The rise of decentralized autonomous systems has accelerated the development of multi-agent ecosystems where independent entities interact, cooperate, and compete to achieve collective goals. Traditional governance models for such ecosystems often struggle with scalability, trust, and adaptability, particularly as agent behaviors evolve dynamically in complex environments. To address these challenges, this study proposes a governance framework that integrates adaptive reinforcement learning (RL) agents coordinated through blockchain-enabled smart contracts. In this approach, reinforcement learning agents continuously adapt policies in response to changing environmental conditions and evolving system objectives. Their adaptive decision-making is augmented by blockchain smart contracts, which provide a tamper-resistant, transparent, and decentralized coordination layer. Smart contracts encode governance rules, enforce accountability, and ensure that cooperative behaviors among agents are aligned with agreed-upon protocols. This integration prevents unilateral manipulation, supports dynamic consensus, and fosters equitable participation across diverse agents. The framework is designed to function across decentralized infrastructures where centralized oversight is infeasible. By embedding governance into programmable contracts, system operations become both autonomous and verifiable, enabling trust in high-stakes contexts such as decentralized finance, energy trading, and smart city management. Simulations demonstrate that combining adaptive RL with blockchain governance enhances stability, resilience, and efficiency under conditions of uncertainty, while reducing risks of collusion or free-riding. This paradigm illustrates a pathway toward self-governing decentralized ecosystems, where intelligent agents not only optimize their actions but also collectively enforce fair, scalable, and transparent governance. It advances both the technical foundations of multi-agent reinforcement learning and the institutional frameworks of decentralized autonomy.
In this chapter, the authors give a theoretical overview of the landscape of decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) as the native organizational structure of Web 3. The authors place this new formation in the existing theoretical framework of transaction cost economics and new institutional economics analyzing their governance from economic and legal perspectives. They argue that DAOs are so-called hybrid organizations, which embrace features from the free market and from hierarchical organizations. DAOs show characteristics of hybrids such as pooling resources, coordinating operations by contracts and facing competition in their coordination. However, their changing nature imposes challenges in their identification.
Real-world contract texts are in natural languages, and normally suffer from lack of accuracy and are subject to interpretations. Hence, it is difficult to automatically generate smart contracts from real-world contracts for monitoring and enforcement of the execution of real-world contracts. Smart contracts can be viewed as a digital twin of real-world contracts because smart contracts in the digital world have the same objective as their corresponding real-world contracts in natural languages. In this paper, an approach to automatic generation of smart contracts from real-world contracts in a natural language is presented. In this approach, a language, called the Contract Text Markup Language (CTML), is used to facilitate automatic abstraction of the details of the real-world contract and convert them to a marked-up contract, which can be automatically compiled to generate the corresponding smart contract executable code for monitoring and enforcing the execution of the real-world contract. A legal contract in English is used to illustrate this approach. In addition, an online smart contract library is presented to facilitate the applications of this approach.
Firms are increasingly adopting blockchains as a form of knowledge engineering to align their internal processes, share information, and improve oversight. We study intraorganizational blockchains from an agency perspective to understand how the distributed, sequenced, and consensus-based nature of blockchains mitigates information asymmetries and affects organizational structures. First, we explain how blockchains differ from conventional relational, contractual, and system-based mechanisms to address three pertinent information challenges—concentration, continuity, and conflict. Subsequently, we address the consequences of introducing such blockchains, arguing that they create both direct and sequenced information channels among principals and agents, which elicit an organizational reconfiguration via vertical disintermediation and lateral reintermediation. Finally, we theorize the implications of blockchain-based organizing for agency theory regarding the chain of command, the unity of direction, and the span of control. Overall, we show how blockchains for intraorganizational governance can mitigate principal-agent problems and impact organizational design in profound ways.
DPoS is a consensus algorithm designed to address scalability and speed issues in PoS. It achieves this by predefining a maximum number of validators who participate in block generation while delegating stakes and sharing block rewards. However, DPoS has faced security vulnerabilities, where Block Producers can manipulate votes through fraud, bribery, and lack of community communication. While there has been research on the centralization resulting from DPoS voting, there has been limited discussion on the voting coefficient. In this paper, we propose a model that reduces the influence of wealthy individuals and gathers community opinions by adjusting the voting coefficient using quadratic delegates. We apply this model to EOS's Block Producer voting and demonstrate a significant reduction in the influence of the wealthy few, while ensuring the community's preferences are reflected. These findings contribute to protecting DPoS elections from security threats and encouraging decentralized voting participation by users.
