Systemic Altruism
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Justice & public goodsPreliminary editorial review

Computational Democracy Project

Designs and maintains Polis, with implementation support for civic groups, researchers, journalists and public institutions.

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Systemic Altruism practice potential: 74–84/100
90% of weighted axes reviewed. A mechanism hypothesis, not proven effectiveness or a donation recommendation.

Who this work enables

Tools & support for charities: Polis software, implementation knowledge and support for institutions conducting public-interest consultation.

Open-source evidence · license checked

  • Polis — AGPL-3.0; included third-party notices remain separate license file. Organization’s role: maintainer.
    Named Polis repository root license inspected on edge, including its additional dependency notices. This is not a license audit of all dependencies, a production-release endorsement, a security/fairness audit, or permission over conversation data and hosted-service terms. License-file snapshot: bca73f7e2acb097404ff02c1833b52247218b654.

License checked 2026-10-27. This is not a security audit, proof of current support or effectiveness, or a promise of free hosting. A sponsor or steward is not necessarily the sole developer. Unchecked profiles are not evidence of closed code. No extra score points are added.

Humanity’s Checklist source match

Coordination · Gatekeepers — editorial, partial alignment.

Shared consultation infrastructure can lower the cost of gathering diverse perspectives and finding common ground. It does not establish consensus legitimacy or binding public authority.

Explicit checklist adoption: not verified. A mechanism match is not an affiliation, endorsement, evidence of effectiveness or a scoring bonus. Read the practice.

Focus classification: 2026-10-27. Based on the organization’s dated official sources below; earlier axis-review dates are unchanged.

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The proposed pathway

Reusable large-group consultation and opinion-analysis infrastructure

Six dimensions, with rationale

Structural depth

3 / 4

Changes how public input can be gathered and interpreted; a consultation tool alone does not change who holds binding decision power.

Institutional reach

4 / 4

A reusable consultation platform can support many institutions and topics, without proving representative participation or improved decisions.

Durability

2 / 4

Public code and reusable methods may outlast a single project, but institutional use, moderation and consequential follow-through are uncertain.

Scalability

4 / 4

Common software supports reuse and large groups, while recruitment, language access, moderation and interpretation remain implementation constraints.

Funding additionality

Unreviewed

Unknown: current maintenance bottlenecks, paid-service revenue, restricted funding, alternative tools and marginal donation effects were not audited.

Community agency

Unreviewed

Unknown: submitting statements and votes is participation, not verified control of agenda-setting, data use, moderation or final institutional decisions.

Evidence and selection

Organization reported; current primary mechanism sources inspected and named license file checked

Illustrative inclusion to examine this mechanism. Inclusion is not an external recommendation or a verified comparative ranking.

A testable next question

Do supported consultations produce more representative, accountable and consequential decisions than comparable processes without Polis, with documented safeguards against manipulation?

Review confidence: Moderate for documented design; low for systemic attribution. The 501(c)(3) nonprofit and its Polis development/support role, distinct from every organization running a conversation or using the separate hosted service.

What remains uncertain

Self-selected samples, organized manipulation, exclusion and misleading interpretation can undermine a consultation. A statistical cluster is not a mandate. No algorithmic-fairness, security or impact audit was performed; hosted pol.is and conversation data have separate terms.

Sources to inspect

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Axis review: 2026-10-27 · weighting method v0.2 (2026-10-26) · Method, conflicts and coverage