Authority Boundary
The explicit limit of what a person, role, or AI agent is authorised to do — defined structurally rather than implied informally.
An authority boundary is the explicit scope of what an actor (human or AI) is permitted to do within the organisation. Unlike informal authority ("I think I can approve this" or "I've always done it this way"), authority boundaries are defined structurally and enforced at the moment of action.
Authority boundaries prevent two common governance failures: - Authority creep: when people gradually take on more authority than they were granted, often without anyone noticing - Authority ambiguity: when no one knows who has authority for a given decision, leading to either paralysis or unauthorised action
In Constellation, authority boundaries are defined in the Charter and enforced by the governance gate. They can be as broad as "CTO has authority over all technical decisions" or as narrow as "this AI agent can only read files in the /docs directory."
How Constellation handles this
Constellation makes authority boundaries explicit in the Charter layer and enforces them through the governance gate. When someone or something acts beyond their authority, the system catches it immediately.