Sowelu Avanzo, Teodoro Criscione, Julio Linares, Claudio Schifanella
Recent advancements of blockchain technologies ensure security and trustability of Community Currency Systems (CCSs), enabling their increasingly widespread adoption. These systems aim at empowering the local economies by virtue of a medium of exchange whose governance and circulation are local. Smart contracts enable the enforcement of token economy policies, which facilitate the experimentation of radically new economic models. Recent studies investigated blockchain-based CCSs. Still, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first study analyzing a CCS providing a token-based Universal Basic Income (UBI). We evaluate the Circles UBI decentralised application utility in delivering an unconditional income to its users, focusing on its main pilot project running in Berlin. We analyse the structural changes in the network, especially in relation to a subsidy program, involving local businesses. We also identify prominent users based on centrality measures, and investigate how the UBI was effectively spent. We adopt a method agnostic to the economic context to identify optimal aggregation windows for the temporal network of CCS transactions based on the Causal Fidelity (CF) index. This aims to provide static representations as accurate as possible in terms of sequential order of edges, which aspect was not considered in previous research on CCSs. Our findings suggest that the pilot project sustained the expansion of the economic network and the system facilitated trade in urban communities in Berlin. Future research is needed to identify methods to ensure sustainability of self-organised CCSs adopting a UBI issuance scheme and to further decentralise their governance.
Double auctions are procedures to trade commodities such as electricity or parts of the wireless spectrum at optimal prices. Buyers and sellers inform the auctioneer what quantity they want to buy or sell at specific prices. The auctioneer aggregates these offers into demand and supply curves and finds the intersection representing the optimal price. In this way, commodities exchange owners in an economically-efficient manner. Ideally, the auctioneer is a trusted third party that does not abuse the information they gain. However, the offers reveal sensitive information about the traders, which the auctioneer may use for economic gain as insider information. These concerns are not theoretical; investigations against auctioneers in electricity and advertisement auctions for manipulating auctions are ongoing. These concerns call for solutions that conduct double auctions in a privacy-preserving and verifiable way. However, current solutions are impractical: To the best of our knowledge, the only solutions satisfying these properties require full interaction of all participants. In this work, we design a more practical solution. We propose the first privacy-preserving and verifiable double auction scheme that does not require traders to interact actively, tailored to electricity trading on (inter)national exchanges. Our solution relies on homomorphic encryption, commitments, and zero-knowledge proofs. In a simulated auction with 256 traders, we observe that traders take up to 10 seconds to generate their order, the auctioneer takes 10 seconds to verify an order, and the auction result is computed and verified in 30 seconds. We extrapolate these results to larger auctions to show the practical potential.
Alpesh Bhudia, Anna Cartwright, Edward Cartwright, Darren Hurley-Smith · 5 authors
Consensus algorithms facilitate agreement on and resolution of blockchain functions, such as smart contracts and transactions. Ethereum uses a Proof-of-Stake (PoS) consensus mechanism, which depends on financial incentives to ensure that validators perform certain duties and do not act maliciously. Should a validator attempt to defraud the system, legitimate validators will identify this and then staked cryptocurrency is `burned' through a process of slashing. In this paper, we show that an attacker who has compromised a set of validators could threaten to perform malicious actions that would result in slashing and thus, hold those validators to ransom. We use game theory to study how an attacker can coerce payment from a victim, for example by deploying a smart contract to provide a root of trust shared between attacker and victim during the extortion process. Our game theoretic model finds that it is in the interests of the validators to fully pay the ransom due to a lack of systemic protections for validators. Financial risk is solely placed on the victim during such an attack, with no mitigations available to them aside from capitulation (payment of ransom) in many scenarios. Such attacks could be disruptive to Ethereum and, likely, to many other PoS networks, if public trust in the validator system is eroded. We also discuss and evaluate potential mitigation measures arising from our analysis of the game theoretic model.
