DAOs vs. PBCs for Public Administration and Social Policy Entities

Abstract

The law in most countries has long recognized entities other than individual humans a matter of social policy. Entities recognized by the law are subject to the benefits of legal enforcement of applicable rights (e.g., property ownership rights) and burdens (e.g., taxation). Legal identities are thus a fundamental characteristic of modern society. Corporations are traditional, non-human legal entities. Public benefit corporations have recently emerged as a new type of corporation. Technology advancements have also created robots and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) that are also gaining legal recognition. This chapter reviews and contrasts recent traditional and cyber evolutions of corporate legal entities. The benefits and challenges of the cyber approaches for corporate entities are developed and positioned within broader digital transformation trends impacting public and private sectors and accelerated by the recent pandemic.