Vitalik: Ethereum Should Be "Sanctuary Tech"
In a lengthy X post this week, Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin laid out a philosophical vision for what Ethereum should be in the current political and technological moment.
Over the past year, many people I talk to have expressed worry about two topics:
— vitalik.eth (@VitalikButerin) March 3, 2026
* Various aspects of the way the world is going: government control and surveillance, wars, corporate power and surveillance, tech enshittification / corposlop, social media becoming a memetic…
What's the Scoop?
- Vitalik acknowledged what's been weighing on him: "Through all of the various low-grade online memetic wars, international overreaches of corporate and government power, and other issues of the last few years, Ethereum has been playing a very limited role in making people's lives better."
- He proposed a reframing: "We in Ethereum should conceptualize ourselves as being part of an ecosystem building 'sanctuary technologies': free open-source technologies that let people live, work, talk to each other, manage risk and build wealth, and collaborate on shared goals, in a way that optimizes for robustness to outside pressures."
- The goal isn't to refashion the world toward Ethereum, but rather: "To create digital islands of stability in a chaotic era. To enable interdependence that cannot be weaponized."
- His call to action: "Do not try to be Apple or Google ... Instead, build our part of the sanctuary tech ecosystem — the 'shared digital space with no owner' that enables both open finance and much more."
Bankless Take:
The sanctuary tech framing lands differently in 2026 than it would have five years ago. These threads of idealism have always been in the Ethereum community, to be sure, but what's changed is that the threats Vitalik is describing are no longer hypothetical.
The fact that Vitalik felt the need to write this at all is its own signal. It's essentially a moral manifesto, published at a time when dystopian pillars are encroaching all around us. A sounding of the alarm and calling of the banners, so to speak.
Whether Ethereum can fully actualize this sanctuary vision and make a difference before it's too late for too many is an open question, of course. But it's 100% the right one to be asking and trying to answer.