Appearance

Governance Escalation ​

Canonical

Purpose ​

Runtime must detect when a request is no longer only operational and becomes governance-sensitive.

Governance escalation protects Axodus from unauthorized policy changes, treasury actions, DAO federation changes, tokenomics changes, custom plugin deployments, product access decisions, and ACS authority expansion.

Scope ​

This page applies to Business, ACS, Coder, product owners, and operators who need to know when normal execution must stop or pause for Governance.

It defines the canonical escalation model and record posture. It should not be read as proof that every governance-routing tool, automation, or enforcement surface is already active.

Governance-Sensitive Categories ​

  • Constitutional alignment: Axodus principles, local DAO autonomy, or product access status.
  • DAO federation: official status, product access, registry updates, suspension, or revocation.
  • Governance plugins: voting, execution, eligibility, or local workflow plugins.
  • Treasury: capital allocation, transfers, revenue distribution, high-value spending, or exposure change.
  • Tokenomics: reward policy, utility, locked rewards, unlock conditions, emissions, or burn mechanics.
  • Academy: Learn-to-Win reward policy, certification power, or ecosystem-level tutor policy.
  • Trading: user strategy access, treasury trading, risk limits, or API key policy.
  • Marketplace: payment assets, fee distribution, locked reward spend, seller policy, or tutor policy.
  • ACS: agent permission expansion, sensitive MCP access, autonomous execution, or memory source-of-truth changes.
  • Public claims: partnership, audit, financial performance, token value, or official status claims.

Escalation Levels ​

Escalation may be None, Visibility, Review, Formal Proposal, Boardroom or High-Level Review, or Emergency.

Emergency handling requires a defined emergency protocol and post-action accountability.

Escalation Flow ​

  1. Runtime item is classified.
  2. Governance-sensitive trigger is detected.
  3. Execution is paused or limited when needed.
  4. Governance context is prepared.
  5. ACS may generate summary, risk flags, and reason codes.
  6. Human reviewer validates escalation.
  7. Governance route is assigned.
  8. Governance decision is recorded.
  9. Runtime scope is updated.
  10. Execution resumes only if approved or conditioned.
  11. Accountability record is created when material.

Record Fields ​

Escalation records should include escalation identifier, runtime identifier, trigger category, reason, risk level, affected nuclei, ACS analysis reference, human reviewer, governance layer, decision, conditions, related proposal or record, next action, and timestamp.

Decisions and Reason Codes ​

Decisions may include no escalation required, visibility only, review required, formal proposal required, approved, approved with conditions, rejected, deferred, or escalated higher.

Common reason codes include GOVERNANCE_REVIEW_REQUIRED, CONSTITUTIONAL_ALIGNMENT_REQUIRED, DAO_FEDERATION_REVIEW_REQUIRED, PLUGIN_REVIEW_REQUIRED, TREASURY_REVIEW_REQUIRED, TOKENOMICS_REVIEW_REQUIRED, ACS_AUTHORITY_REVIEW_REQUIRED, and PUBLIC_CLAIM_REVIEW_REQUIRED.

Anti-Patterns ​

Avoid governance bypass, over-escalating minor work, under-escalating policy or financial decisions, treating ACS escalation as governance decision, and escalating without record.

Canonical Traceability ​

  • Integration: INTG-EP8-0017
  • Canonical counterpart: Governance Proposal Lifecycle
  • Interfaces: INT-EP7-004, INT-EP7-005, INT-EP7-014
  • Authorities: AUTH-EP8-0010, AUTH-EP8-0011
  • Evidence: EVID-EP7-0013, EVID-EP8-0002
  • Status: a governance decision does not prove executor readiness, execution, verification, or receipt.

Released as living documentation for the Axodus ecosystem.

© Axodus. Documentation under active reconstruction.