Blockchain technology promises to revolutionize not only the way we transact among peers but also the way we organize to create socio-economic value. Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are governed and owned by the community whose members follow a set of blockchain-embedded governance rules that define and control participation. In this chapter, we will clarify what governance decentralization and automation mean, examining DAOs’ distinguishing characteristics. We will also discuss the problems that DAOs solve (e.g., lack of extrinsic incentives, censorship, mismanagement and lack of transparency and accountability), as well as the problems they face (e.g., lack of participation, rigidity, voting misbehaviours and legal status).
Andrea Lisi, Nunzio Lopardo, Domenico Tortola, Paolo Mori · 6 authors
Rating systems are services collecting users' opinions about any kind of item, such as movies, locations, or hobbies, typically characterized by centralized governance making them susceptible to censorship or rating manipulation. This paper leverages blockchain technology to build a decentralized system to secure the ratings and operations performed by the users. We assume a scenario where many rating systems coexist and are hosted by different blockchains, and these blockchains are connected with one that could handle monetary-like operations common to the rating systems. The paper describes an experiment with Chainbridge, a tool to perform transfers across two Ethereum-like blockchains, applied to a cross-chain rating system prototype involving two blockchains: one hosting the ratings and one handling the payments. The results include the costs in units of gas and USD, i.e. the blockchain fees, and the latency time to perform a transfer across two test networks, Goerli and Mumbai.
Non-fungible tokens(NFTs) are on the rise. They can represent artworks exhibited for marketing purposes on webpages of companies or online stores -- analogously to physical artworks. Lending of NFTs is an attractive form of passive income for owners but comes with risks (e.g., items are not returned) and costs for escrow agents. Similarly, renters have difficulties in anticipating the impact of artworks, e.g., how spectators of NFTs perceive them. To address these challenges, we introduce an NFT rental solution based on a pay-per-like pricing model using blockchain technology, i.e., smart contracts based on the Ethereum chain. We find that blockchain solutions enjoy many advantages also reported for other applications, but interestingly, we also observe dark sides of (large) blockchain fees. Blockchain solutions appear unfair to niche artists and potentially hamper cultural diversity. Furthermore, a trust-cost tradeoff arises to handle fraud caused by manipulation from parties outside the blockchain. All code for the solution is publicly available at: https://github.com/asopi/rental-project
Augusto Sampaio, Pedro Antonino, Juliandson Ferreira, Filipe Arruda · 5 authors
We present a framework that supports the safe deployment and upgrade of smart contracts based on the design-by-contract paradigm. The starting point is an interface specification with invariants and pre- and postconditions for each function. The first deployed smart contract must conform to this specification. Specification evolution might involve both changing the data representation as well as extending the interface with new functions, provided the evolved specification is a refinement of the original one. Implementation evolution must conform to the corresponding specification. We report on the applicability of the framework in the verification of smart contracts that implement some Ethereum standards.
Bruno Medeiros de Oliveira, Pedro Antonino, Augusto Sampaio
Transaction costs are a barrier to the wide adoption of decentralized applications. To address this issue, this paper proposes a framework to optimize transaction fees by carrying out a conflict-avoiding packaging of multiple smart-contract calls into a single transaction. It relies on two main concepts: a way to optimize the bundling of transactions with a conflict-avoiding packaging strategy and a way to execute such bundles with a package-processing methodology. We illustrate our framework and the gas economy it can bring with a case study where we analyze a popular Ethereum smart contract.
The development of smart contracts in the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) can be a complex task, both for experienced and beginner developers. Understanding these contracts can be challenging for both technical and non-technical users, due to the difficulty in comprehending the connection between the elements and resources available, as there is no clear way to visually present the functionalities of a contract and its relationships. In this paper, we introduce the Smart Contract Modeling Tool (SCMTool), a graphical tool based on the Model-Driven Engineering approach, that allows users to specify models that represent the structure of a smart contract in a simpler and more intuitive way. The tool was validated using a use case from the NFT industry.
