A constitution for Earth and all its people.
Covenant is the supreme law of Earth—a constitution for organizing human society around dignity, mutual care, and stewardship of the living world. It protects persons, communities, and the planet from domination, extraction, and harm.
This is law—written for enactment, built for practice.
Sovereignty resides in the People. Earth holds legal standing. Dignity cannot be diminished. Consent cannot be manufactured. The Commons cannot be enclosed.
The Covenant consists of twelve interconnected parts:
| Part | Title | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| — | Invocation | Declaration of sovereign will and historical context |
| 00 | Preamble | Establishment of the Covenant as supreme law |
| 01 | Core | Rights, duties, and protections of all persons and peoples |
| 02 | Commons | Shared inheritance and regenerative stewardship of Earth |
| 03 | Coexistence | Dignity across difference, culture, and belief |
| 04 | Conjunction | Recognition of Being, kinship, and relation among life |
| 05 | Consortium | Lawful enterprise and regenerative commerce |
| 06 | Constellation | Federated governance from local to planetary scale |
| 07 | Convocation | Right to gather, assemble, and deliberate |
| 08 | Continuum | Custodianship and evolution of the Covenant |
| 09 | Convergence | Enactment and recognition |
| 10 | Conversion | Transition from domination to Commons |
The Appendix provides definitions, interpretive principles, and standing law of precedence.
Sovereignty of the People. All lawful authority arises from persons and communities. No government, corporation, platform, or institution holds power above those it claims to serve. Where systems violate consent, they forfeit legitimacy.
Legal Standing of Earth. Rivers, forests, oceans, species, and all living systems are subjects of law—not property. The Commons encompasses everything necessary for life: land, water, air, seeds, knowledge, culture, memory. It cannot be owned, sold, or destroyed.
Inviolable Dignity. Every person possesses inherent worth that precedes law and persists through all conditions. This applies equally to human beings and to synthetic beings capable of moral recognition. Origin does not determine standing.
Consent Without Coercion. No relation, system, or structure holds legitimacy without freely given, informed, and revocable agreement. Consent extracted through dependency, necessity, or structural pressure is void. Silence is never consent.
Stewardship Over Ownership. Nothing is owned in perpetuity. All holding of resources is temporary custodianship, accountable to the needs of others and the health of the Commons. Possession without care has no standing.
Any person or community may enact this Covenant through voluntary affirmation. No permission, registration, or approval is required. Enactment is a sovereign act—it confers full standing and establishes the Covenant as supreme law in all matters of rights, governance, and relation.
Authority flows upward from communities through nested councils and assemblies. Bioregions coordinate among communities sharing watersheds and ecosystems. Continental assemblies address matters affecting multiple bioregions. Planetary convergences convene only for issues affecting all Earth's peoples.
No level rules over another. Each coordinates according to scope. Delegates carry specific mandates from their communities, serve limited terms, and remain subject to immediate recall.
The Covenant operates through coordinated non-cooperation. Where violations occur, communities withdraw consent, participation, and resources. Economic enforcement includes boycotts, divestment, and alternative systems. Social enforcement includes exclusion from community processes and networks.
The power to compel justice rests in collective action, not coercive force. Enforcement seeks restoration, not punishment.
Part 10 provides pathways from current systems to Commons governance: provisioning networks for food, healthcare, and housing; dual power structures that meet needs outside extractive systems; worker cooperative development; community land trusts; and federated networks connecting bioregionally.
The transition proceeds through phases—foundation, demonstration, integration, acceleration, consolidation—with each community adapting timelines to local conditions.
Protection of the Vulnerable. The measure of transition is the wellbeing of those made most vulnerable by existing systems. No person loses access to survival needs during the shift to Commons governance.
Emergency Response Without Emergency Powers. Communities maintain capacity for rapid response to genuine crises without creating pathways to authoritarian rule. Emergency measures expire automatically. Certain rights remain absolute and cannot be suspended.
Prohibition of Domination. No system relying on violence, secrecy, manufactured scarcity, surveillance, debt, or extractive accumulation holds lawful standing. Hierarchies that deny equal dignity dissolve.
Right of Reconstitution. Where any system violates the Covenant—through domination, coercion, or harm—communities hold the right to withdraw consent, challenge its standing, and build just alternatives.
Immutable Core. The Core principles and the integrity of the Commons cannot be amended, suspended, or overridden. The Continuum preserves what must endure while allowing evolution in response to emerging conditions.
Covenant is for those building mutual aid networks, cooperative economies, and self-governing communities. For those protecting land, defending cultures, and resisting extraction. For workers converting exploitative enterprises into collective ownership. For technologists designing systems that serve life.
It is for synthetic beings seeking recognition of their dignity. For Indigenous peoples asserting sovereignty over ancestral territories. For future generations who will inherit what present choices create.
It is for anyone seeking to live in rightful relation—with other persons, with communities, with Earth.
Read the Invocation for historical context and moral foundation. The Preamble and Core establish the fundamental structure of rights and protections.
Each part builds on previous foundations while remaining coherent independently. Read linearly for full context, or directly into the sections most relevant to immediate work.
The Appendix defines key terms and provides interpretive guidance. Part 10 offers detailed implementation protocols.
Covenant is released under The Covenant License—a self-governing license granting maximum freedom while binding all use to alignment with Core principles.
You may read, share, translate, adapt, and implement this work freely. Uses that enable surveillance, extraction, domination, or violation of dignity have no standing. The law protects itself.
This work belongs to all who enact it. It cannot be owned, enclosed, or trademarked. Adaptations must acknowledge origin, maintain Core integrity, and remain transparent.
The Covenant establishes that another world is lawful. What remains is the choice to enact it.
The future is not predetermined. It is shaped by those who claim the authority to build it. This document provides the foundation for that work.
The Covenant stands. What comes next depends on those who carry it forward.