The Decentralized Finance (DeFi) platforms are proving to be a calling card of the financial system in the global front. The de-Fi platforms provide peer-to-peer financial services without relying on any type of significant centralized intermediaries. This paper evaluates the success of DeFi platforms using a two-frame analysis, the Decentralized Infrastructure Sustainability and Security (DISS) Model, and the System Usability Scale (SUS). This study assesses the role of different elements of DISS and SUS models in affecting the use of DeFi platforms. Such findings in their turn assist us in comprehending the significance of encouraging mechanisms and data privacy in constructing and increasing the user trust and making the platform more successful.
Crowdfunding for social goods has become a transformative force in India's development ecosystem, emerging as a crucial citizen-driven financing model for healthcare assistance, educational support, social welfare, environmental conservation, and community development projects.As India progresses toward achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the importance of innovative, decentralized, and participatory funding mechanisms has grown significantly.Traditional sources of funding-government schemes, philanthropic donations, CSR initiatives, and institutional grants-are often insufficient to meet the enormous financial needs of low-income and marginalized communities.In this context, digital crowdfunding platforms such as Ketto, Milaap, ImpactGuru, Donatekart, and GiveIndia offer flexible, inclusive, and accessible channels for mobilizing public contributions.Unlike commercial crowdfunding, donation-based crowdfunding provides no financial returns to donors.Therefore, donors' decisions are fundamentally shaped by behavioural finance factors rather than economic incentives.This research adopts a behavioural finance perspective to examine the psychological, emotional, cognitive, and social determinants that influence campaign success for SDG-aligned social crowdfunding projects in India.The study investigates how donor motivations-including altruism, empathy, moral obligation, warm-glow effect, identity-driven giving, and social influence-interact with campaign design elements, platform architecture, and trust signals to determine fundraising outcomes.Findings from prior research and platform-level data indicate that trust remains the strongest driver of donation intention.Indian donors tend to be risk-averse due to concerns about fraud, misrepresentation, and misuse of funds.As a result, trust-building mechanisms-such as verified fundraisers, authentic documentation, medical proof, transparent financial breakdowns, institutional endorsements, and frequent campaign updates-significantly increase credibility and donor confidence.Emotional storytelling is another powerful determinant; campaigns featuring identifiable beneficiaries, vivid visuals, personal narratives, and urgent medical needs evoke stronger empathy and are more likely to attract support.Social proof and herding behaviour also play a critical role.Donors frequently look to the actions of others to validate campaign legitimacy, especially when information is limited.High engagement metrics-number of donors, comments, shares, early contributions-signal popularity and urgency, triggering positive herding effects that accelerate the fundraising process.Campaigns that achieve early momentum typically experience higher visibility, stronger network effects, and higher conversion rates.In India, where community networks, family ties, religious identity, and regional affiliations are strong, such social cues significantly enhance campaign reach:
Omar Otoniel Flores-Cortez, Ernesto Rivas Valdez, Vladimir A. Polanco-Zepeda, Carlos Pocasangre Jimenez · 5 authors
This paper presents the design and implementation of thesocks.net, a decentralized social finance network inspired by the CAW protocol manifesto. thesocks.net leverages Web3 technologies and the Polygon blockchain to provide a communitygoverned, anonymous, and censorship-resistant platform that integrates traditional features of social networks with decentralized financial services. The architecture is built around two core elements: the NFTs-Username utility cryptocurrency deployed on Polygon and NFT_Username identities, which function as user accounts represented by unique and tradable NFTs. Smart contracts written in Solidity govern key features such as content publication, user interactions (likes, shares, follows), stake, token burning, and reward distribution, ensuring transparency and autonomy. The platform enables users to create profiles, send encrypted messages, transfer tokens, and participate in staking and games, all without centralized control or personal data collection. This paper outlines the technical framework, the development process, and the deployment phases of thesocks.net, demonstrating how the blockchain-based infrastructure can support secure, scalable and inclusive social ecosystems. The implementation highlights the potential of decentralized architectures to foster freedom of expression, digital ownership, and financial participation on a global scale.
