Community Coordination Protocols

An overview for social benefit organizations

 

 

1. Introduction

In the current social and economical landscape it has been difficult for social benefit organizations and projects to establish themselves and become sustainable. Social benefit organizations and projects are meant as the ones which create value that is not accumulated by specific individuals or organizations permanently but is rather shared with society. All over the world there have been ongoing efforts from many different angles; research on alternative economies (e.g. social economies), cooperatives, creative spaces, non-profit organizations, open technology development, agricultural collectives, innovative individuals and so on. Some efforts have seen some significant success, but it still remains quite difficult for most projects to develop. One of the main reasons for this outcome, is that our economies are engineered to reward organizations that maximize profit production and accumulation. Nonetheless, the work of social benefit organizations is very important. Societies can thrive only if the created value (resources, capital, knowledge, services, products, art etc) is shared and then used for the next iterations of value production. That means that it is necessary to foster ecosystems that are supportive towards this kind of value distribution. The creation of such ecosystems is a quite complex and challenging task to be covered in just a few pages, but this text is focused on one of its key elements; the federative element or the coordination between social benefit organizations and projects. If organizations support, complement and invest in each other, their chances for sustainability grow significantly. So, we need to examine what are the prerequisites for social organizations to coordinate in such an ecosystem, what coordination means and how it can be achieved. This text approaches social coordination as a protocol design problem among others, aiming to integrate values, functional requirements, and observable outcomes into a shared federative logic.

2. Prerequisites

 

 

To guarantee a healthy ecosystem, the social benefit organizations need to produce substantial social benefit work, to be independent, to respect human and non-human rights and the environment, to be sustainable and to incorporate mechanisms for transparency, accountability and resilience. A compilation of some of the main prerequisites follows; social benefit organizations have to:

• Create quality work that provides a socially and/or environmentally positive impact. That could be anything from creating art spaces and developing innovative technologies for digital communities to organic agriculture, research and so much more.

• Not facilitate capital accumulation by individuals or groups. Individuals can be compensated for their work according to the agreed structure of an organization, but this has to have a ceiling or an obligation of allocation, as produced wealth should be shared and invested back to society.

• Not be controlled by established power structures (state, partisan, economic-resource, religious-ideological, military, social status etc). Organizations and individuals that have close ties to such structures, should not have access to higher levels of decision making within the organization if any.

• Not be involved in serious criminal activities against human or non-human life forms.

• Respect diversity, inclusivity and the rights of human and non-human life forms, both within the organization and through its impact to society and the environment.

• Provide fair compensation to their members. People working in such organizations should be compensated for their work taking into account equality and meritocracy. Also if any higher wage tiers exist, they should be capped (e.g. maximum 5X lowest salary), not allowing extreme wage differences.

• Adopt governance models that include all members of their community, balancing democracy, meritocracy and efficiency. Each organization can choose their structure from horizontal governance to more vertical. Nonetheless, all members of the community must be able to participate in the decision making processes that concern them. Also, in the cases that there are key people (founders etc) there should be specific procedures for power distribution and succession, accountability and transparency.

• Network, support and collaborate with other social benefit communities with economic design also taken into account. Maximal social benefit can only be accomplished through collaborations and synergies. An ecosystem’s sustainability relies on its ability to cover its needs. Networking, shared infrastructure, common research, co-production, investment in innovative individuals or in the development of social benefit projects and organizations are only some of the possible examples.

• Comply with accountability and transparency standards. Both the members of an organization and its partner organizations, should have access to the organization’s statute, economic data and decision making minutes. There must be clear accountability procedures in case of any economic or other misconduct.

• Work on being sustainable and resilient. That includes working on being economically independent, maintaining productivity, making risk assessments (e.g. cyber-security, government instability) and taking the necessary steps against such risks, and more.

3. Federative practices

Organizations can both coordinate with other organizations working on the same or relative field and with organizations that share the same foundational values. In both cases organizations are empowered. Ultimately if an ecosystem could become deep and broad enough, it would mean the emergence of a new economy – even a local one – in practice. Possible ways of how federated organizations and individuals may cooperate:

• Share equipment (e.g. agricultural collectives sharing machinery, event spaces sharing sound equipment).

• Share spaces (e.g. many creators in the same building, farmers using common warehouses).

• Share knowledge, resources and practices (e.g. information about service providers, bibliography).

• Share services (e.g. different digital technology companies sharing cloud services, discounts in gyms for members of the ecosystem).

• Provide services and products for free or for lower prices to each other (e.g. graphic designers for marketing for event spaces have free tickets to events).

• Make consortia for funding applications and share funding.

• Conduct joint research and development.

• Conduct joint advocacy (e.g. organize events, creative informative digital material).

• Achieve market competitiveness (e.g. many independent bookstores bargain lower costs with print-houses and offer discounts to customers that buy books from the ecosystem).

• Create pooled resources and then invest them (e.g. fund a kindergarten-school for members of the ecosystem, fund transportation such as bikes, cars that people use to commute, fund banking within the ecosystem).

