Citizens who write the rules
RULEMAKERS DAO is a Japanese civic community where citizens, entrepreneurs, experts and politicians work across their usual boundaries to reform regulation and design better rules. This is a short English introduction to who we are and what we have actually changed.
Rules should be made, not just obeyed
Every society runs on rules — laws, regulations, guidelines, business customs. Many of them were written for a world that no longer exists, and they quietly block new technology, new ways of working, and solutions to real problems.
Rule-making, as we use the term, is the practice of the people closest to that wall — entrepreneurs, citizens, professionals — proposing and reshaping the rule itself, working with government and politics rather than shouting from outside. It is not the exclusive craft of professional lobbyists. It is something a community can do.
We are organised into SubDAOs by theme (regions, Web3, startups, wellbeing). Day-to-day discussion happens on Discord, and it connects through events and programmes into policy proposals and, sometimes, into law.
Track Record
What we have changed
Japan’s digital nomad status of residence
Japan had no status allowing someone employed abroad to stay and keep working remotely. Our Region SubDAO documented the gap, proposed a new status, and kept presenting it to legislators. The proposal was reflected in the Cabinet’s Basic Policy 2023, and the status came into operation on 1 April 2024. We then led the founding of the Digital Nomad Public-Private Council and serve as its secretariat. Read the full English guide →
Making the LLC-type DAO workable
Tokenising the membership interest of a Japanese LLC used to trigger heavy securities regulation, which made DAO-style token issuance impractical. Following a hackathon we ran in late 2023, a policy proposal was compiled by the Liberal Democratic Party’s headquarters for the promotion of a digital society in January 2024, and an amendment to the relevant Cabinet Office ordinance took effect on 22 April 2024. Members were also involved in founding the Japan DAO Association. Accounting and tax guide (Japanese) →
Removing friction for founders
Not every win is a headline. We have proposed practical fixes such as revisiting the requirement to record a representative director’s home address in the commercial register — the kind of single line that quietly discourages people from starting a company.
We were also selected as a partnership programme of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s TOKYO SUTEAM startup initiative, and adopted for a Toyota Foundation research grant on dynamic consensus-building in DAOs.
Programmes
How we support others
RIFTAccelerator for foundersFounders refine a policy proposal through lectures and hands-on support, then present it. The first cohort ran in 2025, closing with the “RIFT OFF” demo day.
Read
In English
The LLC-type DAO in Japan: accounting and taxWhat the April 2024 ordinance actually changed, the two carve-out tests, choosing between a godo kaisha and a general incorporated association, why there is no pass-through, crypto-asset year-end valuation, and the 20% separate taxation now moving through the Diet.
Japan’s Digital Nomad Visa — requirements, and how it was createdWhat the status actually is (Designated Activities, Notice No. 53 / 54), the requirements table, the timeline from proposal to enactment, what we proposed versus what was enacted, and the open issues.
Most of our material is published in Japanese. If you read Japanese, the main site has far more, including a 16-part series on the accounting and tax treatment of LLC-type DAOs written by a certified public accountant.
Outline
Organisation
- Name
- RULEMAKERS DAO
- Legal entity
- RULEMAKERS DAO, Inc. (一般社団法人RULEMAKERS DAO), a Japanese general incorporated association
- Established
- 25 December 2024 (the founding study group started in late 2022)
- Representative
- Yoshiki Shiozawa, Representative Director
- Address
- MIDORI.so NAGATACHO, 2-5-3 Hirakawacho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Japan
- Contact
- info@rulemakers.io
- Community
- Discord (free to join, no cryptocurrency required) / X @RULEMAKERS_DAO
- Wikidata
- Q140774994
We use DAO to describe how we organise — open participation, theme-based SubDAOs, decisions made by the people doing the work. There is no token, no fundraising from participants, and no cryptocurrency is required to join. If you came here expecting a crypto project, this is not one.