While hybridity has been extensively studied within bounded organizations, hybrid forms of organizing beyond formal organizational structures remain undertheorized. Hybrid organizationality, the concept introduced in this article, refers to a mode of organizing in which multiple institutional logics are sustained through coordinated action without crystallizing into a formal organization. The concept is developed through a qualitative case study of the Large-scale Agrifood Communal Trade Network (LACTN), a large-scale direct-to-consumer agricultural network linking farmers, volunteer-run distribution hubs, and consumers in Israel during successive periods of crisis. We show how LACTN loosely couples commercial and communal logics while preserving the autonomy of its constituent actors. Hybrid organizationality, we argue, becomes possible through the convergence of three conditions: the coexistence of autonomous commercial and communal actors, shared moral commitments that bridge these domains, and digitally mediated infrastructures that enable decentralized coordination at scale. The analysis further demonstrates how socio-economic sustainability may emerge in practice through large-scale, socially embedded market coordination, even in the absence of an explicit ideological sustainability agenda. By examining a network built largely upon conventional agricultural production and market logics, yet organized through volunteer mediation, communal coordination, and morally inflected exchange, the article complicates the conventional distinction between “alternative” and “conventional” food systems that has long structured scholarship on alternative agri-food networks. More broadly, the case illustrates how sustainability-oriented organizing can emerge through loosely coupled alignments among markets, communities, and digital infrastructures beyond the boundaries of formal organizations.
Abstract Since their 1994 uprising, Zapatista communities have built social, political, and economic alternatives within autonomous territories, setting an example for multiple Transformation Initiatives and social movements globally. Focusing on economic solidarity through coffee distribution, this article investigates how the boundaries between being inside, beyond, or against the state and the market are relationally conceived and performed by autonomous peasants and European activist networks. The study is based on multiple fieldworks between Europe and Chiapas and years of engaged research. Beyond dual rationalizations between silent and loud resistance, I argue that anticapitalist worlds surrounding Zapatismo connect everyday forms of struggle with broader, structural hopes for change through transnational alliances. It is the existence of an organized infrastructure that allows this form of trade to reproduce its own antagonism, in constant tension against the state, reified as the ultimate perpetrator of the neoliberal order. Revisiting informality through the lenses of anti-systemic movements allows us to decentralize resistance, encompassing non-hegemonic processes from below (and to the left) that cannot be reduced to Western categories nor trivialized as the sole weapons in the hands of voiceless and powerless societies. Articulating Marxist anthropology with decolonial thought through the framework of Zapatista autonomy suggests that it is not enough to categorize resistance as visible or invisible, formal or informal. The study of economic solidarity surrounding the Zapatista experience provides an understanding of the complex realities of anticapitalist resistances today, where collective organization is as much about survival as it is about reimagining power and economy.
Sustainable trade requires verifiable, granular, and trustworthy data across multi-jurisdictional supply chains. This paper argues that blockchain’s binding constraints are institutional, not technical, and proposes the Green Trade Blockchain Governance Trilemma: no design can simultaneously maximize (i) transactional efficiency, (ii) regulatory verifiability, and (iii) decentralized governance with commercial privacy. Comparative cases—TradeLens, IBM Food Trust, Everledger, and Power Ledger—show divergent institutional choices and outcomes: TradeLens faltered under perceived hegemonic control; Food Trust succeeded via a buyer mandate; Everledger thrived through symbiosis with trusted authorities; Power Ledger scaled within a regulatory sandbox. We further analyze the Oracle Problem as the key limit to verifiability and assess privacy-enhancing technologies, especially zero-knowledge proofs, as partial mitigations that protect sensitive data while enabling compliance checks. We conclude that success hinges on context-specific institutional design—certified oracles plus verifiable computation—rather than a one-size-fits-all stack, offering actionable guidance for policymakers, consortia, and firms building credible green-trade infrastructure.