The constant evolution of Decentralized Finance (DeFi) calls for the continuous monitoring of its developments and implications through a critical review of the academic literature. While DeFi holds promise for enhancing economic activity by expanding market access for enterprises and promoting financial inclusion, concerns remain that digital assets are primarily used for speculative purposes rather than for financing the real economy. This study employs bibliometric methods to investigate whether and how the current academic literature addresses the potential influence of DeFi on real economic dynamics. Employing bibliometric methods—including co-citation, bibliographic coupling, and keyword co-occurrence analyses—focused on DeFi-related publications in the Economics and Business subject areas within the Scopus database, the study maps the knowledge base, author networks, and thematic trends and their temporal evolution, supporting regulators, researchers, and practitioners. The findings reveal that the integration of DeFi with the real economy has received limited attention in scholarly research. This highlights the need for further investigation into DeFi’s implications for financial stability, productive investment, and long-term economic growth.
Sustainable finance is becoming an essential tool in addressing critical global environmental challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and resource depletion with the youth generation emerging as a central driver for green investment models.The research identifies new participatory financial systems led by youth, which promote sustainable development, particularly in areas such as renewable energy, climate change, and the circular economy.We achieve this by examining the shift in investment patterns in general, as well as the specific trends among rich young entrepreneurs, activists, and technologists.This is carried out through an indepth analysis of grassroots actions, case studies, and decentralized finance (DeFi) models.The article explores new ways of engaging youth in crowdfunding platforms, green bonds, tokenized carbon credits, and venture funds that focus on environmental, social, and governance (ESG) issues, bringing sustainability finance within the reach of all and reducing the entry barrier to green innovation.Furthermore, the study sheds light on the interaction between the benefits of technology and finance, as well as the use of blockchain, AI, and other fintech solutions provided by youth-led platforms to maintain accountability, traceability, and scalability in green investment projects.The paper also examines policy gaps and institutional issues contributing to the inability of young people to access sustainable finance and provides recommendations to facilitate an environment that can foster innovation as well as inclusion in it.The study also identifies young changemakers as key drivers in achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), specifically SDG 13 (Climate Action) and SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals), by placing them in perspective not just as recipients of sustainable finance, but as creators of its ecosystems.This piece of work is part of the debate around inclusive green growth and a roadmap in terms of empowering the future generation to live within the context of the sustainable economic model.
This paper presents a systematic literature review on Decentralized Finance (DeFi), examining its key components, implementation challenges, and benefits to the financial sector. Using Kitchenham’s guidelines and the PRISMA framework, relevant studies from 2021 to 2025 were analyzed. Findings show that DeFi systems are built on smart contracts, decentralized exchanges, lending platforms, and stablecoin mechanisms. These enable open, programmable, and intermediary-free financial services. However, DeFi adoption faces issues such as security risks, scalability, high cost, market quality, centralization, uncertainty regulation, and complexity. Despite these challenges, DeFi offers potential advantages including greater transparency, improve efficiency and services and enhanced financial inclusion. Overall, this comprehensive review serves as a valuable resource for researchers, practitioners, and organizations seeking to understand the evolving DeFi landscape, address existing limitations, and make informed decisions regarding its adoption and development.
This chapter explores the emergence and evolution of Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) as a disruptive model for collective governance in Web3. It explains how DAOs leverage blockchain technology and smart contracts to enable token-based decision-making, eliminating traditional hierarchical structures. The chapter details various governance models – including weighted, quadratic, and liquid democracy – that balance inclusivity and efficiency. Through real-world examples and case studies, it demonstrates how DAOs are transforming investment, social causes, business operations, and community-driven initiatives. It also addresses challenges such as legal uncertainties, security vulnerabilities, and scalability issues, while providing actionable steps for individuals to engage with, contribute to, and even launch their own DAOs. Overall, the chapter highlights DAOs’ potential to foster transparent, democratic, and resilient organizational ecosystems in the digital age.
