Perspective Chapter: Actor-Network Theory as an Organising Structure for Blockchain Adoption in Government

Abstract

Blockchain technology (BT) is a promising technology with compelling distributive and security capabilities for digitalising organisations and social systems. It is, however, often approached from a deterministic and technical perspective yet requires social, cultural and institutional changes as part of the process of adopting new technology in the context of the digital government sectors. This study uses actor-network theory (ANT) for its closely related hybrid middle, translation features, token passing through to network stability and interessement, as a lens to shape and understand the complexities surrounding the adoption and use of BT, particularly in the public sector organisations. Using the land registration system in Sudan as a case study, the findings show that ANT provides an adequate lens through which to examine the role of emergent distributive technologies such as BT in shaping social and organisational processes. ANT further contributes to a more holistic adoption of BT in public sector organisations. In the case study, the proposed blockchain guided by ANT simplified the complexity of land processes for registration, selling, buying and ownership, eventually replacing multiple processes with single transactions while at the same time embedding security and transparency.

1. Introduction

Blockchain technology (BT) is an emergent technology that is being adopted and considered for its key features of decentralisation, peer-to-peer authentication, persistency, anonymity and auditability [1]. Other attractive features include its openness, extensibility and anonymity in transactions [2, 3]. Some authors have even suggested that blockchain is comparable to a legal institution in its own right [4].

These BT features are value-laden as each feature presupposes certain belief systems, meaning that BT adoption is accompanied by the social meanings embedded in the technology [5]. There is, therefore, bound to be a clash of social structures when BTs are implemented [6, 7, 8].

This study illustrates BT adoption through the lens of actor-network theory (ANT) [9, 10]. ANT represents the complex socio-technical world [11] in which new technologies such as blockchains are introduced based on the interests of different actors – human and non-human [12, 13]. More specifically in the public sector, the adoption of BT as part of digital government efforts, though seemingly ideal, has mainly focused on the technological aspects at the expense of the transformatory potential inherent in the technology [14]. Institutionalising such technologies as part of digital government efforts implicitly involves introducing extrinsic social structures that are embedded in the digital technologies [15, 16]. For example, BT is recommended by the United Nations as an essential low-cost approach to digital government in low-income countries without considering the associated social transformatory effects and the resistance to such changes [14, 17].

The primary objective of this chapter, therefore, was to identify the suitability of ANT as a tool to holistically adopt BT in the context of digital government. The secondary objective was to assess the influence of ANT as an organising theory for the adoption of blockchain in digital government efforts. Specifically, the study seeks to answer the question, ‘How can ANT inform the implementation of BT in the public sector?’

The remainder of the chapter is structured as follows: The next section presents the literature on ANT and BT. It is followed by a section that maps BT to ANT terminology and then offers an illustration using a case study from Sudan’s land registration. Analysis and discussion of the illustration are then presented. The final section provides conclusions and recommendations on the efficacy of ANT as a lens through which to introduce BT into digital government.

2. Literature review

2.1 Actor-network theory

The boundaries between the technical and the social, between human and non-human (machine), are frequently contested and negotiated. ANT is concerned with the interaction between the social and the technical, and the creation and maintenance of stable coextensive networks of humans and non-humans [18]. In the case of digital technologies, this includes people, organisations, software, computers and communications hardware and infrastructure standards.

ANT symmetrically treats the social and the technical as inseparable, arguing that humans and artefacts should be analysed with the same conceptual apparatus. Latour [19] illustrates the rationale for the symmetric treatment by identifying that it is no longer clear if digital technologies are a limited form of an organisation or if the organisation is an expanded form of digital technology [11]. ANT is often described as a systematic approach exploring the infrastructure that supports the ‘scientific and technological achievements’ within a network, making it a more profound approach to researching and understanding service networks [20]. ANT is, therefore, a useful theoretical lens for understanding socio-political phenomena, especially where digital technology plays a critical role. One of the most distinctive ANT features is that actors can also be non-human – a text, a machine, an institution. It values the interaction between humans themselves or between human and non-human actors [21].

ANT provides added explanatory power over existing socio-technical theories that are either deterministic such as structuration theory and diffusion of innovations, or are theoretically too narrow such as the social construction of technology theory. ANT does not exclude a priori non-human actors from the analysis, allowing for a more explicit examination of the enabling or the restricting role of digital technology in a socio-technical process; second, ANT does not distinguish a priori between micro (e.g., individuals) and macro actors (e.g., organisations), but acknowledges the inherently unstable nature of actors [22, 23, 24]. This allows for a flexible consideration of a socio-technical collective as a single actor or as a group of individual actors, depending on the level of analysis desirable [25].