Ethereum, a leading cryptocurrency, is advancing the way we handle digital transactions. One important concept in Ethereum is “account abstraction,” which could play a crucial role in making it accessible to a wider audience. Currently, Ethereum has two types of accounts: externally owned accounts (EOAs) and contract accounts (CAs). EOAs are controlled by a public address and private key, allowing users to initiate transactions and interact with smart contracts. However, losing the private key can result in the loss of funds, and EOAs are not quantum safe. On the other hand, CAs are controlled by the code written on the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and do not possess private keys. They rely on network storage, and their creation incurs a cost. To enhance the existing technology and make it more user-friendly, there is a proposal for “account abstraction” in the Ethereum protocol. This change would enable users to interact with smart contracts using smart contract wallets instead of externally owned accounts. This would bring greater flexibility and security to the management of user accounts, as well as open doors for new and innovative user experiences.
This paper evaluates the scoring platforms for decentralized autonomous organization (DAO), examining their methodologies and highlighting their strengths and limitations. Using content analysis, we scrutinize the scoring methodologies of the Prime Rating, DAO Meter, and DeFi Safety platforms, evaluating code, documentation, security, team composition, governance, and regulatory compliance. We analyze the underlying assumptions and data sources relied upon by these platforms, using a content analysis approach. Our investigation furnishes valuable information for stakeholders, aiming to evaluate or enhance DAO scoring methodologies used by scholars and practitioners in the finance and blockchain fields. By contributing to a more rigorous understanding of DAO performance assessment, this paper supports informed decision making and promotes the development of a dependable and efficient scoring system for the decentralized financial ecosystem.
Decentralized finance (DeFi) based on smart contracts has reached a total value locked (TVL) of over USD 200 billion in 2022. In DeFi ecosystems, price oracles play a critical role in providing real-time price feeds for cryptocurrencies to ensure accurate asset pricing in smart contracts. However, the price oracle also faces security issues, including the possibility of unanticipated price feeds, which can lead to imbalances in debt and assets in the DeFi protocol. However, existing solutions cannot effectively combine transactions and code for real-time monitoring of price oracles.
This study explores the intricacies of waiting games, a novel dynamic that emerged with Ethereum's transition to a Proof-of-Stake (PoS)-based block proposer selection protocol. Within this PoS framework, validators acquire a distinct monopoly position during their assigned slots, given that block proposal rights are set deterministically, contrasting with Proof-of-Work (PoW) protocols. Consequently, validators have the power to delay block proposals, stepping outside the honest validator specs, optimizing potential returns through MEV payments. Nonetheless, this strategic behaviour introduces the risk of orphaning if attestors fail to observe and vote on the block timely. Our quantitative analysis of this waiting phenomenon and its associated risks reveals an opportunity for enhanced MEV extraction, exceeding standard protocol rewards, and providing sufficient incentives for validators to play the game. Notably, our findings indicate that delayed proposals do not always result in orphaning and orphaned blocks are not consistently proposed later than non-orphaned ones. To further examine consensus stability under varying network conditions, we adopt an agent-based simulation model tailored for PoS-Ethereum, illustrating that consensus disruption will not be observed unless significant delay strategies are adopted. Ultimately, this research offers valuable insights into the advent of waiting games on Ethereum, providing a comprehensive understanding of trade-offs and potential profits for validators within the blockchain ecosystem.
Corruption is widely spread and not easy to avoid. Blockchain-based smart contract technology enables the opportunity to develop transactions in such a way that corruption should not be possible. In this paper, we develop and evaluate an arrangement based on blockchain-based smart contracts to avoid and reduce corruption. Smart contracts are used for buying and selling goods, in which the public must agree that the goods arrived and are used to contribute to the creation of societal value. Only then will the supplier be paid. Al transaction data is stored in a blockchain and opened to the public to create transparency. In this way, the price of the good and the sellers can be inspected to avoid price manipulation and nepotism. The smart contract avoids the likelihood that corruption will happen, and it can be spotted if it happens.
