TL;DR

We’re on a mission to realize a global regenerative economy rooted in startup cities all around the globe. With this long-term goal, ReFi DAO is supporting the emergence of a network of regenerative villages in strategic startup cities in 2023 with the belief that regeneration begins within...

We refer to these strategic local communities as ‘Local Nodes’.

Connected by an online community, and enabled by the most powerful tools of our time—Local Nodes bring the physical and digital world together into a symphony of inner and outer regeneration.

These value-aligned nodes are for founders conducting radical experiments to unlock a regenerative economy at scale, they’re for leaders of public, private and third-sector institutions, and they’re for anyone committed to taking action and making the world a better place.

ReFi DAO is here to support the growth of the mycelium of regenerative culture, technology and ventures both in-person and online.

ReFi DAO: History & Trajectory

Focusing first and foremost on founders, we are building small, value-aligned communities with startup culture at the core as we believe radical innovation is required to unlock a regenerative economy at scale. But these Local Nodes are not just for founders, they’re also for leaders of public, private and third-sector institutions committed to taking climate action and co-creating a regenerative future…

Regeneration is about so much more than climate and justice. It is the dream of human and planetary health as we discover how to live as one unified system on earth.

Over the last year, our community has achieved some incredible milestones:

• Supported 300 founders via Founders’ Circles
• Co-hosted 35 in-person events via ReFi Spring
• Reached 50k+ downloads via ReFi Podcast
• Grew to 2574 weekly readers on ReFi Roundup
• Kicked-off ReFi Lisboa, the first Local Node, with three events and over 260 participants

Genesis of a regenerative economy

After merging with ReFi Spring, we are bringing the physical and digital together to embark on the first chapter of a new vision: A network of healing villages that regenerate the earth using the most powerful tools of our time.

Rooted in major startup cities around the world, connected to an online community and a growing media network, we believe this organizational structure will be a primary catalyst for realizing a global regenerative economy within our lifetime.

Thanks to the Gitcoin Beta round, we are aiming to raise $60k to support our operations over the next three months to enable us to:

1. Build the first Local Node in the heart of Lisbon with an embassy, healing heARTS centre, co-working space, and residency program
2. Award a winner of the Local Node Prize to an emerging community in the Global South
3. Support the alpha cohort of the Local Node Incubator with Commons Stack
4. Launch an alpha cohort of Online Guilds for Founders and Community Managers
5. Grow our diverse network of content creators to share the story of regeneration, both in-person and online
6. Collaborate with Kevin Owocki and Stephen Reid from Supermodular and metacrisis.xyz to lobby the Gitcoin Community for a Metacrisis Main Round in Q3 2024 to fulfill Gitcoin’s ultimate coordination game

Support ReFi DAO & Local Nodes

Your donation would be sincerely appreciated and received with great care. We would also be deeply grateful if you would consider supporting some of the Local Nodes actively fundraising on Gitcoin via our Local Node subset round with $25k of match funding available:

• ReFi Medellín
• ReFi Mexico City
• ReFi San José
• ReFi Paramaribo
• ReFi São Paulo
• ReFi Willemstad
• ReFi Lisboa
• ReFi Nairobi
• ReFi Cape Town
• ReFi Lagos
• ReFi Kinshasa
• ReFi Dar es Salaam
• ReFi Hyderabad
• ReFi Hong Kong
• ReFi Seoul
• ReFi Miami

Most of these nodes are growing in emerging economies, others act as strategic interfaces between developed and developing markets. Our goal is to run regular grant programs via Gitcoin to support the emergence of Local Nodes in strategic locations around the world.

What is a Local Node? 🤔

To read more about “What is a Local Node” and how it all fits together into our vision of realizing a global regenerative economy, check out our Mirror article: Announcing the ReFi DAO Local Node Prize

We’ve been inspired by the architecture of Balaji’s Network State, but are taking a radically different approach to implementation and governance. We see ReFi DAO and Local Nodes as peers in an emerging network that will accelerate the rate of talent and capital flowing into the work of regeneration.

Starting with meet-ups and events, a network of local communities will go on to acquire land and other real-world assets. Our ambition is not to create new borders but to work alongside existing nation-states as an accelerant to a regenerative future. A phygital passport, reserve currency, embassies, & diplomatic recognition at COP all key milestones on the roadmap!

Feel free to read more below about our evolving theory of change and vision given the recent learning we’ve had building a local node in Lisbon over the last three months.

