Doctoral Dissertation Research: Blockchain Infrastructure, Decentralization, and Value

博士论文研究：区块链基础设施、去中心化和价值

• 批准号: 1947195
• 负责人: Julie Chu
• 金额: $ 2.52万
• 依托单位: University of Chicago
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-06-01 至 2023-09-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1947195&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Blockchain; Infrastructure

An emergent digital accounting system combining computer and financial engineering, the distributed ledger technology known as blockchain promises to transform socioeconomic relations. Its development today is bound up with political and moral desires and far-reaching claims that the technology has the capacity to challenge or even replace the existing financial system and its centralized institutions with decentralized organizations and governance. In the long wake of the 2008/09 financial crisis, blockchain's promise of decentralization has resonated. But if the vision of decentralization is initially based on the distributed networks architecture of computer systems, what happens when people try to translate it into social reality? What cultural, economic and political concepts and sensibilities underpin the making of blockchain, and how does the technology's development in turn influence human behavior? This project investigates the human dimensions of an opaque yet increasingly widespread technology, formulating both academic and non-academic descriptions and arguments about blockchain's sociocultural and political-economic contours for scholars and broader publics. In addition to providing funding for the training of a graduate student in anthropology in the methods of empirical, scientific data collection and analysis, the project would enhance scientific understanding by broadly disseminating its findings to organizations invested in developing more effective methods for communicating science and the scientific method to the public.The research will consist of fourteen months of ethnographic study in two established blockchain hubs, which are also home to lively crypto-communities. The two research locations allow for comparative tracking of how distinct political, economic, social, and cultural situations and discourses bear on blockchain development. Asking how a digital native or Internet-based infrastructure becomes meaningful across highly uneven economic, geopolitical, and cultural-linguistic contexts, the project also examines how blockchain gains traction in relation to or even at the expense of other matters of concern. In both locations, research will investigate how blockchain developers, entrepreneurs, and other stakeholders (1) define value, and how they understand blockchain as a technology that identifies, makes or manipulates value; (2) what attracts them to blockchain; (3) how they think blockchain will and/or should change human relations; and (4) how they imagine decentralization in relation to blockchain's promise. Through data gathered at blockchain-oriented promotional, educational, and networking events, conferences, and hackathons, from online, social and journalistic media, and through interviews with engineers, entrepreneurs, and other stakeholders, the investigation will produce results shedding light on the nature of blockchain as a technology of value and its promise of economic and social decentralization.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

一个新兴的数字会计系统结合了计算机和金融工程，被称为区块链的分布式账本技术有望改变社会经济关系。它今天的发展与政治和道德愿望以及深远的主张息息相关，即技术有能力挑战甚至取代现有的金融体系及其分散的组织和治理的集中机构。在2008/09年金融危机之后，区块链对去中心化的承诺引起了共鸣。但是，如果去中心化的愿景最初是基于计算机系统的分布式网络架构，那么当人们试图将其转化为社会现实时会发生什么呢？什么样的文化、经济和政治概念和情感支撑着区块链的形成，技术的发展又如何影响人类的行为？该项目调查了一种不透明但日益广泛的技术的人性维度，为学者和更广泛的公众制定了关于区块链社会文化和政治经济轮廓的学术和非学术描述和论点。除了提供资金培训一名人类学研究生学习经验科学数据收集和分析方法外，该项目将通过向投资于开发更有效的方法向公众传播科学和科学方法的组织广泛传播其研究结果来增强科学理解。该研究将包括在两个已建立的区块链中进行为期14个月的人种学研究中心，也是活跃的加密社区的所在地。这两个研究地点允许比较跟踪不同的政治，经济，社会和文化状况和话语如何影响区块链的发展。该项目探讨了数字原生或基于互联网的基础设施如何在高度不均衡的经济、地缘政治和文化语言背景下变得有意义，并研究了区块链如何在与其他问题相关的方面获得吸引力，甚至以牺牲其他问题为代价。在这两个地方，研究将调查区块链开发人员，企业家和其他利益相关者如何（1）定义价值，以及他们如何将区块链理解为一种识别，创造或操纵价值的技术;（2）是什么吸引他们进入区块链;（3）他们认为区块链将如何和/或应该如何改变人类关系;以及（4）他们如何想象区块链承诺的去中心化。通过在面向区块链的宣传、教育和网络活动、会议和黑客马拉松中收集的数据，从在线、社交和新闻媒体，以及通过对工程师、企业家和其他利益相关者的采访，调查结果将揭示区块链作为一种有价值的技术的本质及其对经济和社会去中心化的承诺。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。