The global financial ecosystem is undergoing a profound transformation driven by the convergence of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) imperatives, Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities, and Financial Technology (FinTech) innovations. This paper explores the synergistic nexus among these three forces and articulates how their intersection is reframing the trajectory of sustainable finance. By integrating ESG objectives with AI-powered intelligence and FinTech-driven efficiency, the study demonstrates how financial systems can evolve from traditional, compliance-based models to adaptive, data-driven, and ethically informed architectures that promote long-term sustainability and inclusiveness. Using a multidisciplinary research framework, the paper examines the mutual reinforcement between sustainability principles, technological innovation, and digital finance mechanisms. It assesses how AI enhances ESG data management through advanced analytics, natural language processing, and machine learning algorithms that can measure, predict, and optimize sustainability outcomes. These technologies improve data transparency, reliability, and comparability, addressing one of the core challenges of ESG evaluation and reporting. In parallel, FinTech platforms like spanning blockchain, decentralized finance (DeFi), green digital bonds, and peer-to-peer investment systems-enable traceable and democratized financial flows that embed sustainability values at the transaction level.The study proposes a novel conceptual model, the “Sustainable Intelligence Framework (SIF)”, which delineates how ESG indicators, AI insights, and FinTech mechanisms interact within a dynamic feedback system. The SIF illustrates that when these domains operate synergistically, they not only enhance decision-making efficiency but also generate compounded social, environmental, and economic value. Through case studies of emerging economies and advanced markets, the research uncovers practical applications, regulatory considerations, and ethical implications of the ESG‑AI‑FinTech triad. The analysis further highlights how AI-driven FinTech can facilitate green credit scoring, impact investment assessment, and automated sustainability auditing, while blockchain ensures trust, traceability, and reduced information asymmetry across value chains. The findings affirm that the integration of ESG, AI, and FinTech is not merely convergent but transformative in creating a synergistic ecosystem that can accelerate the transition toward a sustainable, transparent, and equitable financial future. This synergy also redefines risk management and governance paradigms, positioning sustainability as a strategic driver rather than a regulatory constraint. The paper concludes by emphasizing that the ESG‑AI‑FinTech nexus represents the next frontier in sustainable finance, offering a blueprint for policymakers, institutions, and innovators to harmonize profitability with planetary and social well-being.
NFTree creates incentives to protect ecosystems of high ecological value and strengthens territorial resilience by integrating companies, communities, and key stakeholders under an innovative financing model. Through decentralized community management structures and natural asset tokenization (a process that digitally converts ecological value into verifiable assets), it turns ecosystem stewards into direct protagonists, ensuring transparency, traceability, and placing both people and ecosystems at the core of sustainable development. This publication provides a clear replication guide to consolidate a sustainable financing system that ensures long-term conservation. Based on Fundación Futuro's experience in the Andean Chocó and other successful conservation models, it offers a strategic framework to integrate stakeholders, implement digital tools, and develop governance and financing mechanisms that make ecological and social regeneration viable. The goal is to share experience and inspire replication in other contexts and regions. The publication shares key lessons and insights from Fundación Futuro and Grupo Futuro's journey, aiming to inspire adaptation and replication in diverse contexts and regions.
Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) can be perceived as a novel way for people to organize themselves and carry out collective activities, based on the blockchain and with a degree of decentralization that traditional forms of organization such as companies, associations, or foundations do not provide. With some exceptions, it is rare to find jurisdictions with bespoke regimes for DAOs. However, this vacuum does not mean DAOs escape the law – in most jurisdictions, DAOs will be considered partnerships, with common themes of informality, lack of legal personality, and unlimited liability of members. Portuguese law is no exception, and this chapter provides a review of how Portuguese civil law partnership (sociedade civil) law would apply to DAOs and to what degree it is compatible with their purposes. However, as will be pointed out, the treatment of DAOs as partnerships is unsustainable, and any future tailor-made regulation must keep some essential issues in mind.
