Addressing socio-technical barriers to adopting blockchains for social good

Addressing socio-technical barriers to adopting blockchains for social good

Alongside the promises of disrupting financial systems and governance, blockchain has also
come with a promise to “do social good” and address social challenges communities face through tokenization and decentralisation. However, real-world examples of social good projects that utilise blockchain technologies are very rare, and are often affected by a range of challenges that pose barriers to adoption. The challenges for these projects are often socio-technical, related to the digital literacies of users, the social processes of onboarding people to blockchain systems, and the rigidity of these systems when used in settings
with complex social phenomena. This is compounded further by most blockchain
systems and DApps being poorly designed, with little consideration of the people who will be using the application. This project addresses these socio-technical challenges, through
empirical and applied research into the human-centered design of a DApp based on the
Cardano platform to support social capital and exchange in communities.

This project builds on the work the Design Informatics team have done on the Peoplehood project, focusing on the design and evaluation of a decentralised blockchain-based DApp that will incentivise community volunteering and time exchange. The DApp will providing a socio-technical framework for: community members to receive a time-based currency for helping others in their local area; and support the proof of identity for community members and to validate their skills through social validation of identities.