---
title: "Make voice cheap"
description: "Three-layer governance is costly – without active design, this cost self-selects for the resourced"
url: "/make-voice-cheap/"
tags: [principle]
readingPathPosition: 8
---

# Make voice cheap

[Three-layer governance](/every-protocol-has-three-inseparable-layers.md) is inherently costly – meetings, consent rounds, critique-and-contemplation sessions. Without active design, this cost self-selects for the resourced. So design every protocol with this in mind: make asynchronous participation first-class, provide multiple channels for raising objections, build in objection support, fund participation budgets from solidarity contributions, and commit to response times that make raising concerns feel worthwhile.

In other words, [design for asymmetry](/design-for-asymmetry.md).

## Sources

- Voice/exit/loyalty framework from Hirschman (1970), *Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States*

## In this vault

- Previous: [Design for asymmetry](/design-for-asymmetry.md)
- Next: [Design for scale](/design-for-scale.md)
- Referenced by: [Protocol design is guided by a set of principles](/protocol-design-is-guided-by-a-set-of-principles.md), [Tension drives development](/tension-drives-development.md)