Participate in the Next Chapter of Decentralizing Community Governance for Polygon Networks

tl;dr:

• The next phase in decentralizing community governance arrives today, enabling staked POL token holders to participate in the community governance for Polygon protocols and (soon) shared AggLayer components by delegating to technical delegates or voting directly on future proposals
• With this next phase, the staked tokenholder community will have more oversight over System Smart Contracts
• Community members are able to seamlessly access governance through Polygon Governance Hub, live today

Polygon now has a governance framework worthy of the community’s innovation and dynamism: Introducing the next phase of System Smart Contracts Governance, a paradigmatic upgrade of community governance across Polygon.

As of today, through the Polygon Governance Hub, you can begin to delegate your voting power, an important step in participating in community governance of Polygon. 

Begin delegating today 

The growth of the Polygon networks demands a robust framework for community decision-making across all levels of the network, and that’s what the new system provides. In keeping with the spirit of community participation and decentralization, all holders of staked POL will be able to seamlessly take part in transparent voting processes, with clarity and efficiency across governance activities via Polygon Governance Hub.

Here’s what System Smart Contracts governance is, and what you can expect going forward with the Polygon Governance Hub, built collaboratively with Aragon. 

What is System Smart Contracts Governance?

L2 chains need two things that are often in tension: 1) Security and 2) Upgradeability. 

That is to say, it’s crucial to be able to upgrade the chain without compromising security. 

Governance gives communities robust mechanisms to make sure that all upgrades honor the basic trust they have in the chain and any smart contracts deployed on it. 

In order to address these challenges, the Polygon community moved to adopt the Protocol Council (PC) model, which allows for efficient and secure upgrades to critical infrastructure. 

Now, the next step in community ownership is materializing.The first iteration of a novel voting framework will allow efficient and secure decision-making by the technical community of core contributors, the Protocol Council, and staked tokenholders. 

Authority is delegated to the Protocol Council, which creates on-chain proposals based on PIPs that come from core contributor community. 

Subsequently, staked tokenholders can signal their vote on proposals. While a signaling system means there is no on-chain enforceability of a veto, the Protocol Council can and should take the voters’ voice into account when executing transactions. 

Here’s the flow of decision-making in the new governance system:

As you can see, there are several steps along the way. Staked tokenholders are empowered to signal their preferences to ensure transparency and legitimacy in decision-making. 

What else makes the system unique?

It’s important to note that System Smart Contracts Governance will be separated from other aspects of governance, such as the Community Treasury. For more on the rationale, check out the previous conversations in the forum, but the tl;dr is: Different forms of governance require different models. 

Consider: Would you trust your local city council to make decisions on your country’s foreign policy? And analogously, would you want the national government to make decisions on which roads will be paved in your city?

The answer is presumably no, even though both forms of government constitute the decision-making framework of their respective domains within the same country, the objects of government and the required expertise are widely different, as well as the way in which the underlying legitimacy comes from citizens to authorize the aggregate of governmental actions. 

So coming up with different models is necessary for different forms of governance. To that end, here are some novel components of System Smart Contract Governance on Polygon:

• Split delegation of voting power: A novel, but incredibly important, mechanism that allows staked tokenholders to split their voting power among any number of delegates. This in turn allows for better representation of a single voter’s preferences. Split delegation builds on the principles of liquid democracy, while simultaneously reducing the centralizing power of the largest staked tokenholders. Namely, healthy decentralization of decision-making power often runs into the issue of major tokenholders having to, by default, disproportionately delegate their immense voting power to a single delegate.
• Adaptive quorums: It’s possible to imagine a scenario in which voter apathy leads to the community not having a reasonable chance to signal vetoes of proposals coming from the Protocol Council. To address this, System Smart Contracts Governance will implement adaptive quorums, inspired by Polkadot’s Governance V1.
• Nimble nature of the system: In order to follow a roadmap from the initial release towards an on-chain implementation of the governance model (replacing off-chain signaling), specific parameters might need to be tweaked based on data–e.g., adjusting adaptive quorum multipliers based on established voting activity, as well as an eventual reset of delegations.

To find out more about the SSC signaling framework and the underlying components, read PIP-50.

A refresher on Polygon Governance Hub

In simple terms, Polygon Governance Hub is the interface where the above framework happens–along with a whole lot of other important community endeavors. 

Through the Polygon Governance Hub, community members can find insight into governance proposals (including Polygon Improvement Proposals (PIPs)), access community discussion, and vote (for staked tokenholders). It will be where the Polygon community gathers to make important decisions. 

Read more about Polygon Governance Hub here.

Here are the key features:

• Integrated platform: Streamlines all governance activities into a single hub, which makes it far easier for Polygon stakeholders to navigate and participate in governance
• Real-time updates: All PIPs can be tracked live, ensuring maximum transparency
• Educational resources: New tools and guides to help everyone participate in governance, no matter how new they are to the process
• Community-centric development: Built and run with direct input from the Polygon community
• Ease of voting and proposals: Submitting and voting on proposals is much easier

Polygon Governance Hub makes governance easier, more transparent, and across-the-board better for all Polygon community stakeholders.

What’s next for Polygon governance?

The launch of Governance Hub opening up participation in System Smart Contracts Governance is the best opportunity yet to take part in crucial decision-making related to the Polygon network and (soon) shared components of the AggLayer. 

So what are you waiting for? Visit the Polygon Governance Hub and participate in the future of Polygon by delegating your voting power to a technical delegate, or voting on proposals yourself!

Whether or not you decide to join your fellow Polygon community members right away, keep an eye on Governance Hub going forward. It will be your resource to learn about what might happen across the network—and to have your say. 

Tune into the blog and our social channels to keep up with updates about Polygon.

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