Defipunk Beyond “Code Is Law”: What Kind of Social Layer Is Possible?

Duration: NaN:NaN:NaN

Speaker: Ekin

Type: Workshop

Expertise: Deep prior knowledge

Event: Devcon

Date: Nov 2026

Defipunk is articulated as a vision for permissionless, open-source, censorship-resistant finance that minimises trusted intermediaries and maximises user control. What happens when that vision confronts the realities of everyday Ethereum DeFi? This workshop uses cases such as MEV extraction and resolution attempts, DPRK-linked protocol abuse and community responses, governance failures, and censorship pressures to explore how protocol design interacts with Ethereum’s social layer. Participants will work through these cases through structured deliberation, live polling, and facilitated discussion, comparing competing responses and their trade-offs, while engaging with academic and policy debates about how DeFi can or should respond when its technical properties, community norms, user interests, and external pressures come into conflict. The workshop asks what forms of social coordination are compatible with a genuinely permissionless financial system.