, this emerging space is yet too heavily inspired by legacy institutions, both structually and culturally. And while this certainly has benefits, many consequences are not even considered in the general discourse of web3 circles.

In an exercise to imagine how such a phenomena could be constructively challenged, they looked at the so called natural world (as well as its stewards) in search of inspiration. This gave rise to the concept of BioGovernance.

After presenting it to some governance related collectives (MetaGov included), it became clear that it was necessary to take a step back and understand what was at the core of such an inquiry.

And so the initial explorers simultaneously looked within and reached out to their peers overseas, nurturing the soil for the InterComVerse Cycles to emerge. Understanding that web3 and governance are aspects of its inquiry process, ICV proposes to investigate paths for broader contemporary communion with the more-than-human pluriverse, in the form of cycles of (1) bibliographic studies and (2) prototyping of artifacts and practices.

This new framework has already yielded many advancements. For example, a week-long ArtScience residency in Morretes-PR (Brasil), culminating in the setup of the YXR Life lab. And during the same residency the concept of Symbiocracy was born, via the crossing of multiple sources we had been engaging with (two of which have come to our way via the MetaGov community).

### Symbiocracy – creating habitable multispecies landscapes

Considering the multispectral crisis imposed on life in the Anthropocene, *simbiocracy* surfaces as an attempt to coordinate human governance so that sovereignty is exercised by an intimate *life-togetherness* of organisms of different species symbiotically relating to each other and to the environment they share.

The articulation of such a concept is nothing but complex, for it requires not only new tooling but, perhaps most importantly, new sensing and sense-making. And that is why we turn to MetaGov once again.

As ICV, we have come to the understanding that it is fundamental for this work "to stand on the branches of giants." So this proposal seeks to gather funds for a grand qualitative bibliographic research, which we believe will ground deep roots for the concept of Symbiocracy. More concretely, we are proposing a 6-month-long investigation of a handful of selected materials (novels, papers, books, movies, models), with the intention of answering the question: **what are the characteristic patterns of symbiocracy?**

To do that, we intend to:
- Facilitate open study sessions (cycles) around each one of the materials in our list. The deliverables of each one of such cycles would be: 1) an artistic audio-visual "summary of perceptions" around the material 2) a seminar presentation to the MetaGov community (to be distributed via DAOcast as well), focused on how the material informs Symbiocracy as a concept. It is worth mentioning that we will invite the authors of such materials to participate in their respective cycles.
- Co-author a fiction that speculates fabulatively the contours and possibilities of symbiocracy as a concept and governance model, including possible applications for a SymbioDAO.

List of Study Materials

- Stigmergy as a universal coordination mechanism I: Definition and components - paper by FrancisHeylighen
- Honeybee Democracy - book by Thomas D. Seeley, model by Uri Wilensky (cycle already in course)
- Simbiogenesis - Lynn Margulis, Anna Tsing et al. (cycle already in course)
- Camille Stories - Donna Haraway
- WarmData - Nora Bateson
- Indigenous Protocols and AI - Jason Edward Lewis et al.
- Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants - Robin Wall Kimmerer

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##### Tim's Version

Since late 2021, a cluster of Brazilian researchers, artists, and developers have been discussing their concerns over the direction of web3 governance. They see practices emerging that yet remain too heavily influenced - structurally and culturally - by legacy institutions. While this may be simply reflect the expedience of the status quo, we believe that it is crucial to expand on countervailing and contrasting perspectives if we are to achieve the regenerative potential of Web3 and avoid negative consequences adumbrated by the prevailing discourse.

We looked to nature and its stewards in search of inspiration; conceiving an exploration of “Biogovernance” and “Symbiocracy” and began to reflect on this direction of inquiry and reaching out to our peers around the world we convened the InterComVerse Cycles (ICV). ICV proposes to investigate paths for broader conception of Web3 governance in communion with the more-than-human pluriverse, in the form of cycles of (1) bibliographic studies and (2) prototyping of artifacts and practices.

This new framework has already yielded many advancements. For example, a week-long ArtScience residency in Morretes-PR (Brasil), culminating in the setup of the YXR Life lab. And during the same residency the concept of Symbiocracy was born, via the crossing of multiple sources we had been engaging with including collaborators within the extended MetaGov community.

Symbiocracy – creating habitable multispecies landscapes

Considering the complex crises facing Life in the Anthropocene, Simbiocracy imagines the coordination of human governance with sovereignty exercised by an intimate, organismal life-togetherness across and among different species symbiotically relating to each other and to the environment they share.

Articulation of such a integrative living complex possessing the requisite variety to shift human activity toward more regenerative regimes of healthy adaptation requires new sensing and sense-making on the path to sustained cultural shifts and practical innovations in Web3 governance.

We aspire to “stand on the branches of giants” and gather funds for comprehensive qualitative bibliographic research to establish deep roots for the concepts of Symbiocracy. We propose a 6-month-long investigation of a handful of selected materials (novels, papers, books, movies, models), with the intention of answering the question: what are the characteristic patterns of symbiocracy?

Anticipated activities include:

Open study cycles focused on selected study materials; each cycle producing:
1) an artistic audio-visual “summary of perceptions” around the material
2) a seminar presentation to the MetaGov community (to be distributed via DAOcast as well).
Co-author speculative fiction fabulating conceptual and experiential contours and possibilities of a Symbiocracy inspired governance model and realization of a SymbioDAO.
Proposed study materials for these cycles of inquiry:

Stigmergy as a universal coordination mechanism I: Definition and components - paper by FrancisHeylighen
Honeybee Democracy - book by Thomas D. Seeley, model by Uri Wilensky (cycle already in course)
Simbiogenesis - Lynn Margulis, Anna Tsing et al. (cycle already in course)
Camille Stories - Donna Haraway
WarmData - Nora Bateson
Indigenous Protocols and AI - Jason Edward Lewis et al.
Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants - Robin Wall Kimmerer