Why to DAO: a narrative analysis of the drivers of tokenized Exit to Community

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Author: Merk, Tara
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Merk, Tara
author_facet Merk, Tara
contents This paper asks why startups in the blockchain industry are exiting to Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs), an outstanding phenomena in the wider digital economy which has tended to retain centralized ownership and governance rights of many platforms, products and protocols. Drawing on a narrative analysis of three case studies, I find three possible drivers: (1) exit to DAO is motivated by both financial and stewardship goals which it simultaneously promises to realize via the issuance of tokens; (2) exit to DAO adds an additional layer of ownership and governance rights via tokens, without requiring existing rights to be relinquished, thus making it a lucrative strategy; and (3) markets, laws and social norms underpinning the broader environment in which exits to DAO occur, seem to play an important role in driving the decision. This paper contributes to the academic literature by situating DAOs as a hybrid (and perhaps incomplete) entrepreneurial exit strategy and identifying plausible drivers of the phenomenon which warrant further dedicated research.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2407_14327
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Why to DAO: a narrative analysis of the drivers of tokenized Exit to Community
Merk, Tara
General Economics
Economics
This paper asks why startups in the blockchain industry are exiting to Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs), an outstanding phenomena in the wider digital economy which has tended to retain centralized ownership and governance rights of many platforms, products and protocols. Drawing on a narrative analysis of three case studies, I find three possible drivers: (1) exit to DAO is motivated by both financial and stewardship goals which it simultaneously promises to realize via the issuance of tokens; (2) exit to DAO adds an additional layer of ownership and governance rights via tokens, without requiring existing rights to be relinquished, thus making it a lucrative strategy; and (3) markets, laws and social norms underpinning the broader environment in which exits to DAO occur, seem to play an important role in driving the decision. This paper contributes to the academic literature by situating DAOs as a hybrid (and perhaps incomplete) entrepreneurial exit strategy and identifying plausible drivers of the phenomenon which warrant further dedicated research.
title Why to DAO: a narrative analysis of the drivers of tokenized Exit to Community
topic General Economics
Economics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.14327