Ovaj rad predstavlja koncept i implementaciju decentralizirane web aplikacije za upravljanje aukcijama nezamjenjivih žetona na Ethereumovom block-lancu. Nezamjenjivi žetoni predstavljaju jedinstvene digitalne entitete - umjetnine, glazbene zapise, videozapise, i druge kolekcionarske predmete, čija autentičnost, vlasništvo, i transakcije su transparentno i neizbrisivo zabilježene na block-lancu. Decentralizirani karakter ovakvih platformi koristi block-lanac tehnologiju kao temelj, omogućujući pouzdane, sigurne i transparentne aukcije digitalne imovine. Implementacija ove aplikacije sastoji se od dvije integralne komponente - backend, koji je izgrađen na platformama NodeJS, Express.js i Sequelize ORM, i frontend, koji je kreiran koristeći React i TypeScript. Backend je ključan element za efikasnost ovog sustava, koji "sluša" i obrađuje događaje na Ethereum block-lancu. Kada pametni ugovori na block-lancu bilježe neki događaj, poput kreiranja aukcije, postavljanja ponude ili finaliziranja aukcije, backend sustav ažurira SQL bazu podataka putem Sequelize ORM, omogućujući efikasno upravljanje podacima. S druge strane, frontend je izgrađen koristeći React i TypeScript, omogućava korisnicima interakciju s platformom i pametnim ugovorima na Ethereum block-lancu putem Web3.js knjižnice. Korisnici mogu stvarati NFT-e, pokretati aukcije i postavljati ponude. Ovaj rad pruža sveobuhvatan uvid u izgradnju decentralizirane web aplikacije za trgovinu NFT-ima na blok-lancu Ethereum, pri čemu se koristi niz suvremenih web tehnologija, uz naglasak na integraciju i upotrebu blok-lanca i pametnih ugovora.
Vivek P Marakumbi, N Soumya, Preeti Goure, Priya Jadekar · 5 authors
Blockchain is an emerging technology that finds applications across various industries by providing secure transaction records that cannot be tampered with. It operates as a decentralized and open ledger, offering additional benefits such as traceability and immutability, which greatly contribute to its desirability. Two important blockchain applications include Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT) Marketplaces and Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs). NFTs are unique digital assets like artwork or music that can be bought and sold using cryptocurrency, ensuring both security and efficiency. On the other hand, DAOs are transparent organizations that make decentralized decisions. In our work, we have developed an integrated NFT marketplace and DAO that leverages NFT ownership to determine the weights of choices. The implementation is based on Ethereum ERC-721 tokens. However, the Proof of Stake (POS) consensus algorithm used in Ethereum 2.0 lacks fairness. To tackle this issue, we introduce the Delegated Reputation-based Proof of Elapsed Time consensus algorithm (DRPoET). Evaluations conducted on an Ethereum testbed demonstrate that our integrated DAO benefits from fair weights and improved transaction latency and fairness compared to the POS algorithm.
Handan Kunkcu, Kerim Koç, Aslı Pelin Gürgün, Houljakbe Houlteurbe Dagou
As an emerging but embryonic way of contract administration, smart contracts can play a prominent role in managing construction projects in an effective manner. However, there are still some barriers preventing the implementation of them in the life cycles of construction projects. This study investigates operational barriers against the adoption of smart contracts in construction projects and explores the challenges in this process. Operational barriers against smart contract implementation are identified through a comprehensive literature review and a focus group discussion is performed to refine the identified barriers. These barriers are evaluated through fuzzy analytical hierarchy process analysis. Finally, a framework is proposed for the adoption of smart contracts effectively in construction projects. 20 operational barriers were attained based on four main barrier categories: technical, financial, security/technological, and time. The results show that financial and technical aspects establish the most significant categories hindering the adoption of smart contracts, while expensive and clunky drafting and registration process, and cost of upskilling are the most significant barriers. Overall, the proposed framework might be useful for practitioners and project managers, who decide to use smart contracts in managing construction projects. The motive behind understanding critical operational barriers is to assist construction practitioners in automating contract execution processes. This study provides a basis for recommending the necessary strategies for the use of smart contracts in the industry to researchers in the construction management field.
In this paper, we propose a smart contract broker to improve the reusability of smart contracts in a blockchain environment. The current blockchain platform lacks a standard approach to sharing and managing smart contracts, which makes it difficult for developers to reuse them and leads to efficiency issues. The proposed smart contract broker uses tags to identify and organize smart contracts, and it provides an environment for comparing and reusing smart contracts. This improves the reusability of smart contracts and efficiency. The proposed smart contract broker can be applied as a reference model that increases the flexibility and reusability of smart contract management in a blockchain environment.