The Mina Foundation have a dedicated team working on the vision for Mina Protocol’s future governance. The Mina Research blogpost discusses the concept of collective intelligence and its application to the governance of the Mina Protocol. It is quite a long blog post and because of the subject matter it takes some time to absorb. The amazing Marc from Mina’s discord channel has created a condensed version for those who TLDR. Here’s a summary of the key points:

Overview

• Collective Intelligence: The blog introduces collective intelligence, where groups of people solve complex problems more effectively than individuals alone. This is inspired by natural systems like brains and swarms, which demonstrate how individual units work together to make decisions.
• Mina Protocol Governance: Effective governance is crucial for the Mina Protocol to ensure decisions align with community wishes and optimize ecosystem development. Governance must be inclusive, allowing all stakeholder groups to participate.

Insights from Biology and Social Science

Building Mina’s hive mind through collective intelligence

• Biological Insights: The decision-making processes in brains and swarms (e.g., bees) provide models for collective intelligence. These models emphasize local information, feedback loops, and competition between options until a decision is made.

• Swarm Intelligence: Examples include how bees decide on new hive locations through scouts’ reports. This process can be likened to neuronal decision-making in brains.

• Social Choice Theory: Traditional theories on group decision-making are evolving with insights from swarm intelligence, highlighting the dynamics of opinion formation and competition in networked groups.

Frameworks for Collective Intelligence

• High-Level Frameworks: Social science researchers have developed frameworks for organizing groups into a ‘hive mind,’ focusing on who should participate, how they should communicate, and how decisions should be made and implemented.
• Core Functions: These include observing problems, analyzing data, generating solutions, deliberating options, implementing decisions, and learning from outcomes. Each function requires specific methods and tools.

Practical Application in Mina Protocol

• MIP Process: The Mina Improvement Proposal (MIP) process is the main mechanism for protocol decision-making, involving stages from research and drafting to on-chain voting and implementation.
• Ecosystem Funding: The zkIgnite program exemplifies community-based ecosystem funding, with a formal process for submitting and evaluating proposals.

Challenges and Solutions

• Complex Problems: Governance is considered a ‘wicked problem’ with no clear solutions. The document emphasizes ongoing experimentation and learning to adapt and improve governance processes iteratively.
• Real-World Examples: Lessons from various real-world collective intelligence applications inform the approach, stressing the importance of clear planning, political support, and continuous testing.

Conclusion

• Iterative Approach: The document advocates for an experimental approach to governance, encouraging community involvement in iteratively testing and refining processes based on real-world experiences.

By leveraging collective intelligence, the Mina Protocol aims to create a more effective, inclusive, and adaptive governance system that harnesses the cognitive power of its community.