Regeneration begins within 🙏🏼

Rooted in the idea that in order to regenerate the earth, we need to regenerate ourselves—we are gathering the brightest hearts and minds into the most challenging work of our time. Alongside the journey of inner regeneration, we are equipping leaders with the pioneering tools of public ledgers, open data, open science, decentralized physical infrastructure networks and artificial intelligence.

We believe this unique combination of inner healing with tech-enabled innovation will unlock unprecedented social, cultural and technological growth in the regenerative space. If we do not heal the trauma within ourselves, we run the risk of re-creating extractive systems in the name of regeneration.

This recognition beckons us to ask…

If all the tools are here, and all the capital is ready to be deployed...

If the solutions are clear, and the science has shown us exactly what we need to do to solve these problems…

… why can’t we?

The metacrisis: Our current paradigm 🦠

With 8 billion people on the planet, exponentially growing artificial intelligence and atmospheric concentrations of CO2 over 419ppm—most of life on earth has been destroyed in the last 150 years and it’s leading us to catastrophic collapse within our lifetime…

Since the inception of the industrial revolution, we have refined our craft to extract resources from the earth. Since the digital revolution, we have refined our craft to extract attention from humanity.

The predominant human story as isolated individuals motivated by self-interest has shown its true colors and has created an entangled web of existential threats from all sides.

We feel shifting the narrative away from a myopic focus on carbon towards a more holistic perspective of regeneration that encompasses the many verticals and horizontals of the Metacrisis is essential.

That’s why we’re looking to partner with Kevin Owocki, Stephen Reid and the rest of the metacrisis.xyz network to lobby the Gitcoin community to make ‘Metacrisis’ a main round in the next Gitcoin grant…

The challenges we face 🕸

We cannot solve these cascading crises in isolation. We must build solutions that address the systemic root cause. But what is it?

If we solve for a stable climate by reducing and removing CO2e might we accidentally realize a fascist global dictatorship, or worse? From this perspective, might funding public goods and other solutions be better framed within this holistic systematic view?

If you’ve heard of the metacrisis, this probably resonates with you…

If we solve for AI risk might we miss the opportunity to build the systems required to protect biodiversity—the key to a thriving biosphere?

It’s become increasingly clear that we cannot solve these problems using our current structures and methods. Nations and corporations in particular have demonstrated they cannot solve these problems.

They have shown themselves year after year to be incapable of making commitments necessary to solve this problem, let alone actually fulfilling them…

We need new organizational structures and new systems of value exchange.

Money is the greatest myth of all 🪙

Of all the stories ever told, money is the greatest myth, it is the greatest religion—the greatest institution. This is why money itself is the highest point of leverage to enact positive, systemic change.

Right now money is subservient to the story of the ‘Invisible Hand’ which tells us we are separate individuals motivated by our rational self-interest. This story has run it’s course…

We need a new story from which we can design an entire ecology of money that reflects what we as people actually need to survive.

We need money that is aware of its positive and negative externalities.

We finally have everything we need to explore this design space.

Redesign money to heal the earth 🌎

With the power of public ledgers, remote sensors, physical infrastructure networks and artificial intelligence, we have all the tools that we need to enable a future where people and the planet live together in harmony.

This is our future, the only one we’ve got.

A future rooted in a new human story: The story of regeneration.

But the problem is, we cannot write this story from a centralized, top-down perspective otherwise we will inevitably recreate the mistakes of our colonial past…

We have to re-write this story in a highly collaborative way in communities of care that are rooted in a culture of healing, radical transparency and innovation. It is from this place that we can write a new story and redesign money itself.

Heal ourselves to redesign money 🙏🏼

As we've seen from various implosions, rug pulls, scams, and frauds, web3 is a mirror of our current society. Unfortunately, our current society is not well and not aligned with the needs of our selves, let alone the people and planet around us. We are living off a perpetual cycle of extraction, thinking that "more for me means less for you, and that is better." However, we are now realizing that this is actually detrimental to our own well-being. When the soil suffers, we suffer. When refugees suffer, we suffer.

The internet and global economy have demonstrated the deep interdependence that ancient wisdom has spoken of for millennia... Only now are we beginning to understand how delicate and intertwined this thriving ecosystem of life on earth really is.

If we are to harness the power of decentralized technologies to build new forms of money, new systems of finance, and new structures to govern society at large, we need to learn how to properly wield these tools to achieve these outcomes. The intention we hold as we build with these tools is a key driver that determines the outcome of any given technology. Web3 tools are nothing without intention. AI is nothing without intention.

