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DAO Harvard 2023
DAO Harvard took place on April 2-4, 2023 bringing together policymakers, blockchain experts and scholars to discuss and explore different aspects of Decentralized Autonomous Organizations. The conference was co-organized by Blockchain Gov alongside Harvard Kennedy School, Belfer Center, and the Safra Center for Ethics,
as well as Metagov, COALA, and the DAO Research Collective. The event was organized in different tracks – Research Summit, Law Summit, and Summit on Equitable Ownership and Governance in the Online Economy.
The Law Summit
The Law Summit at DAO Harvard featured multiple working groups focused on legal aspects of DAOs. They discussed topics like incorporation benefits, liability, taxation, legal pathways, and regulatory compliance standards. BlockchainGov and COALA co-organized the event, building on the COALA DAO Model Law. This model law offers guidelines for regulatory frameworks to provide legal clarity for DAOs while considering their unique characteristics. This approach has gained momentum, as seen in the passage of the Utah DAO Bill. Each group included legal experts, academics, and practitioners, and their insights will contribute to a revised COALA DAO Model Law (V2)
On Costitutionalism
In the latter, Primavera De Filippi discussed the relationship between blockchains and constitutions, highlighting that decentralized technology doesn’t necessarily equate to decentralized power. Decentralization isn’t inherent; it must be intentionally designed, and it’s not always without costs. Blockchain systems incorporate both formal (on-chain protocols and smart contracts) and informal (off-chain rules) constitutions.
Our friends at Belfer Center compiled a complete report at this link.
This site is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The BlockchainGov project has been funded by an European Research Council Grant.