Bribery in crypto governance is at least four distinct flows, each with different visibility and ethics. Public bribe markets move hundreds of millions in disclosed pay-to-vote. Structural payments are openly documented. The most consequential influence isn't on-chain at all.
Across 60 active forum threads in 9 DAOs, gauge proposals are 0% of public discussion despite being 25.6% of contested votes (per issue 002). Forum activity and contested votes are decoupled by topic. The most-discussed category is delegate intros at 38%.
Issue 001 surfaced a turnout dip at the 40-60% contested band that we could not explain. We tested three hypotheses. One survives: information cost. Tight votes are tight because they are technical.
Most alignment metrics in DAO research measure attendance, not coordination. We walk through the methodology using the Balancer veBAL battle of 2022, plus shorter looks at Safe DAO 2024 and Lido 2021.