Oxford University Press: Foundations of Decentralized Organizations
Blog Post: Foundations of Decentralized Organizations, Oxford Business Law Blog
Embedded Files
Foundations of Decentralized Organizations: Blockchain and the Future of Corporate Law
Abstract
Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are blockchain-based entities that pool digital assets, automate governance through smart contracts, and enable collective decision-making, challenging traditional corporate structures. By removing hierarchies and centralized control, DAOs promote transparency and global participation, while raising complex questions around liability, governance, and regulation in the digital age. This authoritative volume places DAOs within the framework of corporate law, offering a rigorous, interdisciplinary analysis of their evolution and potential. Written by a global team of scholars from the US, UK, continental Europe, Australia, and Asia, the book combines cutting-edge blockchain research with legal expertise. It traces DAOs from their idealistic origins as code-based systems designed to replace traditional law, to practical adaptations in Swiss associations and bespoke legal forms in US states such as Wyoming. Key chapters explore legal debates, historical parallels with early corporations, and governance innovations that expand participation while testing accountability. Case studies highlight DAOs’ diversity and adaptive governance, while additional chapters address bankruptcy, international law, dispute resolution, collective investment, and DeFi regulation. Forward-looking perspectives consider DAOs’ legal integration, limitations, and emerging intersections with AI. Ideal for academics, policymakers, investors, and professionals navigating Web3, Foundations of Decentralized Organizations: Blockchain and the Future of Corporate Law reveals DAOs’ transformative potential to reshape corporate law and organizational design.
2026
Introduction to Foundations of Decentralized Organizations: Blockchain and the Future of Corporate Law (co-authored)
in Kevin Werbach, Eva Micheler, and Bianca Kremer (eds), Decentralized Organizations: Blockchain and the Future of Corporate Law, Oxford University Press
This Introduction outlines the rise of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), highlighting how blockchains, smart contracts, and digital assets enable new forms of collective action beyond traditional corporate structures. It traces DAOs’ evolution from early experiments to today’s diverse applications, from finance to social initiatives, while emphasizing unresolved legal and governance challenges. The volume responds to the need for rigorous scholarship by uniting corporate law and technology law perspectives. With contributions spanning regulation, governance, dispute resolution, and theory, it provides an interdisciplinary foundation for academics, policymakers, and practitioners engaging with DAOs as programmable, transnational, and rapidly evolving organizational forms.
Code, Community, and Conflict: DAO Disputes
in Kevin Werbach, Eva Micheler, and Bianca Kremer (eds), Decentralized Organizations: Blockchain and the Future of Corporate Law, Oxford University Press
Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are a still-evolving organizational form. As such, they face unique challenges in dispute resolution. These challenges start with the definition of what constitutes a DAO dispute, compounded by the oftentimes pseudonymous identity of parties, the absence of traditional hierarchical structures, and opaque power dynamics. In addition, governance and operations are frequently—though not invariably—implemented using blockchain technology and smart contracts, adding further complexity. This chapter explores the intricacies of DAO disputes by attempting a definition and examining both internal conflicts and external challenges, outlining DAO-specific obstacles in dispute resolution and drawing from real world examples, including interviews with DAO practitioners. There is a clear need for DAOs to plan for disputes and establish clear rules and guidelines for dispute resolution (both on- and off-chain) from the outset.
2024
DeFi Attacks and the Role of DAOs (co-authored)
in Perestrelo de Oliveira and Garcia Rolo (eds), Decentralised Autonomous Organisation (DAO) Regulation - Principles and Perspectives for the Future, Mohr Siebeck
2023
Restoring Trust and Managing Risks
Report based on Wharton BDAP's ninth Reg@Tech Roundtable
Bits of Justice: Arbitration in the Metaverse (co-authored)
Shortened version of "Le métavers ne mettra pas fin aux litiges: Quel rôle à jouer pour l'arbitrage?" in English, Lexisnexis Blog UK
Le métavers ne mettra pas fin aux litiges: Quel rôle à jouer pour l'arbitrage? (co-authored) (French)
Article on arbitration and the metaverse, published in ICC France's Éxchanges Internationaux n°123 (the magazine of the French Committee of the International Chamber of Commerce)
Decentralized Autonomous Organization Toolkit (co-authored)
Insight report stemming from the Wharton BDAP and World Economic Forum collaboration on Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs)
Finding Common Ground - Navigating Tornadoes, Algorithmic Collapses and Novel Kinds of Organisms
Report based on Wharton BDAP's eighth Reg@Tech Roundtable
2022
Blockchains, Smart Contracts, and International Arbitration: The Emergence of a Crypto Autonomous Legal Order
Doctoral Thesis, University of St. Gallen (HSG)
This thesis explores the emergence of dispute resolution mechanisms on blockchains from the perspective of international commercial arbitration law and its legal theories. The underlying thesis is that blockchain technology, with the help of smart contracts, has the potential to change the dynamics of social processes, institutions, and even law. The emergence of so-called Decentralized Autonomous Organizations foreshadows new power structures in cyberspace, which can have far-reaching consequences for international trade, where experience has shown that arbitration plays a pivotal role. This thesis explains blockchain technology in its basic features and presents the historical development of proposed solutions for dispute resolution on blockchains. Thus, for the first time, it provides a comprehensive and descriptive conceptualization of blockchain disputes and blockchain dispute resolution approaches. The new crypto arbitration phenomenon is then examined in-depth and contrasted to international commercial arbitration. Finally, this dissertation extends the framework of existing legal theories in the field of international arbitration law and private ordering by a so-called crypto autonomous legal order. While this new smart contract-enabled legal order may complement the existing legal system, it also competes with it.
