Stanford Professor Jeff Strnad Joins Advisory Panel of Q International Foundation to Address DAOs’ Governance Challenges
July 11 2024 - 12:30PM
Professor Jeff Strnad from Stanford
University has joined the Economic Advisory Panel of Q
International Foundation, the not-for-profit organization behind
the Q Protocol. The collaboration between Q International
Foundation and Prof. Strnad aims to help address the pressing
governance challenges faced by Decentralized Autonomous
Organizations (DAOs).
Addressing DAO Governance Challenges
DAOs suffer from a fundamental dilemma: On the one hand, they
need to be decentralized—otherwise, there is no point in organizing
as a DAO. On the other hand, decentralization often comes with
negative side effects: absence of leadership, slow decision-making,
and lack of accountability are problems that are all too familiar
for many DAO participants. The result: most DAOs do not meet
expectations, and many are outright failures.
Innovative Governance Concept: Contestable
Control
In a recent paper, Professor Strnad
proposes a novel solution to many of the issues DAOs face. His
“contestable control approach” allows for DAOs to remain
decentralized while ensuring efficient and effective management.
The essence of this framework is that control of the DAO is
continuously up for grabs to the highest bidder. Successful bidders
are rewarded for the value they add, and DAO token holders benefit
from an increase in the DAO token’s price.
Collaboration with Q International
Foundation
Q International Foundation aims to create a prototype
implementation of the contestable control framework, leveraging the
Q Protocol’s capabilities to enforce the necessary conditions that
cannot be addressed by smart contract code alone.
Professor Strnad explains, "DAOs have immense potential,
but they often struggle with decentralization leading to
inefficiencies and lack of accountability. The contestable control
approach provides a potential solution that ensures that DAOs can
be both decentralized and effectively managed. I am excited that Q
International Foundation is interested in putting this idea into
practice. The Q Protocol with its in-built ability to enforce
non-deterministic rules is an ideal platform for testing this novel
approach to DAO governance.
I am looking forward to serving as advisor to Q International
Foundation with respect to this project as well as others
“Professor Strnad’s approach to DAO governance aligns
perfectly with Q’s mission to advance decentralized governance
beyond the limitations of code-is-law. We aim to set a new standard
for DAOs, ensuring they are not only decentralized but also
accountable, effective and efficient,” comments Martin
Schmidt, a key contributor to the Q Protocol.
About Professor Jeff
Strnad
Professor Jeff Strnad is Charles A. Beardsley Professor of Law
at Stanford Law School. He teaches various courses on blockchain
and cryptocurrencies, including a course on blockchain
governance.
Prof. Strnad’s research spans the fields of taxation, public
finance, finance, and empirical analysis. He has published leading
works on the taxation of financial instruments and on the
application of Bayesian empirical methods to law. An innovative
teacher of quantitative methods, Professor Strnad has created
original courses in empirical analysis and game theory. Before
joining the Stanford Law School faculty in 1997, he was a professor
of law and economics at the California Institute of Technology and
the John B. Milliken Professor of Taxation at the University of
Southern California Gould School of Law.
About Q Protocol
Q is a novel blockchain protocol acting as a fundamental
governance layer in Web3. Going beyond the code-is-law paradigm, it
combines the benefits of a public, open, and decentralized ledger
with the transparency and predictability of enforceable private
contracts. Q enables adoption by many use cases that desire
decentralization but require scalability and dependability.
About Q International
Foundation
Q International Foundation is a not-for-profit organization
located in Liechtenstein. Its purpose is to support and grow
decentralized applications and ecosystems. Q International
Foundation is the initiator of the Q protocol and is supporting the
project.
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