Glossary
Every term the course uses, defined the way the course uses it — for a member of a small group, not for a lawyer or an engineer. If a word here still isn't clear after its definition, that is a fault in the definition — tell us through the feedback button on this page and we'll fix it.
Framing and deciding
- Deliberation vs aggregation
- two different ways a group can "decide". Aggregation counts existing preferences — a poll, a show of hands, a like-tally — and tells you where people already stood. Deliberation exchanges positions and reasons first, so preferences can move before they are counted. Voting on an undebated question aggregates; it does not deliberate. The course exists because the difference is where legitimacy comes from. (Primer and Module 2.)
- Decidable question
- a question a reasonable person could vote no to and mean something by it. It names an action, a scope, and a start, in one sentence. "Do more for food security" is a topic; "convert eight named plots from spring" is decidable. (Module 1.)
- Decision rule
- the agreed test the count is judged by — consent, ranked choice, majority with safeguards, or another the group has chosen. The rule is fixed before argument starts; a rule chosen after positions are known is choosing the winner. (Module 3.)
- Consent
- a decision rule under which a proposal passes unless a defined share of the group actively objects. Consent asks "can everyone tolerate this?", not "does everyone love this?" — the right question for people who must live with the outcome together. It is not unanimity: objections can be outnumbered; they cannot be unheard or unrecorded.
- Quorum
- the minimum participation for a result to bind the group — a number or fraction of the eligible deciders, set before the window opens. Quorum stops four people committing forty, and stops a quiet poll passing quietly. It is a separate gate from the decision rule: a result must pass both.
- Deliberation window
- the declared period from when a proposal opens for discussion to when its poll closes. Declared before argument starts, and not moved once arguing is under way — extending a window mid-fight always favours whoever asked.
- Sunset clause
- an expiry date written into a decision: it ends on a named date unless renewed by a fresh decision. A sunset makes the cost of being wrong recoverable, and lets the losing side lose without losing forever. Its cousin is the right of return — a named condition under which the question automatically comes back.
The four responses, and dissent
- Agree with reservations
- one of the four consent-poll responses: "I support this going ahead, and I have concerns I want on the record." The reservations are written down and travel with the decision; they do not count against it. Three months on, they are usually the most accurate forecast of where the decision is straining.
- Stand aside
- "I won't take part in this decision, and I won't stand in its way." For members who are conflicted, personally affected, absent from the deliberation, or unwilling to own the outcome. Recorded, but counted outside the objection tally — a stand-aside is a withdrawal, not a warning.
- Object
- "I believe this proposal should not proceed, and here is why." An objection is a claim about the proposal, not a mood: it comes with a stated reason, counts against the consent threshold, and — pass or fail — goes onto the record verbatim.
- Dissent
- the recorded disagreement that travels with a decision: objections in the objector's own words, stated alternatives, reservations. In this course dissent is an asset, not a residue — it is the group's institutional memory of the argument, and its early-warning system if the decision starts to fail. A record that shows only the winning side is not a record of the decision; it is a press release. (Module 4.)
The record
- Sealed record
- the complete account of one decision — proposal as put, amendments, full tally, dissent verbatim, dates and rule — closed in a way that makes later alteration detectable. On paper, the seal is a read-back, signatures, and dated copies in several hands. Digitally, it is a hash and a signature. Both are real seals; they differ in how far away, and how much later, a stranger can check them. (Module 5, and stage 5 of the demo.)
- Hash / tamper-evidence
- a hash is a digital fingerprint: a short string computed from the whole record, where changing even one character of the record produces a completely different fingerprint. Tamper-evidence is what that buys — no one can silently edit a sealed record, because the fingerprint stops matching and the alteration announces itself. Note what it does not promise: it cannot stop a record being altered, only guarantee that alteration is visible.
- Ed25519 — "the group's signing key"
- the signature scheme Village Assembly uses; in this course you can simply read it as the group's signing key. The group holds a private key that only it can sign with, and publishes a public key — the group's signature specimen — that anyone can check a signature against. A record signed with the group's key provably came from the group and provably hasn't changed since. The name (a mathematician's curve, a number) matters to implementers; the two-key idea is all a member needs.
- Offline verification
- checking a sealed record's fingerprint and signature with no server, no login, and no one's say-so — on any machine, including one the group has never seen, including years later. The proof lives in the record itself, not in a service that might be down, discontinued, or owned by someone with an interest in the answer. It is the property that makes the record trustworthy to people who don't trust you.
Many rooms
- Federation
- an arrangement in which several assemblies join on specific decisions while each keeps its own authority — no head office, no master copy. Concretely, a federation is a set of sealed records that reference each other, which is why the sealed record is called the join primitive: each room's decision proves itself, so the rooms can trust each other without a centre to vouch for them. (Extension module — optional.)
- Delegate / mandate
- a delegate is the person who carries a room's voice into a joint decision; a mandate is the written, bounded instruction they carry — scope, what they may agree to, what they must refer back, an expiry, and a reporting duty. The mandate is itself an assembly decision, sealed like any other, so "was this within the mandate?" has a checkable answer. A concession beyond the mandate does not bind the room. A shared mandate is one worded text adopted separately by every room in a federation, in force when all have sealed it.
Te reo Māori used in this course
- Hui
- a gathering or meeting; used in the course for the assembly session itself.
- Whakaaro
- a thought or considered view; what a position card asks each member to contribute — a view with its reasoning attached.
- Kōrero
- talk, discussion; the deliberation itself, as distinct from the count.
- Tautoko
- to support; to speak or stand in favour of a proposal.
- Whakahē
- to object or disagree; in this course, the dissent that goes onto the record in the objector's own words.
- Koha
- a gift offered in reciprocity; here, the voluntary contribution this free course invites — never a fee.