The concept of Non-Fungible Token (NFT) is complex. To understand the legal definition of an NFT, one must first consider the idea behind NFTs. According to the Treccani Encyclopedia, a Non-Fungible Token (NFT) is defined as “a non-duplicable digital certificate that certifies the originality and unique ownership of a physical or digital asset registered on the blockchain”. When someone buys an NFT, they do not gain ownership of the underlying asset; instead, they acquire specific rights related to it. These assets can be classified into three groups: native digital assets, which have no physical form; assets that do have a physical form; and assets with “variable geometries”, which include digital goods that can be linked to a physical version upon request. Examples of such goods include fashion items, luxury brands, and artwork. For items intended for use in “new virtual dimensions”, like the Metaverse, buyers can also request a corresponding physical item for use in the “real world”. NFTs have gained popularity across markets such as art, fashion, collectibles, and, most recently, sports. Aspects such as their legal status, regulations, and the effects of trading on specialized platforms, particularly regarding exchange value, require careful attention.
Christina Singh, Aleksandra Natalia Wojewska, U. Martin Persson, Simon Laursen Bager
Transparency and equitability are key for improved sustainability outcomes in global value chains. Blockchain technology has been touted as a tool for achieving these ends. However, due to the limited empirical evidence, claims on transparency and sustainability benefits are largely theoretical. We lack an understanding of the benefits and drawbacks for upstream actors within global value chains and how this affects technology adoption. Addressing this gap, we conduct an empirical study to identify the drivers and obstacles for coffee producers in Colombia in adopting blockchain. We base our research on an event-driven and permissioned blockchain model, specifically designed for this research. Applying the Participation Capacity Framework and conducting semi-structured interviews with coffee producers and key informants, we analyze adoption attitudes towards the blockchain application. We further identify opportunities and drawbacks from the producers’ perspective. We set these findings in the context of the Global Value Chain research, considering the existing power relations in the coffee value chain. The top-down nature of blockchain projects raises distributive concerns, as resource investments, implementation burden, and risks are significantly higher upstream, whereas downstream lead firms will benefit most. We identify data squeeze as an additional channel of sustainable supplier squeeze relevant in the case of blockchain initiatives. Data squeeze implies lead firms turning the data obtained through, likely unpaid, labour of blockchain participants into a monetizable assets and marketable value through branding and advertisement. Based on the findings, we identify potential design dimensions and implementation features that can contribute to materializing producer benefits, thus mitigating the risk of a sustainability-driven supplier squeeze.
Nick Bernards, Malcolm Campbell‐Verduyn, Daivi Rodima‐Taylor
This article interrogates the turn towards digital technologies for addressing sustainability challenges in global supply chains. Focusing on the case of blockchains, we assess industry claims that this set of distributed ledger technologies for undertaking, verifying, and publishing digital transactions provides the greater transparency necessary to resolve sustainability challenges. Our central contention is that blockchain-based initiatives to promote sustainability in global supply chains double-down on modes of third-party audit and disclosure governance that have thus far failed to address labour and environmental abuses. The turn towards these digital technologies, we show, extends interlinked processes of managerialization and the spread of ‘audit culture’ in the governance of global supply chains. These tendencies heighten obstacles to enhancing sustainability across global supply chains, exacerbating the very challenges blockchain initiatives are ostensibly meant to address. Worse than not fundamentally addressing sustainability problems, applications of this set of ‘sustech’ render failures to address sustainability abuses more opaque. The technological novelty of blockchain helps to construct what we call a ‘veil of transparency’ over sustainability abuses and marginalities in and across global supply chains.
