The BlockchainGov Newsletter #23 | July 2025
This last month was especially memorable, Network nations were born and Ethereum turned 10!
🕸️ Catch up with us:
I. Network Nations Workshop
From July 14–19, BlockchainGov hosted a workshop on Network Nations at Emerge Lakefront in Stockholm. We spent six days co-creating the theoretical and practical foundations of network nations. As a result, we launched a website, published an introductory paper, and began prototyping roadmaps for communities interested in becoming network nations. Both ReFi DAO and the Burning Man Foundation are already in motion.
Following the workshop, we’re now developing a series of follow-up papers, and finalizing a full report capturing the experience. We will keep you posted once it's ready.
In the meantime:
📖 Read the introductory article
What are network nations? Network Nations are interdependent, translocal communities that share a collective identity, culture, and aspiration—leveraging networked technologies, mutualizing resources, and exercising self-governance to engage in collective action as a common political entity capable of functional sovereignty.
Are Network Nations the same as Network States? Not quite - though they definitely share some conceptual similarities, Network Nations and Network States differ in foundational ways. While Balaji Srinivasan’s Network State emphasizes building new, territory-based systems, with one “founder” leading the state. Network Nations operate without the need for territorial claims or physical infrastructure.
They are:
Aterritorial by design; they do not seek land ownership or physical jurisdiction.
Polycentric; There are multiple centres of decision-making with mutual influence.
Commons-oriented, emphasizing shared infrastructure, mutual aid, and collective stewardship.
Interoperable with existing state systems, but not dependent on them for legitimacy or authority.
Most importantly, Network Nations don’t aspire to take over the role of nation states in citizens' day - to day - life. They achieve sovereignty not by owning territory with defined borders and having jurisdiction over the people populating it, but by creating autonomous systems infrastructure that transcends said borders. These systems achieve operational autonomy and work independently of—yet alongside—existing geopolitical actors. In doing so, they exercise what we call “functional sovereignty.”
Read more about Network Nations, functional sovereignty, and operational autonomy on the website:
https://networknations.network/
🌱🚀
II. Highlight: Governance Futures is Live
🎙 Governance Futures is officially one month old! A new weekly podcast hosted by Jamilya Kamalova and Eugene Leventhal Governance Futures explores the past, present, and future of decentralized governance—across web3 and beyond.
In the last few weeks, they’ve featured conversations with:
Angela Walch on governance experiments, emergencies, and institutional fragility.
Ellie Rennie on automation vs coordination, AI’s impact on DAOs, and collective intelligence.
Eric Alston on institutional design, democratic limits, and why conflict can be productive.
James Austgen and Dani Vilardell, PhD students at Cornell University , on Dark DAOs & the end of “One wallet = One person".
Next episode drop is 7th of august with Tally CEO Dennison Bertram, discussing the politics of technology.
Follow and listen here:
📡 Governance Futures on LinkedIn
III. Now Open: RSE Research Collaboration Grants
The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) runs a biannual Research Awards Programme to support cross-sector, cross-border research led by Scottish universities. They are currently offering funding to support small-scale collaborative projects between academic researchers and partners from other sectors (such as industry, public sector, or civil society).
The current round includes a project focused on data governance, exploring how data intermediaries can support and co-imagine collective data sharing and management practices. This makes it especially relevant for those working on data cooperatives, commons-based infrastructure, or community-led governance models.
Dr. Morshed Mannan from BlockchainGov recently received a RSE Collaboration grant to work with Dr. Paolo Gerli and Dr Paul Oliver (Edinburgh Napier University) on data intermediation in the Scottish creative industries. If you are interested in data cooperatives or collective data governance more generally, please reach out to them!
