POLLEN The recent explosion of governance models within the DeFi ecosystem didn’t come without challenges. Extreme hyperinflation in some token economies saw some projects emit their entire governance token supply within weeks, distributions that concentrated voting power among a handful of actors were commonplace, and governance functions tended to be limited at best. Pollen’s POLLEN governance model addresses these issues, focusing heavily on developing community participation incentives and processes that build towards decentralization and uses the hive mind to put the community in control. The POLLEN model allows Pollen to separate the asset pool token economy and governance functions. It uses merit-based rewards for asset pool management, rewarding positive participation. The governance model is sustained by diverting yields back from the asset pool. This aligns interests and underpins the token’s value. This model enables symmetrical token emission rates, a sustained system of rewards, and ultimately complete decentralization. POLLEN MECHANICS POLLEN is a decision-making protocol that responds to participants’ needs and motivations while optimizing decision outcomes. This creates a sustainable, merit-based reward system by quantifying decision outcomes and rewarding users accordingly. The POLLEN governance model diverts yield back to the community by leveraging asset pool reserves, creating an internal economy that underpins the governance tokens’ value. POLLEN has a range of voting mechanics that build on stakeholders’ reputation in the system and scales user voting power through a mix of meritocratic validation of decision-making history and token stake. Those that have the power in the system will be those that have earned it through participation and the merits of their decision making. We leverage POLLEN’s meritocratic validation model to create new delegation models such as Collective Delegation, where we automatically delegate voting power to those with the best decision making performance. The Collective Delegation model simplifies the delegation process by maintaining dynamic pools of the best performers based on voting history. This encourages passive users to delegate to the most deserving.