Cardano Aims to Be ‘Legitimate Option’ in Global Governance

(Bloomberg) -- Blockchain and decentralized technologies offer a compelling potential solution for many of the governance issues affecting the world today, according to the founder of the Cardano blockchain.

Cardano’s ecosystem is working on projects from voting to payments and even ways to run the currencies of nation-states, Charles Hoskinson said in comments at the Cardano Summit broadcast Saturday. There should also be a lot of “real-life data about how to do governments differently,” he said. 

“You could run a nation-state on this type of infrastructure -- not today, but in three to five years, definitely possible,” Hoskinson said. Cardano is trying to “position itself in the marketplace of ideas to be a legitimate option for at least some of these systems and some of these institutions,” he added.

Cardano, which launched in 2017 and recently added smart-contract capabilities, has attracted its share of naysayers over time including the likes of Galaxy Digital Holdings Ltd. CEO Mike Novogratz -- who last month said the platform had “zero traction” with developers. However, its ADA token is the third-biggest cryptocurrency after Bitcoin and Ether after gaining more than 2,800% in the past year, according to pricing from CoinGecko.com. Projects from Cardano include the development of a blockchain-based digital identity system for students and teachers in Ethiopia.

“People are fundamentally unhappy with governance,” Hoskinson said at the summit. “There’s an appetite for new systems, new ways of governance, new types of institutions.”

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