This chapter explores the benefits and challenges of decentralized governance in decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). While decentralization promotes broader stakeholder participation and enhances transparency, it also brings significant practical hurdles. Full decentralization can result in inefficiencies, especially as organizations scale, and may lead to unclear accountability. The chapter thus argues that decentralization does not need to be embraced exclusively in its purest form but rather can be integrated selectively into traditional organizational structures. By combining decentralized elements with conventional governance models, through decentralized autonomous committees (DACs), organizations can reap the advantages of automation, transparency, and stakeholder engagement, while maintaining operational efficiency and clarity in leadership. This hybrid approach positions decentralization as a valuable complement rather than a standalone model.
This chapter gives an overview of key benefits to the Global South that stem from Web3 and the metaverse. It provides a perspective on the Global South's preparedness to benefit from Web3 and the metaverse looking at key indicators related to the adoptions of cryptocurrency and Web3 browser and investment in Web3 and the metaverse. It provides details of economic and social impacts of the metaverse in key areas. The chapter talks about the role of the metaverse economy as a job creator. It also reviews the metaverse's effects on training, education, knowledge exchange, innovation, and entrepreneurship. It will discuss how the metaverse can help the Global South internationalize cultural products and artifacts. It analyses how Web3 can provide leapfrogging opportunities in areas such as finance. This chapter also explains how various trust issues can be addressed by Web3, which is especially important in the Global South.
The creative environment has transformed because of the digital economy's explosive growth, particularly for digital artists who now produce, distribute, and monetize their work primarily through online channels. To preserve the financial sustainability of digital art actors, this study aims to investigate how digital financial literacy serves as a supporting element in crowdfunding and microfinance. Two hundred respondents working in various digital art domains, including graphics, music, and non-fungible tokens (NFTs), were surveyed using a quantitative methodology. The study's findings, obtained using the Structural Equation Model (SEM) and SmartPLS software, demonstrated that microfinance has a statistically negligible and detrimental impact on the long-term financial viability of actors involved in digital art. Crowdfunding, on the other hand, significantly improves their financial viability. Furthermore, financial sustainability is positively and significantly impacted by digital financial literacy. The impact of microfinance on the long-term financial viability of digital creative players is mitigated by digital financial literacy. To enhance the resilience of creative professionals in an increasingly digital economy, this study emphasizes the importance of integrating financial education with training in digital skills. The study's practical implications include suggestions for legislators, professionals in the creative sector, and academic institutions to develop targeted initiatives that may enhance the financial viability of digital arts practitioners. To further understand the connection between digital financial literacy and the sustainability of the creative economy, further study is advised that it uses a longitudinal approach and cross-national comparisons.
Regenerative Finance emerged in response to the Great Recession of 2007-2008 and the subsequent financial crisis, which exposed the erosion of the financial system. Its foundation is on Regenerative Economics, proposing a new economic system and framework for a regenerative civilisation that will reshape the future of Finance. It contrasts with various other propositions, such as ESG, DEI, and Green Finance. This thesis aims to define Regenerative Finance and how it differs from traditional extractive Finance and investment business models. How “ReFi” challenges the habitual mindset behind the Financial industry, which prioritises maximising profits at the expense of communities, living ecosystems, and the environment, generating “a triple planetary crisis of climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss”. How it plans to transform the financial system, addressing inequality, and setting forth regeneration. The study employed secondary data collection gathered from official sources, including the UNFCCC. The presentation is descriptive and employs thematic analysis, identifying core themes typical of social science projects. This research examines the technology substructure, which serves as an intersection between Web3, characterised by DAOs, blockchain, Decentralised Finance (DeFi), Crypto, NFTs, and tokenisation as its tools for regeneration. It explores all their technical specifications, the principles behind these innovations, implementation, and challenges. Additionally, there are Natural Capital-Backed Assets (VCM, Biochar, etc.), which function as a novel solution to preserve natural resources, employing technologies such as Tokenization. It encompasses socio-economic and political aspects, examples of ongoing ReFi projects, criticism, challenges, and/or fraud that ReFi may encounter in practice, beyond the theoretical.