• Develop common infrastructure (e.g. digital application on demand and availability of work within the ecosystem, a different currency within the ecosystem).

• Create space and time where people can explore their needs and desires and envision and practice their futures (e.g. public deliberation spaces, fantasy-facilitating festivities).

• Create governance bodies (e.g. assemblies, councils) that can facilitate decision making and decision implementation.

 

 

 

4. Relation to non-aligned projects

Even if some organizations, projects or individuals do not meet the prerequisites for social benefit organizations, they may still provide work that is socially beneficial and opportunities for collaborations may be present and of value. Common research with state administered universities, technology development with high value capturing for-profit entities such as startups, public events in for-profit event spaces, innovation with individuals excelling at a field are just some of the possible examples. In such cases, as long as an organization does not have to compromise their own practices collaborations can of course be conducted. However, non-compliant organizations and individuals cannot be considered part of the federated structure and its processes, while their contributions to society may still be recognized.

5. How to build the ecosystem

Starting from individual organizations and projects

First of all, to build such an ecosystem it is required that people who understand the necessity of social benefit organizations and the importance of the prerequisites they must have, have either built or are building such organizations and are ready to commit into fostering an ecosystem. This is by definition a hard problem, because social benefit organizations face economic obstacles and it is rare and time consuming to make a team of people who are competent, collaborative and ethically aligned with such a mission at the same time. Such an endeavor requires time, resources, research, strategic planning and relentless effort into building the organization, assembling a team and creating value (product, service etc) among others.

Expanding to ecosystems

Mapping relevant organizations, reaching out to them, co-developing strategies and applying them, advocating for an ecosystem, designing it and building infrastructure to support it, are all part of the steps required to build it. And finally proceeding to federative practices as described above. Building an ecosystem is a long-term commitment with many requirements, including consistency, persistence and adaptability to name a few. It cannot work if its parts are not dedicated to participation and do not share responsibilities.

The importance of protocols and standards

The prerequisites as described in a previous section are the core of building the ecosystem. Coordination is only achieved through a framework of mutual agreements. A bare minimum of rules that every part follows, without the whole of which coordination breaks. For example, an ecosystem the organizations of which are governed only by few people without democratic elements sooner or later collapses. The same happens with ecosystems that do not integrate meritocracy; no value is produced without competence. And the general rule is that people will pay for things that provide value for them. Thus the organizations and individuals of an ecosystem must recognize and agree on the values and prerequisites of their collaborations. And of course practice them, because agreement does not guarantee actual implementation by itself in any way.

Governance

Governance would mainly focus on facilitating decision making among organizations, implementing collectively agreed decisions, and conducting compliance controls. While the proposed model leans heavily on the autonomy of organizations as long as they comply with a minimum set of shared agreements, any governing body should have clearly defined and limited competencies, sufficient only to fulfill these coordinating functions. The form of governance depends on the context and scale of each ecosystem. Very small ecosystems may not require a distinct body, relying instead on assemblies of organization representatives meeting at agreed time intervals. Larger ecosystems may require a council to coordinate recurring tasks and processes. A statute upon which the federation is based must be agreed upon at the outset, defining core rights and obligations of members (e.g. pooled resource contributions, representation principles, conflict resolution mechanisms, and entry and exit protocols).

Transparency and accountability

Within the ecosystem compliance with the prerequisites and any common agreements must be subjected to an agreed control mechanism. Each organization must be transparent regarding all relevant operations and accessible for controls. Each organization must also accept accountability. Non-compliance or misconduct would mean agreed consequences whether it is a simply a warning, a fine, a termination of collaboration etc.

Grounding the prerequisites and possible practices to different cases

The prerequisites mentioned in this text are quite abstract, because they are meant as the foundation for a whole ecosystem. They need to be applied accordingly to different cases of organizations. For example, for a digital platform the prerequisite of respect to human rights would mean that user privacy and open protocols are mandatory. For an agricultural collective, it would mean respect for the environment and the highest standards to protect consumers’ health. The specific mechanisms of control, conflict resolution, and sanctioning are context-dependent and must be co-designed by the participating organizations, provided they remain consistent with the shared prerequisites and values of the ecosystem.

Regarding the federative practices applied between organizations, it is again up to them to decide the final implementation. Different organizations might have different needs and different capacities for commitment. In a rather small town, a few bookstores and event spaces might just share some spaces, equipment and bargain better costs. In a city maybe several organizations decide to build a hospital as well. The different actors and situations dictate the final implementation of the needed practices.

6. Limits of current text

The current text is not a constitution rather than an overview of what an ecosystem’s protocols can be; the core logic behind such protocols. As such it does not attempt to exhaustively address a range of critical issues including prerequisite compliance, conflict of interest, possible concentrations of power, conflict resolution, balance between democracy and meritocracy, resource allocation, decision making and strategic planning. Each of these areas requires substantial elaboration and must be shaped and continuously adapted within the specific context of each community. Nonetheless, the text provides a foundational blueprint for federation building, intended to guide the co-development of concrete protocols and practices across diverse ecosystems.

03/01/2026