Consenz: Legislation Co-Creation

[IMPACT]

In order to make sure that new legislation will be beneficial for the greater good and for the long term we have to give attention to the details, get professional input - from lawyers and other policy expert - together with feedback and comments from the general public (in our case - ADA and other crypto currencies holders). By doing so we will increase the chances of pro-crypto legislation to receive the needed support and to be approved.

Wide participation is the key for achieving it. Large number of participants and wide diversity that they will represent will make sure that different perspectives will be taken into consideration in the legislation drafting process.

But technically it is almost impossible if we keep using the current tools that have been used by the community. Google doc is not scalable, github is not user friendly for the non tech audience, voting tools give only a low resolution solution (approve/deny a whole document) and discussions platforms like reddit and other social media platforms produce way too much noise.

Our Solution

Consenz is an agreements building platform (funded in f7) that allows a large number of participants to take an active part in discussion and document editing.

By using consenz in legislation drafting we can widen the circle of participants in the process and create a collaborative, effective and focused product, while keeping it professional and without creating too much noise.

The following discussion-features make Consenz unique, compared to other platforms:

• Instead of an endless and chaotic thread of comments, there is a focus and a product to the process: A document that can be discussed and edited by the participants and reflect their agreements.
• There is a clear structure to the content: comments are attributed to a specific section and function as arguments for or against it; sections are attributed to a specific topic; topics are attributed to the document.
• There is a voting system that allows the users to express their opinion without adding noise to the discussion.
• The voting system also creates a method to deal with conflicts and determine which opinion has the majority of participants' agreements.
• Those agreements are separated from the noise by a simple algorithm that determines which section received enough support and can be added to the document automatically.

The process on consenz creates a "micro-democracy" system - an option to discuss the details of a draft by many users without limiting it to a small group of representatives. Consenz combines elements of - and is inspired by - liquid democracy, direct democracy, deliberative democracy and sociocracy.

The Project Status

Since 2018 we have been building a prototype of consenz (until lately it was available only in Hebrew) and in 2020-2021 we have completed a proof-of-concept phase. The app prototype has been used by diverse groups for different purposes in Israel, among them:

• Schools' teams used Consenz to create teaching guidelines during the covid19 restrictions.
• Unorganized protest movements used Consenz to create demands lists.
• Environmental organizations and activists used it to collaborate with government and municipality workers to create plans for dealing with the climate crisis.

Now that we have been funded by the catalyst community we have started to design and build the MVP of the platform that will be used by DAOs and other organizations.

By using consenz in the process of creating bills and proposals for local, state, national and even multi-national institutions we will be able to improve the chances of those bills and proposals to get the needed support and been approved because of the following:

1. Reduce potential objections: Incorporating a wide number of participants from diverse range of populations and communities in the drafting of proposed legislation from the start of the process will increase the chances that the needs and concerns of those communities will be taken into consideration. This will reduce the risk of discovering in retrospect that a proposed bill may harm potential allies and raises objections that can jeopardize it's chance to be approved.
2. Create cross political parties coalitions: Many good legislations proposals are rejected even though they can get a wide support because of automatic objections from some political parties and representatives that are the rivals of the legislation proposers. By using consenz in the process we can invite people from different political parties and ideologies to cooperate and create coalitions that overcome these automatics divisions.
3. Involve professional and non-professional participators: One of the main features of the crypto eco-system is the potential to break down the current structure of hierarchy that give unfair advantage to some professional groups. In crypto everyone can be a banker, a broker, a trader, a money maker, a policy shaper. While this is good for defi and DAOs, lobbying and legislation require a different approach as it needs cooperation from the legacy institutions, politicians and regulators. Using consenz platform in legislation and lobbying process will allow to bring together both professional participants as lawyers, politicians, lobbyist and policy experts, and the non-professional participants from the wide crypto communities to discuss, create agreements and produce drafts and bills in a trustworthy manner, while keeping it at the highest professional level without alienating the general public from the process.

Opening the process of legislation drafting may be vulnerable to trolling, bots using and other harmful activities.

We plan to mitigate this risk by creating a community driven moderation system that will encourage trustworthy participants to identify and report those bad actors without using centralized censorship.

[FEASIBILITY]

Implementation of this proposal will be on the MVP version of consenz that will be launched later this year (as described in our F7 funded proposal - https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/380926).

To modify and adjust the platform for the lobbying for favorable legislation challenge we will need to:

1. Design and create a special website/lending page for this mission - 8 weeks from launch
2. Implements UX/UI adjustments - 15 weeks from launch
3. Initiate webinars, workshops and coordination meetings for the community members, professional and non-professional - 17-25 weeks from launch
4. Translate the platform to 3 to 5 major languages - according to needs

• Design and build a landing page/web site: 2,000 USD
• Adjust consenz platform for different languages and translation support: 2,000 USD
• Design and Implement needed improvements at the UI/UX: 7,000 USD
• Manage content: 2,500 USD

Total: 13,500 USD

The Team:

Consenz is a partner of ADAgov.org, Software Development Cooperative. Funded F4, F5, F6.

http://adagov.org

Consenz founder and project manager: Aharon Porath, a techno-social entrepreneur, worked with governmental and municipal agencies, a work that includes promoting legislation. Since 2011, Aharon has been involved in a few tech and non-tech ventures to develop consensus-based decision-making methods and platforms for distributed public participation goals.

