- Optimism’s new governance lets users, apps, and chains vote equally in major decisions.
- The Votable Supply Framework protects Optimism from governance attacks by monitoring vote power and treasury exposure.
On August 1, 2025, the Optimism Layer-2 network will activate a new governance system that involves more than just token owners. Starting from ordinary users, application developers, to chain operators will also have a say. Not just a rebranding, this is a total reset of the way decisions are made on the Optimism network.
While usually only those with a lot of tokens have a say, this new system opens up space for anyone who contributes. Imagine if the election system in the real world was not only chosen by citizens, but also involved business actors, local communities, and even toll road managers. More or less like that concept.
Optimism calls this approach “stakeholder governance,” which is here to build a system that is more balanced, transparent, and resistant to the risk of unilateral domination.
Three years into our governance journey, the Optimism Collective is shipping its biggest upgrade yet.
Season 8 lets the system keep evolving with the Superchain while reducing platform risk for those that rely on us.
Let’s dive in ↓ pic.twitter.com/k8aF9hVurt
— optimism.eth (@Optimism) June 16, 2025
Optimism Introduces Guardrails for Its Open Governance
In this new structure, Optimism divides participants into three large groups: end users, application developers, and chains that build with OP Stack. Each group has representation and a voice in the decision-making process.
Not only that, proposals concerning budgets or technical updates can now be automatically approved if no one rejects them. So, there is no need to wait for long voting just for routine matters.
But Optimism also understands that the more open the system, the greater the potential for loopholes. Therefore, a few hours ago, they introduced the Votable Supply Framework. Its function? Keeping this system safe from potential governance attacks that can be carried out by parties with large voting power but bad intentions. This framework also helps monitor the distribution of votes and keeps the on-chain treasury safe.
Not only that, we previously also highlighted the technical collaboration between Chainlink, Astar Network, and Optimism. They ensure that the Chainlink CCIP cross-chain standard can be compatible with Optimism’s SuperchainERC20. The result? Transferring assets between OP Mainnet, Base, and World Chain becomes easier.
Technical things like this may look complicated, but just imagine you can send money from one wallet to another on different networks without any hassle.
Furthermore, since the beginning of this year, the Optimism and Superchain Eco teams have also launched the Superchain Index. Launched on January 17, 2025, the index is like a big map that shows the security status, configuration, and compliance of all chains in the Superchain ecosystem. So it’s a kind of dashboard to find out which chains have met the standards, which ones need updates.
However, amid all these positive updates, the price performance of the OP token itself is not so pleasant. At the time of writing, its price is hovering around $0.5737 after dropping 5.72% in the last 24 hours. Its market cap has also fallen below $990 million. Well, maybe the market is still digesting all the changes that are happening.
