Who Can Make the Action Happen? An Authority-Decomposition Framework for High-Risk Automated Systems

• URL: http://arxiv.org/abs/2608.18965v1
• Date: Wed, 19 Aug 2026 14:30:58 GMT
• Title: Who Can Make the Action Happen? An Authority-Decomposition Framework for High-Risk Automated Systems
• Abstract summary: This paper provides an action-relative method for deriving which trust-domain coalitions are sufficient to cause protected execution.<n>It separates causal control over execution from control over the authoritative account of an operation.<n>It derives inclusion-minimal sufficient coalitions and tests whether claimed execution boundaries remain independent of designated upstream domains.
• Score: 8.71734630214811
• License: http://arxiv.org/licenses/nonexclusive-distrib/1.0/
• Abstract: High-risk automated systems distribute control across services, credentials, protected components, and lifecycle mechanisms. Labels such as authorized, approved, privileged, or protected therefore do not answer a basic causal question: which actors can actually make a consequential action occur? This paper provides an action-relative method for deriving which trust-domain coalitions are sufficient to cause protected execution, defined as the occurrence of a designated protected state transition. The framework models components, powers, resources, boundaries, and alternative realization structures; includes update, recovery, override, disablement, and alternative invocation; and separates causal control over execution from control over the authoritative account of an operation. It derives inclusion-minimal sufficient coalitions and tests whether claimed execution boundaries remain independent of designated upstream domains. Cross-domain analytical cases illustrate the method. In a split-control, release-intended, open-state, source-bounded Havenlon protocol model, the ordinary witness requires five trust domains, while certificate replacement yields a three-domain inclusion-minimal known requirement set among source-enumerated protocol witnesses; the Linux domain remains insufficient for the complete transition. Deployed global non-bypassability and boundary-bound veto coverage remain unresolved. The framework is a conceptual and analytical tool. It does not certify implementations, establish deployment security, guarantee complete discovery of hidden powers, or define evidence-verification semantics.

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