Understanding the challenges of blockchain technology adoption: Evidence from China's developing carbon markets

Abstract

Blockchain technology promises disruptive change to industry and society. Although academic researchers and practitioners have engaged with blockchain for years, actual adoption rates of this technology significantly lag predictions. This paper explores present barriers to blockchain adoption in an industry for which blockchain might be assumed to offer an obvious solution to a globally distributed challenge: the integration of carbon markets. Using technological framing theory as a focusing lens, we investigate the challenges of blockchain adoption in China's developing carbon markets from three expert groups: carbon market experts with blockchain knowledge only, carbon market experts with blockchain projects, and IT experts in carbon markets. Our findings suggest that different expert groups present distinctive and incongruent framing challenges where technical challenges are not the most significant. In exploring this we make contributions to the introduction of a socio-technical perspective in blockchain adoption research and provide practical suggestions to policymakers and practitioners.