Distributed Ledgers, Artificial Intelligence and the Purpose of the Corporation

Abstract

Distributed ledgers and blockchain technology are widely expected to promote more direct shareholder involvement in corporate governance by reducing costs of voting and trade clearance. Meanwhile, artificial intelligence may shrink the decision-making terrain where corporations rely on human management. This article analyses these technologies and concludes that, while such outcomes are plausible, their potential corporate governance impacts are likely more complex and contingent. Despite the implicit libertarianism that characterises much of the discourse, we in fact have choices to make about how such technologies are developed and deployed – and these policy decisions will have to be grounded in a normative conception of corporate purpose external to the technology itself.

Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain Integration in Business: Trends from a Bibliometric-Content Analysis

“… • AI • Blockchain Barnett and Treleaven ( 2018 ) Corporate governance AI can reduce reliance on humans for decision making in corporations, whereas blockchain can reduce the cost of voting and trade clearance by promoting direct shareholder requirement. • AI • Blockchain • Distributed ledger Bruner ( 2020 ) 6 Marketing Customer satisfaction A blockchain-based evaluation technique that can be used to provide a secure platform and that can predict customer satisfaction through the Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) machine learning algorithm. • Blockchain • Machine learning Tian et al ( 2020 ) Customer service An open and automated customer service platform based on blockchain, IoT, and machine learning can enable small companies that do not have sufficient experience and data to automate their customer services without relying on third parties.…”

Topical issues of digitalization in corporate law

“…Literature [6][7][8][9][10][11][12] highlights the merits of DAO, such as transparency of operations and decisions (without "pressure" from the board of directors); reducing the costs of the management agency, avoiding corporate conflicts; and disadvantages, such as legal uncertainty; unclear legal status; technical problems and shortcomings of blockchain technology, etc. There are obvious significant differences between Russian digital JSCs and DAOs, which the authors have already noted in the Results section.…”