Óscar De los Reyes-Marín, Iria Paz Gil, José Torres-Pruñonosa, Raúl Gómez-Martínez
Urban inequality and the financialization of housing call for a reconsideration of centralized municipal finance. This study introduces Decentralized Behavioral Finance (DBF), a framework integrating behavioral economics, blockchain infrastructures, and participatory governance to realign individual incentives with collective urban outcomes. Grounded in Sen's capability approach, Nash equilibrium theory, and libertarian paternalism, DBF links tokenization and behavioral design to accessibility, capital efficiency, and cooperative stability. Using longitudinal data for Spain (2000–2024) and evidence from tokenized housing initiatives, the analysis shows that citizen participation and technological adoption are positively associated with governance stability and social housing outcomes, while capital concentration exhibits a negative relationship with stability. The paper advances a formal Cooperative Stability Condition, expressed as a structural inequality, under which decentralized governance remains stable when participation amplified by technological enforcement outweighs concentration pressures. By introducing a testable equilibrium condition rather than a descriptive governance model, the study offers an internationally transferable framework for participatory urban finance focused on transparency, inclusion, and institutional resilience. • Introduces a formal Cooperative Stability Condition for urban governance • Integrates behavioral economics and blockchain in municipal finance • Shows participation × technology offsets capital concentration • Provides longitudinal evidence (Spain, 2000–2024) • Proposes a transferable equilibrium framework for cities
Andrew Ifesinachi Daraojimba, Damodar Bihani, Grace Omotunde Osho, Julius Olatunde Omisola · 6 authors
Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) represent a transformative innovation in financial governance, enabling community-owned and transparently operated structures through blockchain technology. This paper presents a conceptual model for integrating DAOs into the banking and financial services sector to promote equitable, trustless, and decentralized financial systems. Traditional banking frameworks often rely on centralized authorities, opaque governance, and profit-driven agendas that marginalize underserved populations. By contrast, DAOs offer a paradigm where smart contracts execute predefined rules without intermediaries, allowing stakeholders to participate directly in decision-making processes. The proposed model outlines a framework for community-owned banking, emphasizing the use of token-based governance, peer-to-peer lending mechanisms, automated interest rate adjustments, and decentralized reserve management. This system fosters financial inclusion by allowing unbanked and underbanked populations to access financial services through open and transparent digital platforms. Moreover, DAO-based financial governance ensures real-time auditability, accountability, and resistance to single points of failure—addressing critical vulnerabilities in conventional financial institutions. Through the conceptualization of a DAO-led Community Bank (DAO-CB), the paper demonstrates how decentralized finance (DeFi) primitives such as liquidity pools, stablecoins, and collateralized lending can be integrated with democratic governance models to create robust, community-led economic ecosystems. Legal, technical, and regulatory considerations are examined, with a focus on scalability, compliance, and user adoption challenges. The study argues that while DAO banking may not yet replace centralized financial institutions, it serves as a powerful complementary system, especially in regions with limited banking infrastructure or high levels of financial distrust. The research contributes to the growing discourse on decentralized finance and its real-world applications, offering insights into how DAOs can redefine ownership, control, and transparency in the financial sector. The conceptual model provides a foundation for future empirical studies and prototype development, encouraging stakeholders, developers, and policymakers to collaborate on building decentralized, equitable, and resilient financial ecosystems.
Nina-Birte Schirrmacher, Johannes Rude Jensen, Michel Avital, Omri Ross
Accountability is crucial for the success of organized social enterprises. In centralized organizations, hierarchical structures clearly define accountability. However, in decentralized organizations, which rely on technology for collaboration, accountability can be ambiguous because, in many cases, these organizations lack centralized planning, have no formally-identified leadership, and allow members to leave without obvious consequences. This study examines how decentralized organizations, specifically decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs), enact accountability. We conducted a theory-building study using digital data from a DAO to explore the enacted accountability mechanisms. The findings revealed two main approaches. First, iterative public governance forums provide “soft” accountability, fostering answerability over time. Second, these forums often lead to “hard” accountability, where binary voting via digital tokens allows for immediate sanctioning when deemed appropriate by members. These insights advance knowledge on accountability in decentralized organizations, which constitute a fast-growing sector of technology-dependent work environments.