📝 Learn more & apply here: https://rse.org.uk/rse-awards-over-724k-to-boost-scotlands-vibrant-research-sector
IV. Ethereum 10 years!
Ethereum celebrated its 10th birthday this July! Since BlockchainGov’s founding in 2021, Ethereum has been one of our most important case studies. We’ve written extensively about its governance systems, unique culture, and the legal questions it raises. To celebrate, below you’ll find a curated selection of some of the papers, reports, and books where we’ve examined and explored Ethereum. We’re grateful for such an incredible case study 💌
To start our celebration of Ethereum research we’d like to share this recording from The Berkman Klein Center from April 2014. Before Ethereum itself launched, and long before BlockchainGov - our research director, Primavera De Filippi was pioneering new approaches to blockchain law and governance. In one of the earliest analyses of smart contracts and DAOs, she highlighted how Ethereum’s Turing-complete scripting language enables autonomous, self-sustaining entities that exist beyond legal or moral accountability. Posing questions that would come to define an entire field:
🎤 Watch the classic talk: “Ethereum: Freenet or Skynet?” (Berkman Klein Center, 2014)
While Primavera has authored countless papers, the overview below highlights a curated selection of our Ethereum research since BlockchainGov’s inception. For a comprehensive look at all her work(recommended), visit this link: ⛓️ Publication list
Now: a curated tour of some of the research BlockchainGov has done related to Ethereum 🎂
Blockchain and the Law: The Rule of Code
Primavera De Filippi & Aaron Wright
This book provides a comprehensive legal and social analysis of blockchain technology, with Ethereum featured prominently as the archetype of smart contracts, DAOs, and code-based governance. It examines how programmable protocols challenge traditional legal frameworks and calls for new regulatory thinking.
📖 Published by Harvard University Press
Blockchain Technology and Polycentric Governance
Primavera De Filippi, Sofía Cossar, Morshed Mannan, Jamilya Kamalova, Tara Merk & Kelsie Nabben
This report explores the polycentric governance of blockchain systems through six case studies - two of which focus on Ethereum. It examines the 2016 DAO hack as a “state of exception,” highlighting the contentious hard fork and the foundational questions it raised about immutability and legitimacy. It also analyzes The Merge, Ethereum’s 2022 transition to Proof-of-Stake, as a constructive example of how decentralized systems can navigate and sustain both internal and external legitimacy.
Report on Blockchain Governance Dynamics
Paul Fehlinger, Sarah Nicole, Primavera De Filippi, Sofía Cossar, Morshed Mannan, Jamilya Kamalova, Tara Merk & Kelsie Nabben
Ethereum features alongside 10 other protocols in this comparative report, which analyzes governance dynamics, legal structures, participation, and dispute resolution across leading blockchain projects. It provides a snapshot of how different ecosystems navigate questions of legitimacy, coordination, and power
📊 Report on Blockchain Governance Dynamics (2024)
📑 Interim version (Project Liberty)
Proof of Humanity: Ethnographic Research of a “democratic” DAO
Jamilya Kamalova, Sofia Cossar & Tara Merk
This fieldwork-based report examines the Proof of Humanity DAO—the first Sybil-resistant, democratically governed DAO on Ethereum. It highlights how democratic ideals can clash with informal power and coordination failures in practice, offering a unique look at on-chain identity and governance.
📄 Read the report (BlockchainGov)
Blockchain as a Confidence Machine
Primavera De Filippi, Morshed Mannan & Wessel Reijers
This article examines blockchain systems—including Ethereum—as “confidence machines,” showing that even in trustless environments, governance remains essential. It discusses the limits of code-based trust, using Ethereum’s history as a central case study.
📚 Blockchain as a Confidence Machine
VI. New Research on Blockchain Dispute Resolution
This month, Jamilya Kamalova published a new article in the Harvard Law Review Forum exploring how blockchain can be used to design alternative dispute resolution systems.
The piece takes a close look at Kleros, a decentralized arbitration protocol, as a real-world example of how blockchain technologies can be applied in legal and governance contexts—raising questions about legitimacy, institutional design, and trust.
Originally published in the Harvard Negotiation Law Review
That’s all from us this month. Thank you for reading this months newsletter!
Keeping you posted as always,
Until soon, The BlockchainGov Team 🕸️👀