 Voting governance and value creation in decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs)Cristiano Bellavitis and Paul P. Momtaz Journal of Business Venturing Insights, 2025, vol. 23, issue C Abstract: Decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) crowdfunds to invest in various projects. The decentralization feature of DAOs submits that decision-making is a collective democratic action of all DAO members. The autonomy feature of DAOs suggests that decision-making is an algorithmic process governed by self-executing smart contracts. However, in reality, DAOs are neither perfectly decentralized nor completely autonomous. Our empirical analysis shows that deviations from the ideals of decentralization and autonomy are costly. Non-algorithmic off-chain voting governance of decision-making leads to a substantial discount in DAO value. Non-decentralized aspects such as large voting coalitions also affect DAO value. Interaction effects are also shown. The study implies that platform governance design choices are crucial for DAO success. Keywords: Decentralized autonomous organization (DAO); Blockchain technology; On- versus off-chain governance; Crowdfunding; Entrepreneurial finance (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jobuve:v:23:y:2025:i:c:s2352673425000241 DOI: 10.1016/j.jbvi.2025.e00537 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Business Venturing Insights is currently edited by Dimo Dimov More articles in Journal of Business Venturing Insights from Elsevier |
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