Aharon has 6 years of experience as a project manager of web platforms and apps, among them - "Open Committee", a web app that enables environmental activists, NGOs and citizens to participate in the decision-making process of Israel's planning department, funded by the government's Israel Innovation Authority.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/aharon-porath-90158962

Design and Development: Sofi is a software cooperative that provides solutions for municipalities, universities, startups, well-established companies, entrepreneurs and NGOs.

The coop model relies on decentralized, consensus-based decision making, as well as total influence and wage equality for all present and future members.

https://www.soficoop.com

Product Manager: Roy Golan. Sofi Coop co-founder. Civic participation & collaboration tools enthusiast since 2012.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/roy-golan-490069a2

Community Manager & Business Development: Ofry Erlich. Sofi's business development director. Political activist with expertise in political parties campaigns & internal processes.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/ofry-ehrlich-470862119

UI/UX Designer: Tzur Sherzer. After managing a big design department, Tzur has joined the team as a lead designer, and is dedicated to the challenge of making the advanced deliberative democratic discussion interface accessible for people from all communities and backgrounds.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tzursher

Software Architects and Developers: Aviran Katz, Nadav Moreno. With vast experience from dozens of projects, Aviran and Nadav will be leading the development team, with the backup of the entire Sofi development department, as well as external developers.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/aviran-katz-491163b3

[AUDITABILITY]

Progress will be majored by onboarding the community for use of consenz platform for the purpose of drafting and promoting favorable legislation.

KPI for 3 years after the launch will include -

1. 5 to 10 different bills/ legislation proposals from different jurisdiction uploaded to the platform
2. 250-2500 registered users, among them -
3. At least 10% known lawyers/policy expert

Success of this project will be that consenz platform will become the standard tool for drafting favorable legislation for the crypto eco-system in 5 different countries at least.

Great success will be that the platform will be known as the standard tool for drafting favorable legislation for other social purposes as well.

1. Fund 6: "Consenz: A Virtual Parliament App" - not funded.

https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/367771

1. Fund 7: "₳GOV: Policy Registry" - not funded.

https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/380928

1. Fund 7: "₳GOV: Agreements Building Platform" - funded.

https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/380926

Other consenz Fund8 proposals:

1. For Accelerate Decentralized Identity challenge: https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/396670
2. For Community Advisor Improvements challenge: https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/397872
3. For Nation Building Dapps: https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/396669

The fund from our F7 proposal is been used for building a MVP (minimal viable product) of the platform. This F8 proposal, if it will be funded, will be used to implement a legislation drafting process on the MVP version.

For that we plan to reach out for groups that are dealing with crypto regulation (so far we have been in touch with the Israeli Institute of Certified Public Accountants, and with the Center for Coin Liberty in Ghana), and offer them to upload to consenz legislation or principals drafts to a public discussion.

SDG Rating

SDG goals:

Goal 11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable

Goal 16. Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels

Goal 17. Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development

SDG subgoals:

11.3 By 2030, enhance inclusive and sustainable urbanization and capacity for participatory, integrated and sustainable human settlement planning and management in all countries

16.3 Promote the rule of law at the national and international levels and ensure equal access to justice for all

16.6 Develop effective, accountable and transparent institutions at all levels

16.7 Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decision-making at all levels

17.16 Enhance the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development, complemented by multi-stakeholder partnerships that mobilize and share knowledge, expertise, technology and financial resources, to support the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals in all countries, in particular developing countries

17.17 Encourage and promote effective public, public-private and civil society partnerships, building on the experience and resourcing strategies of partnerships

Key Performance Indicator (KPI):

11.3.2 Proportion of cities with a direct participation structure of civil society in urban planning and management that operate regularly and democratically

16.3.3 Proportion of the population who have experienced a dispute in the past two years and who accessed a formal or informal dispute resolution mechanism, by type of mechanism

16.6.2 Proportion of population satisfied with their last experience of public services

16.7.1 Proportions of positions in national and local institutions, including (a) the legislatures; (b) the public service; and (c) the judiciary, compared to national distributions, by sex, age, persons with disabilities and population groups

16.7.2 Proportion of population who believe decision-making is inclusive and responsive, by sex, age, disability and population group

17.16.1 Number of countries reporting progress in multi-stakeholder development effectiveness monitoring frameworks that support the achievement of the sustainable development goals

17.17.1 Amount in United States dollars committed to public-private partnerships for infrastructure