{"title":"Blockchain Smart Contracts: A Socio-Legal Approach","authors":"Leonardo Peixoto Barbosa","doi":"10.54648/eulr2021010","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Smart contracts are computer protocols that self-enforce encoded terms. They arguably allow for individual freedom and increased sovereignty from inconveniences. The enthusiasm goes as far as foreseeing that smart contracts will make contractual legal oversight obsolete. However, whereas contract law theory evolved to acknowledge the importance of flexibility and relationality, smart contracts activists defend the opposite direction, arguing for contractual rigidness and denial of social norms supporting complex transactions. This paper departs from this paradox to argue that (i) smart contracts based on existing technology are unlikely to thrive in complex contractual settings, and (ii) contextual analysis is important for LawTech’s propositions.\nSmart contracts, blockchain, system’s theory, social norms, transaction cost, flexibility, relationality, trust, co-operation, contractual governance","PeriodicalId":53431,"journal":{"name":"European Business Law Review","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2021-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"European Business Law Review","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.54648/eulr2021010","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"Social Sciences","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Smart contracts are computer protocols that self-enforce encoded terms. They arguably allow for individual freedom and increased sovereignty from inconveniences. The enthusiasm goes as far as foreseeing that smart contracts will make contractual legal oversight obsolete. However, whereas contract law theory evolved to acknowledge the importance of flexibility and relationality, smart contracts activists defend the opposite direction, arguing for contractual rigidness and denial of social norms supporting complex transactions. This paper departs from this paradox to argue that (i) smart contracts based on existing technology are unlikely to thrive in complex contractual settings, and (ii) contextual analysis is important for LawTech’s propositions.
Smart contracts, blockchain, system’s theory, social norms, transaction cost, flexibility, relationality, trust, co-operation, contractual governance
期刊介绍：
The mission of the European Business Law Review is to provide a forum for analysis and discussion of business law, including European Union law and the laws of the Member States and other European countries, as well as legal frameworks and issues in international and comparative contexts. The Review moves freely over the boundaries that divide the law, and covers business law, broadly defined, in public or private law, domestic, European or international law. Our topics of interest include commercial, financial, corporate, private and regulatory laws with a broadly business dimension. The Review offers current, authoritative scholarship on a wide range of issues and developments, featuring contributors providing an international as well as a European perspective. The Review is an invaluable source of current scholarship, information, practical analysis, and expert guidance for all practising lawyers, advisers, and scholars dealing with European business law on a regular basis. The Review has over 25 years established the highest scholarly standards. It distinguishes itself as open-minded, embracing interests that appeal to the scholarly, practitioner and policy-making spheres. It practices strict routines of peer review. The Review imposes no word limit on submissions, subject to the appropriateness of the word length to the subject under discussion.
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