У статті досліджені переваги та перспективи застосування технології блокчейн у сучасних економічних і організаційних процесах, розглянуто ризики та проблеми, зокрема, в контексті питання довіри у централізованих і децентралізованих системах, організації і адміністрації децентралізованих систем. Оглядаються технічні особливості і можливості сучасних блокчейн систем. Досліджується сутність, контекст і передумови появи децентралізованих автономних організацій як явища, описуються технічні особливості й можливості децентралізованих систем. Розглянуто концепцію мережі Web3, роль технології блокчейн і децентралізованих автономних організацій у нинішньому і майбутньому розвитку мережі інтернет. Розглянута проблематика сучасної архітектури інтернет платформ, вплив великих корпорацій на галузь інформаційних технологій, розвиток технологій, а також питання приватності і використання даних користувачів у комерційних цілях. Проаналізована проблематика децентралізованих автономних організацій, ризиків економічного, технічного та юридичного характеру, пов’язаних з корупцією, розробкою і проектуванням децентралізованих систем, технічними особливостями децентралізованих систем і інформаційних технологій, юридичними і регуляторними практиками. Досліджена сутність і технічні засади децентралізованих автономних організацій, а також перспективи технології й можливі сфери застосування, протиставлено і проаналізовано ключові відмінності між централізованими і децентралізованими організаціями. Проаналізовано основні погляди на використання блокчейн технологій у діяльності цифрової економіки, досліджено актуальний стан та можливості у використанні інструментів. Оцінено можливості та роль децентралізованих систем з огляду на нові способи організації та динамічний розвиток інтернет-середовища, спрогнозовано можливі напрями розвитку у контексті взаємодії користувачів в мережі.
Simon Laursen Bager, Christina Singh, U. Martin Persson
Information sharing lies at the core of most governance interventions within agro-food commodity supply-chains, such as certification standards or direct trade relationships. However, actors have little information available to guide sustainable consumption decisions beyond simple labels. Blockchain technology can potentially alleviate the numerous sustainability problems related to agro-food commodity supply-chains by fostering traceability and transparency. Despite significant research on blockchain, there is limited understanding of the concrete barriers and benefits and potential applications of blockchain in real-world settings. Here, we present a case study of blockchain implementation in a coffee supply-chain. Our aim is to assess the potential of blockchain technology to promote sustainability in coffee supply chains through increased traceability and transparency and to identify barriers and opportunities for this. While our pilot implementation clearly illustrates certain benefits of blockchain, it also suggests that blockchain is no silver bullet for delivering agro-food supply chain sustainability. Knowledge on provenance and transparency of information on quality and sustainability can help trigger transformation of consumer behaviour, but the actual value lies in digitising the supply chain to increase efficiency and reduce costs, disputes, and fraud, while providing more insight end-to-end through product provenance and chain-of-custody information. We identify a need to understand and minimize supply chain barriers before we can reap the full benefits of digitalization and decentralization provided by blockchain technology.
Abstract This paper analyzes the interactions between the separate components of the emerging transnational timber legality regime, both public and private. It examines how far, and through what institutional mechanisms, these interactions are producing a joined‐up transnational regime, based on a shared normative commitment to combat illegal logging and cooperative efforts to implement and enforce it. The paper argues that the experimentalist architecture of the EU FLEGT initiative has fostered productive, mutually reinforcing interactions both with public timber legality regulation in other consumer countries and with private certification schemes. But this emerging regime remains highly polyarchic, with broad scope for autonomous initiatives by NGOs and private service providers, along with national governments, international organizations, and multi‐donor partnerships. Hence horizontal integration and coordination within it depend on a series of institutional mechanisms, some of which are distinctively experimentalist, while others can also be found in more conventional regimes. These mechanisms include cross‐referencing and reciprocal endorsement of rules and standards; recursive learning through information pooling and peer review of implementation experience; public oversight and joint assessment of private certification and legality verification schemes; and the “penalty default” effect of public legality regulation in consumer countries, which have pushed both exporting countries and transnational firms to comply with the norms and procedures of the emerging transnational regime. The paper's findings thus provide robust new evidence for the claim advanced in previous work that a joined‐up transnational regime can be assembled piece by piece under polyarchic conditions through coordinated learning from decentralized experimentation, without a hegemonic power to impose common global rules.
