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Participatory Budgeting

Participatory Budgeting

TL;DR:

Participatory Budgeting (PB) allows communities to decide together how to spend money. People submit proposals, review and deliberate as a group, and then vote on which projects to fund. It’s about shifting budgeting power from central authorities to the people most affected by the decisions.


Originally developed in cities like Porto Alegre, Brazil, PB has been used around the world in civic, institutional, and now onchain settings. In Web3, it’s being adapted to:

  • DAO treasuries
  • Ecosystem grants
  • Local/regional blockchain communities
  • Public goods networks


PB emphasizes transparency, inclusion, and deliberation. It works best in environments where people have shared stakes, want a voice in how resources are used, and are willing to collaborate to prioritize community needs.


PB rounds typically follow this flow:

  1. Proposal submission (by anyone or a defined group)
  2. Community deliberation or review
  3. Voting (one-person-one-vote, QV, STAR, etc.)
  4. Funding allocation based on vote outcome and budget constraints
  5. Follow-up on project execution and accountability

Best For

  • Local communities or ecosystems with shared priorities
  • DAOs seeking to decentralize budgeting
  • Civic networks or bioregional coordination efforts
  • Any group wanting transparent, inclusive resource allocation

Good At

  1. Empowering community voice
  2. Making budgeting transparent and inclusive
  3. Aligning resources with lived experience
  4. Encouraging deliberation, not just voting

Dependencies / Requirements

  • A pool of funds and clear eligibility criteria
  • Proposal submission and discovery process
  • Voting mechanism (simple vote, QV, STAR, etc.)
  • Post-round follow-up or accountability loop

Not Good At

  • Funding very technical or specialized work
  • Low-engagement environments
  • Use cases requiring speed or top-down decision-making
  • Systems where participation isn’t well-distributed

Who Should Use It?

  • DAOs with active contributors and diverse funding needs
  • Local or regional Web3 communities coordinating public goods
  • Civic tech networks experimenting with blockchain-based budgeting
  • Projects aligned with grassroots economics and democratic governance

Example Use Cases

  • A bioregional DAO allocates $50k using participatory budgeting—locals propose and vote on community gardens, workshops, and tech tools
  • A protocol delegates part of its treasury to community participatory rounds using QV
  • A coalition of impact DAOs pilots a shared PB process for allocating joint matching funds across the ReFi ecosystem