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Our early work on defining the Meta-organization (aka Inter-linked Actor-oriented Organization) architecture for Ledgerback in the context of Web 3.0, Cooperativism, and the Token/Data Economy |
A meta-organization is an "organization comprised of a network of firms [and/]or individuals not bound by authority based on employment relationships but characterized by a system-level goal" [1].
The Ledgerback meta-organization model is meant to proliferate and unite cooperative organizations around a common set of principles and values, practices, and a system-level goal, while infrastructure and vital resources (i.e., the commons) is meant to be created and distributed to member organizations to speed up their operations and achieve their goals in a peer production manner.
In the meta-organization, the system-level goal is to push systems innovation (governance, economics, infrastructure, knowledge-sharing, enterprises, innovation, practices, thinking, etc.) through the creation and usage of models, systems, thinking and mechanisms that will actuate our principles and values.
In the meta-organization, the organizations behave in a horizontal and egalitarian relationship such that all organizations are treated equally, and no organization has greater authority than another, i.e., a system-wide cooperative governance structure.
Primarily, the organizational structure will be cooperatives, social enterprises, trusts and nonprofits.
In the meta-organization, the system is a horizontal, flattened structure such that all organizations are not trapped in a hierarchical system, no organization has greater authority over the system than another organization, no organization is greater in the hierarchy than another organization, and organizations democratically and equitably engage in collective decision-making on moving forward towards the system-level goal. In other words, a system-wide cooperative governance structure.
In the meta-organization, organizations can balance risk among each other while combining resources such that organizations can pounce on greater market opportunities without further investment in the organization.
In the meta-organization, organizations can leverage the core competencies of other member-organizations to quickly pounce on business opportunities without having to develop such competencies themselves.
In the meta-organization, organizations can leverage large and varied data from other member-organizations, and share critical information with member-organizations to help improve productivity while not worrying about absence of trust o
By leveraging core competencies and information from other member-organizations, organizations can trigger innovation in their respective areas and avoid asymmetric learning opportunities because coordination costs are lowered and information is readily shared and stored in the Commons.
In the meta-organization, organizations are not forced into a one-size-fits-all type of relationship with other member-organizations, thereby allowing the relationships to adapt to real-world conditions.
In the meta-organization, we accept that organizations exist in a complex system and act accordingly to help cope with complexity wherever it arises by leveraging the core competencies of member-organizations, and sharing information among member-organizations.
In the meta-organization, organizations can practice commoning (relationships and practices) with other organizations so that local solutions can be developed at each organization with the aid of other organizations, which will lead towards the system-level goal. In other words, developing relationships and practices between organizations around local commons which will lead to the growth of the system-level goal.
In the meta-organization, we do not advocate for one-size-fits-all approaches, rather we acknowledge and support a plurality of solutions and practices within the meta-organization so that member-organizations can work towards organization-specific solutions (local solutions) and commoning (local practices and relationships around resources), while leveraging the information and core competencies of fellow member-organizations.
To resolve the trust issues and information sharing costs that can arise between organizations, to truly see the rise of Meta-organizations, we require the use of a public distributed ledger such as a blockchain to form the basis for information sharing and creating an environment for low-trust. Additionally, the use of cryptoeconomic protocols and collective decision-making protocols to align stakeholders and participants to work towards the system-level goal of the Meta-organization. The use of organization technology (e.g., Aragon and DAOstack) so that organizations can wholly or partially coordinate tasks and offer goods and services on a public distributed ledger. The development of on-chain and off-chain collective decision-making protocols to ensure member-organizations and the members of member-organizations can actively participate in the governance of the Meta-organization (i.e., can practice cooperativism).
One reason why a meta-organization is needed in this transient time as we move from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0, and from the platform economy to the token economy, is that to prevent the grievances and misgivings of legacy systems and overcome the challenges of decentralized governance, we need to develop a base layer of systems that embody cooperative principles and values and governance so that we can avoid centralization, and to ensure that individuals are empowered within the Web 3.0 system through p2p interaction to make changes within the system.
Any organization can join the Meta-organization as long as they acquiesce to the principles and values by adopting the InterConstitution, and patronize the Meta-organization (similar to how a member patronizes a cooperative). The primary means of patronage is sharing information, goods, services and resources with the constituent members and growing the commons.
[1] Ranjay Gulati, Phanish Puranam & Michael Tushman, Meta-organization design: Rethinking design in interorganizational and community contexts, 33 Strat. Mgmt. J. 578 (2012).