Law, regulation, and private standards have evolved to enhance sustainability in value chains. However, the volume of hard and soft laws has created complexity and fragmentation for consumers and firms. In addition, global value chains are increasingly disaggregated, making it difficult for consumers to enforce breaches of sustainability representations. Blockchain, as an immutable and digital record keeping system, is a tool that can deal with this growing complexity in global value chains. Documents verifying sustainability that were once in the private domain and stored in paper copy can now be made accessible in a secure and transparent blockchain platform. Despite a growing interest in the potential of blockchain to transform businesses, there are few concrete examples or scholarly literature showing how blockchain is operationalized in practice. Using a “conceptual framework analysis” approach, we develop an Evidence, Verifiability, and Enforceability (EVE) framework to illustrate how blockchain can enhance sustainability by providing information to consumers on the origin of products, assurances as to the veracity of the information, and a mechanism to enforce representations through the blockchain smart contract function. However, there need to be safeguards put in place for blockchain technology to meet its promise and we discuss some of these challenges.
G. Balachandran, Grégoire Mallard, Olufunmilayo B. Arewa, Lucio Baccaro · 9 authors
This chapter attempts a broad analytical compass for surveying the main actors, institutions and instruments governing our world. Despite its seeming ubiquity, governance is a relatively new expression in this context suggestive both of new modes of exercising power, and an enhanced focus on ordering a world undergoing rapid change. Speaking generally governance may be understood as the exercise of power organized around multiple dispersed sites operating through transnational networks of actors, public as well as private, and national, regional as well as local. The turn to governance is often held to be coeval if not conjoined to profound changes in the meaning and nature of government associated with the ascendancy of ‘neo-liberal’ ideas and precepts. This has had significant implications for how governance tends to be understood. Critics associate it directly with the changing role of states in the economic and social sphere. Transnational governance, in particular, is criticized for foregrounding the priorities of corporate investors often to the detriment of social or environmental goals, subordinating principles of ‘comparative’ or ‘cooperative’ advantage to ‘competitive’ advantage, and promoting microregulatory forms of regulation over strategic or structurally-focused interventions (such as industrial policy). Associated shifts trace states’ powers, otherwise a touchstone of sovereignty, being increasingly negotiated with transnational private actors and international financial institutions (IFIs), and placed under external jurisdictions. The turn to governance tends also to framed, whether directly or directly, justifiably or otherwise, alongside cuts in the public provisioning of health, education, housing, and social expenditures wherever they may have taken place, a parallel proliferation of managerial controls, and to governments contracting out public services to private and quasi-private agencies, or relinquishing them to the voluntary sector. At the risk of oversimplifying its critics’ views, if modern governments describe rule by/of citizens, governance describes rule over subjects. This chapter maps a rather more fluid and differentiated landscape of governance across the five areas it surveys, i.e. finance, investment, trade, labor and environment. In finance, while regulation may appear to have become more transnational and to an extent even voluntary, deregulatory outcomes have reconfigured the nature of risk and the cognitive and policy frameworks for dealing with it. At the same time a growing risk of states having to foot the ultimate bill may still become a point of departure for more differentiated regulatory approaches. On the other hand, not only are environmental agreements continued to be implemented and enforced at national and sub-national scales, the ascendency of market interventions and transnational institutions here has taken place in parallel with—and sometimes through mutual cooptation of—other kinds of interventions including those for promoting decentralization and community control over resources. Trends in labor regulation may also reflect individual state choices more than direct transnational pressures, or run contrary to the preferences of specialized international organizations in the domain. Even in the controversial sphere of investment treaties, there is considerable ongoing fluidity with regard to norms, jurisdiction, and actors within and between national and international arenas. Thus, upon closer inspection and with the benefit of a more domain-specific approach, we may not necessarily observe a sweeping or uniform shift, but more a mosaic of regulatory frameworks, quite disparate trends with regard to their negotiation, implementation and impact, and a future rife with possibilities.