To achieve this, we need to set clear intentions to use these tools from a pure heart that wants the best for people and the planet around us. Local communities rooted in deep relationships help us to purify, clarify, and build technology with these intentions at the core. With local communities, we can build technology that supports and enhances the well-being of people and the planet. We need these relationships to ensure that we don't fall into extractive patterns of Moloch, which is the god of coordination failure. Without these relationships, we cannot build a sustainable future.

Community is the key to harnessing the power of web3 technologies and building a better future for all.

co-Creating a new economic story 🌱🌳

We believe that both local and online communities are the key to apply these powerful tools to real-world problems and tell the stories of success that emerge. Online communities enable us to flexibly gather around shared interests and values. Local communities invite us to overcome our differences and focus on what really matters in the real world.

We need to write this new economic story in a decentralized, bottom-up way that empowers both in-person and online communities to use the most powerful tools of our time to tell this new story. We need to enable the people on the fringes of our society who are most affected by the crises we have made to take up the tools of co-creation and storytelling.

It’s vital for us to recognize that nations in the so-called ‘developed markets’ have caused climate change, biodiversity collapse and the ‘AI alignment’ issues we face. These symptoms have emerged as a direct by-product of economic development—along with an increased quality of life.

co-Creating a just economic story ⚖️

Now the developing nations of the world want the same quality of life and are being asked to sacrifice for the greater good—yet developed nations blatantly refuse to make the same sacrifices (emission reductions, nature preservation, etc.)

If we want to solve the problems we make, we must empower the very communities who have the most at stake in the aftermath of these conflicts. Together we have the keys to unlock these challenges.

We need to co-create this story with a diverse community of leaders in the developing world, rich in culture, human relationships and natural capital.

The story of regeneration will emerge as a dance between developed and developing nations—two sisters moving in harmony with a unified vision for the restoration of all living things.

That is why we are launching a Local Node Prize for a healing village in the heart of a city in the Global South to be twinned with Lisbon as our first two nodes in the ReFi DAO network state.

How do we spread this new story? 🚀

We’ve all seen the effects of the invisible hand: Isolated individuals, destroyed habitats and an increasingly volatile climate. This new story of regeneration has the potential to restore the destruction of the past and create a prosperous future for all living beings. Through technology we can embed this new story into the fabric of everything: Money, art, culture, music, fiction, family, dance, sport—you name it.

This is why we are creating healing heART centers in startup cities all around the world to invite the leaders of the regenerative future into the story of regeneration. This is not just about creating startups, this is about creating a new culture that makes healing the new high, regeneration the new vibe.

With open hearts and open minds, we are creating a new society, tapped into a new set of values, and a new belief system about what actually matters for planetary health. This society has no borders, no headquarters, no centralized mechanism of control…

When we start to see ourselves as integral parts of a larger whole—something powerful begins to happen.

How can Moloch be slayed? ⚔️

If the god of coordination failure is Moloch—who is the god of coordination?

How curious that we don’t even have a name for this…

What if the god of coordination was hidden in every single one of us—hidden in our heart’s deepest desires, in our fears, in our trauma, and in our suffering…

What if the heart of regeneration is not some new technology, but rather healing itself?

What if healing is what the younger generations of today need—instead of the addictive thrill of a dopamine release at the touch of a new screen?

What if young people today put their phones away, gathered together and put their hands into the earth—felt her majesty and invited their peers to do the same?

What if the elders of our society had a clear invitation to tell stories, support younger generations and participate in the formation of a new economic and cultural story?

What if a place to belong, a community to be known, and a platform to take action is the key to unlock a new story—a new myth—a new nation—a new world?

A new nation 🗺

We believe in the power of a new nation, founded on the principles of regeneration.

This is not a nation in the traditional sense.

There is no boundary, no border, no single flag.

This nation is rooted in the hearts and minds of all of those who love peace more than they love war.

This nation is gathering together in healing villages at the heart of startup cities all around the world.

This nation is gathering under a single unified mission: To regenerate the earth using the most powerful tools of our time.

Join us

Where ever you come from, whatever your background, there is a place for you in this story.

We have all the tools that we need. The capital is ready to be deployed. The time is now.

#Regeneration is a symphony.

Find your instrument and come join one of the 33 current #ReFi communities across the globe —> https://refidao.com/join#sign-up 💚

We’d be super grateful for your support.

Join our Discord and ask questions, get involved.

ReFi DAO Discord

Find yourself at home in a local node event near you. Every third Thursday of every month.

ReFi DAO Events

Let’s. F*cking. Go. 🔥