Blockchain Application in Government
Derya AKTAŞ · 2024
The existence of the state depends on maintaining the public perception about its legitimacy. In parallel with the social and economic structural changes, the understanding of legitimacy also changes. One of the most essential factors behind the transformation of social structure is the change in production-labor relations. The change of production-labor relations is shaped especially due to technological developments and this in turn transforms the economic structure. It is necessary for the state and the bureaucracy to adapt to the new socio-economic structure that has been transformed due to the mutual interaction of these factors in order to maintain its legitimacy. A crisis of legitimacy arises in case solutions that will ensure the continuation of the system are not produced. States benefit from the “legitimizing function” and “creative destruction” of technology in ensuring their legitimacy and continuity. In this study, legitimacy is the functioning of bureaucratic processes (transparency, accountability, efficiency, reliability, etc.) are considered in terms of. While blockchain technology tends to eliminate bureaucracy, at present, states are developing projects related to blockchain technology and trying to adapt it to their public administration system. Blockchain technology goes through three stages in this process: research, acceptance, and the reproduction of legitimacy. In this study, I examine how blockchain technology is being used in the reproduction of the legitimacy of the state. For this purpose, the web pages of states that implement blockchain, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and European Union (EU) blockchain documents are analyzed.