Polity Atlas

How each model solves the same problems

Instead of “democracy versus anarchism”, compare the concrete ways collective problems get solved.

Question✕✕✕
How are decisions made?Each cooperative uses one member, one vote; the parent nonprofit, Evergreen Cooperatives, holds voting control and its board includes civic and anchor representatives.A stratified random sample of 523 voters deliberated in moderated groups and plenaries and answered questionnaires before and after; no decisions were taken.Sortition / citizens' assemblyKings of small kingdoms (túatha) under over-kings; assemblies (óenach); customary law expounded by hereditary jurists rather than legislated.
How are conflicts resolved?Boards of each cooperative and the parent set policy; Evergreen Business Services provides shared management, HR and finance.Balanced briefing materials, trained neutral moderators and competing experts structured disagreement.Brehon judges; sureties (naidm, ráth, aitire); distraint of livestock; ritual fasting against higher-ranking defendants; body-fines and honour-price compensation.Arbitration
How are public goods funded?Anchor-institution contracts and philanthropic capital seed jobs and equity for residents of target neighbourhoods.Cooperative ownershipPrivately funded; produced published results, media coverage and a peer-reviewed study.Rules on shared grazing, co-operative ploughing, mills and fencing; obligatory hospitality; churches and monasteries; few public works.
How is AI used?No documented AI role.No AI role.None; a medieval legal order.
What are the main risks?Dependence on a few anchor contracts; early operating losses; capital intensity; worker confusion about profit shares.Self-selection into attendance; artificial setting; analysis by the method's designers; no institutional uptake.Status-graded and unequal protection, unfree labour, endemic raiding and dynastic war, and vulnerability to a centralising conqueror.CLM-0385

This illustrates differences in design; it is not a universal claim about outcomes. Each cell links to mechanisms and the claims behind them.