Citizens’ House

The Citizens’ House is one half of the Optimism Collective’s bicameral governance system. It exists to complement the Token House by representing long-term interests, distributing Retro Funding, and safeguarding the Collective from plutocratic capture.

Purpose

The Citizens’ House was designed to:

• Counterbalance the short-term incentives of token governance
• Safeguard the Collective from capture or misaligned influence
• Allocate resources to public goods that generate long-term impact
• Promote experimentation with novel governance forms

Its core responsibility is managing the Retro Funding, and, increasingly, participating in veto powers over key governance proposals.

What is a Citizen?

Citizens are individuals who hold an attestation of citizenship, managed via Ethereum Attestation Service (EAS). Citizenship is currently:

• Temporary, and may evolve through experimental iterations
• Granted experimentally, often through guest voter rounds
• Revocable, if the criteria are no longer met or based on conduct

🔗 View the current Citizen Schema on EAS

Experimentation with Citizenship

As we said in the previous section, the Collective takes an evidence-based, experimental approach to designing Citizenship.

Core principles for experimentation:

• Measurability: Inputs (selection methods) and outputs (governance impact) must be quantifiable
• Short feedback cycles: Regular Retro Funding rounds accelerate learning
• Reversibility: Guest voters are a lightweight, reversible way to test new systems
• Rich identity layer: Building mechanisms to link contributions, engagement, and reputation to identity

Citizenship design should always be evaluated based on its ability to meet these objectives.

Citizens’ House Governance

The Citizens’ House governs primarily through two processes:

1. Retro Funding Missions

   • Citizens vote on how public goods are rewarded
   • Missions follow clear stages: scoping → applications → review → voting → disbursement → compliance
   • Voting takes place on Snapshot with EAS-verified Citizen identities

2. Veto Powers: Citizens can veto certain governance proposals approved by the Token House.

   Proposal Type	Veto Threshold	Notes
   Protocol/Governor Upgrade	30% of Citizens	Must veto within 1 week of Token House vote
   Maintenance Upgrades	12% of Citizens	Used only in time-sensitive updates

   A vetoed proposal is not enacted.

Guest Voters

Guest voters are temporary Citizens selected for experimental rounds of Retro Funding. They:

• Help test new selection methods
• Are not full Citizens (e.g., cannot cast vetoes)
• Enable reversibility in experiments

Inputs and outputs are measured via:

• Surveys of voters and applicants
• Voting behavior analysis
• Social graph analysis
• Reputation signals (contributions, usage, etc.)

These experiments are key to growing the Collective’s high-confidence knowledge around what makes an effective Citizen.

Identity and Reputation

A scalable and ethical identity layer is critical for:

• Selecting Citizens based on meaningful criteria (e.g., dev contributions, app usage, community participation)
• Enabling rich experimentation
• Tracking performance and refining governance systems

Citizenship design relies on integrating onchain identity, offchain reputation, and collective legitimacy.

Responsibilities

Citizens are expected to: • Vote thoughtfully in Retro Funding • Participate in governance deliberation • Evaluate proposals using impact-aligned criteria • Respect the Rules of Engagement • Provide feedback during experimental rounds • Act in the Collective’s long-term interest

Foundation and Constitution

Citizens’ House governance is grounded in:

• The Working Constitution
• The principle of anti-plutocracy: influence should not be limited to token holders
• The vision of impact = profit: public goods should be rewarded by their outcomes

Over time, the community is expected to take increasing ownership of Citizen selection, Retro Funding design, and proposal evaluation.