Aragon VE Governance

For more detailed info about Aragon DAO, please refer to Aragon DAO docs.

In this document, we'll focus on the user journey.

Aragon’s ve-governance system is a tokenomics-first governance framework designed to improve resource allocation in onchain organizations. It enables DAOs to align user incentives with the protocol, reward long-term participants, and build an active ecosystem using staking, dynamic voting power, emissions, and bribes.

Vote-Escrow (VE) governance is a proven model for aligning user incentives in token-based communities. It was popularized in DeFi, allowing protocols to reward long-term stakers with increasing governance power.

How it Works

1. Users lock tokens in an escrow contract.

2. They receive veTokens, which represent their voting power.

3. Voting power scales with lock duration – longer locks mean higher governance weight.

4. Votes influence resource allocation across the protocol, typically directing incentive emissions towards specific pools or initiatives.