Beyond MVG project: April 2026 progress report – first draft State of Governance report

We're sharing progress on Milestone 3, analysis, which includes the first draft of the State of Governance report, the most comprehensive picture of Cardano's governance system to date.

Summary:

• Survey, workshop, and interview data from over 50 participants — including DReps, SPOs, Constitutional Committee members, governance tooling providers, and community projects — have been analyzed and ranked by priority.

• On-chain data has been analyzed to surface trends and behavioral patterns in Cardano's governance, providing critical context for the survey, workshop, and interview findings.

• A draft ‘State of Governance’ report is now available, with governance recommendations coming in the next iteration. It already highlights governance tools and dashboards to support ongoing governance monitoring.

• The full Milestone 3 submission can be tracked via the Intersect Treasury Contract dashboard

Where we are: Milestone 3 in brief

Milestone 3 focused on analyzing the data collected during Milestone 2 to identify the top governance improvement priorities for Cardano. The work spans quantitative and qualitative analysis, on-chain pattern recognition, metric benchmarking, and ultimately, synthesizing findings into a single coherent report.

The draft State of Governance report - what we learned

The centerpiece of Milestone 3 is the draft State of Governance report.

What makes this report unique is that it brings together, for the first time, both on-chain and off-chain community sentiment data into a single analysis. On-chain data reveals how governance actors are actually participating — voting patterns, DRep delegation behavior, abstention rates, and more. The off-chain data — gathered through surveys and interviews with governing roles across the ecosystem — captures how participants experience governance: what's working, what's frustrating, and what they believe needs to change.

Together, these datasets provide the most holistic view of Cardano's governance system that has been produced to date. The report covers Cardano’s first year following the implementation of CIP-1694, from Epochs 537 - 609 (January 29, 2025 - January 24, 2026).

The main findings indicate that Cardano's governance system is technically functional and demonstrates significant participation growth. However, there exists a critical gap between participation growth and the distribution of voting power, as well as in accountability practices across governance bodies. ~16% of circulating ada actively votes (or~ 39% when including Always Abstain), while a trend toward centralization of voting power, if continued, could threaten the decentralization principle that serves as the foundation of governance.

Category	Key Findings
Ada Owner	Delegation grew 15% to 40%, but redelegation rate was <0.1% per epoch and >95% stake unchanged for ≥12 epochs. Participation is passive, not dynamic.
DRep	Gini coefficient worsened to 0.935; 15–35 DReps needed for 51% voting power. Active DRep count in net outflow every 12-epoch period.
SPO	Active voting declined 55% to 37%, concentrated on mandatory actions. Staking and governance decoupled; 57% cite poor tooling as the primary barrier.
CC	Rationale rate 99.8%; 100% participation in constitutional proposals. One member retired due to a lack of compensation; 30% of seats are now held by individual owners.
Systemic	16% of circulating ada actively votes (or 39% when including Always Abstain). This exceeds median DAO turnout (0.2 –  2.8%)and approaches the ~32% retail shareholder voting rate in U.S. public companies — a more comparable stake-weighted voting environment.

Taken together, these findings indicate a governance system that has achieved initial participation growth but now faces structural challenges related to power concentration and declining engagement.

What's next: join us for the last round of workshops

With the analysis phase wrapping up, the project is moving into Milestone 4 - developing actionable recommendations. This is where we need the community's help.

We are hosting a series of facilitated workshops to collectively brainstorm what needs to change and how. Workshops will be held across multiple time zones to maximize participation. If you care about how Cardano governance evolves - whether you're a DRep, an SPO, a CC member, a developer, or simply an ada holder - your perspective matters.

Find workshop dates and registration details on the project link tree.  If you can’t attend a workshop, you can still enter your thoughts here asynchronously.  Sign in, read the challenges, add recommendations in the ‘Identify’ tab and vote on your favorite ideas.

Building consensus on what to fix and how is where this research starts real change.

Timeline of activities: project roadmap - current status

• Milestone 1: Establish foundation — COMPLETE

• Milestone 2: Collect and aggregate insights — SUBMITTED.

  • Community workshops: Held a series of high-engagement sessions on Jan 27, 29, 31, and Feb 18, 2026, to capture community experiences.

  • On-chain correlation: Gathered data for all governance framework metrics over a one-year period to validate anecdotal feedback and identify additional trends.

  • Available evidence:

    • Community sentiment data: Summary of Workshops, Survey and Interview data.

    • On-chain data visuals: M3- On Chain Visuals Epoch 537 - 609.

    • Updated framework documents: State of Governance Measurement Framework and Governance Metrics Manual.

    • Updated report outline: State of Governance Report Outline.

• Milestone 3: Analyze data and identify priorities — COMPLETED.

  • Available: First version of the ‘State of Governance’ report, which will inform final recommendations for improving Cardano's governance.

• Milestone 4: Develop actionable recommendations — UPCOMING

  • In progress: The team will host collaborative workshops in April 2026 to discuss and refine top recommendations for improving Cardano’s governance based on the Milestone 3 analysis.

Get involved

We’ve made the project’s progress open and accessible to the Cardano community. You can engage with or contribute to the project in several ways:

• Explore and review: Access all published materials, including our research frameworks and the updated report outline.

• Participate directly: Join upcoming workshops

• Follow our progress: Stay up to date as new outputs and data analyses are published throughout the project lifecycle.

All relevant links, documents, and participation forms are available in one central location, here.

Disclaimer: Project timelines and deliverables are subject to change based on community feedback and technical feasibility.