The Digital Asset World of 2035
Report based on the Scenario Planning Exercise conducted during Reg@Tech 7
Quo Vadis Digital Asset Regulation?
Report based on Wharton BDAP's seventh Reg@Tech Roundtable
DAOs: Beyond the Hype (co-authored)
Wharton BDAP and World Economic Forum Collaboration white paper on Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs)
The Global Challenge of Digital Asset Regulation (co-authored)
A bird’s eye view of the global state of digital asset regulation
Back to the Future
Report based on Wharton BDAP's sixth Reg@Tech Roundtable
2018
The Enforcement of Nullified Arbitral Awards in Light of the European Union's Principle of Mutual Trust
Stockholm Centre for Commercial Law Yearbook, Årsbok IX
2017
Judgments Relating to Arbitral Awards and the European Union's Principle of Mutual Trust
Arbitration - Scandinavian Studies in Law, Volume 63
Das Hunderjährige, das immer noch da ist ... (co-authored) (German)
Deutscher Anwaltsspiegel - Dispute Resolution, Ausgabe 1/2017
TALKS & CONFERENCE PARTICIPATION
2025: Ethereum Zürich (speaker); Reg@Tech Brussels Roundtable at the European Commission; Crypto Arbitration Forum (keynote speaker); European DAO Workshop (DAWO25) (speaker); 2025 International Conference on Blockchain and AI (ICOBAI) conference at the University of Malta (speaker)
2024: Oxford Digital Asset Conference; EthCC Brussels
2023: Existing Law and Extended Reality - A Research Symposium at Stanford Law School, IOSCO Fintech Task Force: Crypto & Digital Assets Stakeholder Outreach New York Roundtable at the SEC; Penn Blockchain Conference; Harvard Blockchain Conference; DAO Harvard; International Conference on DAO Regulation in Lisbon (speaker); NYU Law’s Guarini Global Law&Tech Conference on GPT, GDPR, AI Act: How (not) to regulate “Generative AI”?; Symposium at Columbia University on Optimizing for What? Algorithmic Amplification and Society; Blockchain Constitutionalism at EUI, Oxford Digital Asset Conference; Second Stanford DAO Workshop, UBRI Connect 2023 in Toronto (award recipient)
2022: Wharton BDAP and MME DAO Workshop Zurich; Consensus 2022 Austin; Penn Law Capital Markets Association Annual Conference on the Future of Crypto & Digital Assets; Penn Blockchain Conference; The Science of Blockchain Conference 2022 (SBC'22) at Stanford; Stanford DAO Workshop; DC Fintech Week; Perry World House, Rethinking Big Tech: Toward a More Democractic Internet
2021: Distributed Computing (DISCO) Group Blockchain Meetings at ETH Zurich (Dispute Resolution & Blockchains, Governance in DeFi), ASA (Swiss Arbitration Association) PhD Day, CSIS Blockchain and Human Rights Roundtable, Wharton BDAP Virtual Cryptogovernance Workshop, CV Summit Zug
2020: When Blockchain meets arbitration conference at University of Leicester, Max Planck Institute Luxembourg 3rd Seminar on Blockchain Technologies at the Domestic and International Levels, American Bar Association’s Spring Conference Online, The Society of Construction Law (Irish branch) Deep Technology and Construction Law Disputes Webinar
2019: Nordic Arbitration Conference, Lawyering in the Digital Age Conference Amsterdam, Blockchain and the Law Trustsquare Event, 4th Annual HMC-Homerton (Oxford-Cambridge) Graduate Research Day at University of Oxford, Law & Economics Foundation St. Gallen Alps Forum Blockchain Conference, KU Leuven Ius Commune Conference, Max Planck Institute Luxembourg 2nd Seminar on Blockchain and Procedural Law and Justice in the Age of Disintermediation
2018: Swiss Arbitration Association Conference on Blockchain, Arbitration and Smart Contracts, Law & Economics Foundation St. Gallen Alps Forum Blockchain Conference, Swiss Legal Tech Conference, Law & Economics Foundation St. Gallen Arbitration Forum, 4th Weblaw Forum LegalTech Berne, CV Summit Zug, START Summit St. Gallen
2017: The 9th ICC YAF-YAAP Joint Conference: Young Approaches to Arbitration at the University of Vienna (Winner of the ICC Young Arbitrators Forum (YAF) Call for Ideas), Seminar for the SCCL Prize 2016 Award Ceremony at Stockholm University (Recipient of SCCL Prize)
2016: Young Arbitrators Sweden (YAS) Arbitration Days (Recipient of YAS Award)
CONFERENCE CO-ORGANIZATION
2024 Wharton and LSE DAO Workshop (London)
2023 Wharton Reg@Tech 10 (Philadelphia), Wharton Reg@Tech Europe (Vienna), Wharton Reg@Tech 9 (Philadelphia), Wharton Law@Tech (London)
2022 Wharton Reg@Tech 8 (Philadelphia), Wharton Reg@Tech 7 (Philadelphia)
2021 Wharton Reg@Tech 6 (Philadelphia)
2019 HSG Data Science Club Python Coding Camp (Zurich)
2017 ICAL AA – YAAP – Amcham Joint Conference (Vienna)
Copyright © 2026 Bianca Kremer - All Rights Reserved.
Google Sites
Report abuse