The most important ANTs characteristic is providing an analytical lens to understand the socio-technical components of hybrid contexts [26]. An essential ontology of ANT when executed is to track and clarify the translation moments by which networks of aligned interests are formed and preserved, or to inspect why those networks are unable to be created [24, 27]. Successful networks are established through the enrolment of a set of allies that successfully translate its interests, therefore, becoming well prepared to participate in specific methods of thinking and acting, in order to preserve the network [11]. Specifically, ANT supports the goal of this study because of the following network features [28]: ANT networking, which means the strength of the involved actors in the networks over communities and individuals who are not part of these networks; the second feature is ANT network, which is the strength of the standards needed to control the network social interaction through the imposition of the inclusion laws; the third feature is ANT networked, that is the strength of some social actors over other social actors in the network; and finally ANT network making, the strength to program alliance networks based on the dominant actors’ interests and values [28]. Table 1 illustrates ANT terminology and concepts.

Concept	Description
Actor	Both humans and non-human actors such as technological artefacts. Any element, which bands space around itself, makes other elements dependent upon itself and translates their will into a language of its own.
Actor-network	A heterogeneous network of aligned interests, including people, organisations and standards.
Punctualisation	The treating of a heterogeneous network as an individual actor to reduce network complexity (encapsulation).
Focal actor	The key actor behind gathering other actors’ support for a change initiative.
Translation	The successful alignment of the interests of a diverse set of actors with the interests of the focal actor by encouraging one another towards the pursuit of self-interest and collective objectives [20]. Translation is a process that creates ‘a temporary social order, or movement from one order to another, through changes in the alignment of interests in a network’ [29].
Problematisation	It is the first moment of translation that defines the nature of the problems or opportunities to be solved in the network. The common problems precipitate the actors to align their interests with the network.
Obligatory passage points (OPP)	An essential step that has to occur for all of the actors to be able to achieve their interests, as defined by the focal actor.
Interessement	It is the second moment of translation where actors are convinced they share the interests of the focal factor [30]
Enrolment	The third moment of translation, wherein all actors in the network accept (or get aligned to) interests defined for them by the focal actor.
Mobilisation	The fourth moment of translation that is achieved when the actors are successfully enrolled.
Inscription	It is a process of artefact creation that would ensure the protection of certain interests in order to indicate how the network should operate.
Irreversibility	The point where it is impossible to go back to a point where alternative possibilities exist.
Block box	A frozen network element, often with properties of irreversibility. The way scientific and technical work is made invisible by its own success.
Immutable mobile	Network elements with strong properties of irreversibility, and effects that transcend time and place.

Table 1.

Actor-network theory terms and descriptions.

2.2 Blockchain technology

BT revolves around the smart networks theory [29] in which value is replicated in a network using a sophisticated protocol that validates, confirms and controls transactions through the network. These protocols offer a peer-to-peer transfer of value using algorithmic trust compared with the classical typology of trust between human agents [30, 31, 32].

Blockchain is an append-only database technology because the moment the data is stored in the database, it cannot be changed or deleted [33], since the blocks are added in chronological order using timestamps and hashes to form an incorruptible chain. This chain is shared and distributed to all the participating entities [34, 35] in instances where blockchain transactions are public. Due to this transparent behaviour, security features were introduced by categorising blockchains as either public or private blockchains [34, 36, 37].

Public blockchains (permissionless), where the actors are anonymous, have more security challenges as each blockchain is able to be part or quit at any time [38]. On the other hand, private blockchains (permissioned) are predefined groups of specific actors who are authorised, authenticated and allowed to be part of the blockchain network in order to decrease the existence of malicious actors inside the network [31, 33, 39]

An essential part of blockchain development is its distributed intermediary governance where no single entity has full control, but a consensus between the different groups has to be reached using consensus algorithms [35]. Consequently, blockchain-based services are not maintained by a central authority, but by a community of miners and developers [24]. Miners are powerful and important actors in the network since the continuation of the blockchain depends on them. They collectively validate and bundle batches of transactions into blocks and add them into a chronological chain through a ‘consensus’ process that uses multiple consensus algorithms depending on the types and applications [40]. Consensus is used to ensure enhanced security and privacy for various applications in many domains using different mechanisms such as proof-of-work (PoW), which is a mathematical challenge that ensures the security of peer-to-peer transfer by maintaining a digital ledger of transactions that is considered to be unalterable [38]. As a consequence, a novel approach of ‘algorithmic trust’ is established, which is completely different from the classic typology of trust in human actors [32].

BT uses cryptography to provide the security, immutability and rightful ownership of the transactions being stored on the block using the hash function [40]. Further, cryptography helps the receiver to verify the authenticity and integrity of the transactions on the network [31]. It uses a changeable public key (PK) to record the users’ identity that provides an extra layer of privacy [41].

The process of safe transfer of value is undertaken using smart contracts, which can simplify the process by automating verified transactions [42]. Smart contracts are computer programs that run automatically when certain criteria are met within the system, which are used to transfer value of any kind between the peers in a blockchain without the service of a trusted third party [31].

The next section presents an example of blockchain in the land registration context that was technically superior yet excluded critical social processes and therefore failed.

