Ecosystem and independence
Three products. One rule: research is never propaganda.
Three products. One rule: research is never propaganda.
Polity Atlas can serve as an intellectual foundation for related projects while remaining independent, politically neutral and useful to a far wider audience.
| Product | Question | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Polity Atlas | Which systems are possible, and how do they work? | Knowledge, research, design. Explore, compare and design institutions. Open data, open methodology. |
| Zomia (sibling project) | How do we run real self-government? | Software infrastructure: an ideologically neutral operating system for communities — proposals, votes, treasury, rules, reputation, commons. |
| Oroboro (sibling project) | Which specific model of society do we want to test? | Experimental community: a practical experiment with one model of a network polity. |
The intended flow is research → infrastructure → experiment → findings back to research.
Independence commitments
- Same standards for siblings. Zomia and Oroboro are catalogued and assessed like any other project, including their weaknesses.
- Disclosed conflicts. Every page touching a sibling project carries a conflict-of-interest note.
- No promotional placement. Siblings never appear in featured slots, rankings or default comparisons.
- Separate editorial sign-off. Material about siblings needs review by an editor with no role in them.
- Transparent funding. All funding and its scope of influence are published in the funding ledger.
Atlas research may conclude that specific ideas of a sibling project are unworkable. That is a strength of the ecosystem, not a weakness.
Related research communities
Organisations working in adjacent areas whose work we read and link. Listing implies no partnership unless stated.
- Metagov — tools and research on the governance of digital communities.
- Ostrom Workshop — Indiana University; polycentric governance and the commons.
Research institutions can co-publish datasets and studies under our methodology: see Contribute.
Last verified 2026-10-23