Article
The alegality of blockchain technology
29 March 2022

Authors: DE FILIPPI, Primavera; MANNAN, Morshed; REIJERS, Wessel

Similar to the early days of the Internet, today, the effectiveness and applicability of legal regulations are being challenged by the advent of blockchain technology. Yet, unlike the Internet, which has evolved into an increasingly centralized system that was largely brought within the reach of the law, blockchain technology still resists regulation and is thus described by some as being “alegal”, i.e., situated beyond the boundaries of existing legal orders and, therefore, challenging them. This article investigates whether blockchain technology can indeed be qualified as alegal and the extent to which such technology can be brought back within the boundaries of a legal order by means of targeted policies. First, the article explores the features of blockchain-based systems, which make them hard to regulate, mainly due to their approach to disintermediation. Second, drawing from the notion of alegality in legal philosophy, the article analyzes how blockchain technology enables acts that transgress the temporal, spatial, material, and subjective boundaries of the law, thereby introducing the notion of “alegality by design”—as the design of a technological artifact can provide affordances for alegality. Third, the article discusses how the law could respond to the alegality of blockchain technology through innovative policies encouraging the use of regulatory sandboxes to test for the “functional equivalence” and “regulatory equivalence” of the practices and processes implemented by blockchain initiatives.
logo cadmus Read it on Cadmus Download in open access

LATEST FSR PUBLICATIONS

Policy Paper
Large-scale CO2 transport infrastructure is crucial for achieving decarbonization goals, yet its deployment remains slow. This paper maps emerging CO2 transport governance models across two dimensions: State-led policies and Economic [...]
Policy Brief
The aviation industry is leading the technological revolution in transport and is focusing on improved safety, efficiency and sustainability. Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) is the European Union’s flagship [...]
Contribution to book

Join our community

To meet, discuss and learn in the channel that suits you best.

scroll

top