Autonomous Organizations

Shawn Bayern

oct 2021 · Cambridge University Press

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Under current business law, it is already possible to give legal personhood, or a very close surrogate of it, to software systems of any kind (from a simple automated escrow agent to a more hypothetical, truly smart artificial intelligence). This means that, for example, robots could enter into contracts, serve as legal agents, or own property. Ultimately, entire companies could actually be run by non-human agents. This study argues that this is not as scary as it might sound at first. Legal theorist and noted software developer Shawn Bayern argues that autonomous or zero-person organizations offer an opportunity for useful new types of interactions between software and the law. This creative contribution to the theory and practice of law and technology explores the social and political aspects of these new organizational structures and their implications for legal theory.

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Shawn Bayern is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and Larry & Joyce Beltz Professor of Torts at Florida State University College of Law. He has a deep background in computer science, with specialties in computer security and the development of programming languages.