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by throwaway_isms 1875 days ago
> non-profit is inherently a centralized entity.

I would have actually said the opposite, if there is one inherently decentralized type of entity that is officially recognized by central authorities it is a non-profit.

Yes, non-profits exist because of centralized authorities, if they have exempt status for purposes of taxes that determination comes from a centralized tax authority, but a non-profit itself has no owners and is generally governed by the members. The members generally elect a board of directors but that is just representative of the collective decentralized members and should serve at their collective discretion through vote, the board as the official representatives appoints the Officers that manage the day to day business of the entity. There are arguments to be made, and not all non-profits are structured identically, but inherent in all of them is no ownership, so should a non-profit be dissolved and have assets, those assets are not distributed to any ownership class but must be distributed to other non-profits. Based on the lack of profits and ownership, non-profits are more decentralized in nature than many organizations claiming to be DAOs most of which are organized around the concept of an ownership class and profits.