2.3 Bitland case in Ghana

Bitland Ghana is a sophisticated permissionless open blockchain model implemented for informal land ownership in Ghana using the open-ledger platform [43, 44, 45]. A proof-of-stake was used as the consensus mechanism utilising cadastral-tokens formerly issued by the Danish Cryptocurrency Exchange (CCEDK). It also used GPS and open-map API to map lands [46, 47, 48]. Rather than save the identity data on the block, Bitland uses a unique value to link the title to the owner [46, 49, 50, 51].

Bitland focused on the customary and local authorities outside the major cities to establish a land ledger for farmers and local communities [45, 52] without any official government institutions [45, 50]. The exclusion of the official land registration authority in government meant that Bitland was not accepted beyond the local community [52] because customary courts do not have any legislative power. This example illustrates the challenge of focusing on BT’s technological supremacy at the expense of important wider social and network processes.

3. Methodological approach

ANT lends itself to interpretivism in its fundamental thesis which seeks to understand and give a ‘voice’ to technology artefacts in a social context [27]. Therefore, the interpretive case study methodology is used as an analytical framework to guide and analyse a case study. This study, consistent with ANT, does not adopt an ontology of natural realism. In other words, data is not viewed as objective evidence supporting or falsifying an assertion but as texts and text analogues, whose meanings, when read hermeneutically, can go beyond the original intentions and meanings attributed by their sources. This study illustrates the mapping of blockchain to ANT with an interpretive case study from the Sudan land registration authority.

3.1 Blockchain technology through the lens of actor-network theory

ANT has previously been used to describe groups of actors and how those groups sought to define and inscribe particular codes and standards into particular electronic record technologies. Once the rules have become part of the network, they are hard to reverse [53]. ANT has immense potential for understanding the complex social interactions associated with digital technology in various contexts [24]. Modern digital technologies represent the values of the policy-makers frozen in complex digital representations, such as algorithms, codes, electronic thresholds and applications. The idea of software as frozen discourse is an example of an inscription that resists change and irreversibility and leads to a frozen organisational discourse [11].

ANT’s emphasis on the dynamic and relational aspects of a problem is a useful lens for studying non-linear change and the unintended outcomes of technology projects, including the stochastic events that are known to characterise BT projects and programmes [53]. The purpose of this theory is to discover and describe the processes for making patterns, social regulation and resistance [54].

Table 2 illustrates BT through an ANT lens, followed by a discussion using a case study taken from Sudan’s Land Registration system.

Concept	Blockchain equivalent
Actor	Human: Participants, Top management, Miners, Developers. Non-human: Infrastructure hardware, System framework, Software platform, Organisation rules and standards, Documents, Distributed ledger
Actor-network	Distributed ledger + Human Actors + Non-human Actors
Punctualisation	The defining of blockchains as sets of different actors such as nodes, miners, developers, consensus mechanism, smart contracts, hash functions. All are encapsulated together to be seen as one actor.
Focal actor	The professionals who lead the change process (blockchain developer, senior manager, executive)
Translation	Alignment of the actors’ interests with the interests of the blockchain through organisational process rules reformulation. In a temporary order, each actor addresses the effect of introducing the blockchain in order to adjust some of the organisational rules that correspond to decentralisation, transparency and information sharing.
Problematisation	The moment of defining the need to transfer the organisational model from centralised with limited access to decentralised peer to peer in order to share information safely between the actors. The type of blockchain is defined in this stage. Public blockchains are permissionless, and anyone can join the network. They also are decentralised: no central authority or administration has control over the network. Private or consortium blockchains, such as Hyperledger, are permissioned and therefore impose restrictions on who is allowed to participate and make transactions.
Obligatory passage points (OPP)	Blockchain developer (technical) and top manager (social) both participate to create the socio-technical standards that are used to complete the accepted actor’s registration.
Interessement	Actors commit to the focal actors and adapt their interests with those of the blockchain developer and the top manager. Sometimes encouragement and promises are offered to attract actors to accept.
Enrolment	The blockchain to be created and the consensus mechanism are determined. Human actors accept their roles and commit by signing up to join the blockchain using agreements that are registered as inscriptions. The needed non-human actors are included and involved in the network.
Inscription	The definition of the BT rules that guarantee each interest using smart contracts or software as frozen organisational discourse.
Irreversibility	When smooth, an integration of organisational workflow process occurs between the blockchain parties, leading to societal adoption. The BT then becomes indispensable.
Black box	The process of creating, accepting, mining, and adding new blocks successfully to the blockchain, could be considered as the black box when it runs efficiently. The focus moves to its inputs and outputs and not on its internal complexity.
Immutable mobile	The whole system could always lead to the same results of efficiency regardless of place and time.

Table 2.

Blockchain representation using ANT concepts.

4. Case study background (land registration)

Land registration refers to a system whereby a government entity records ownership and land-related rights. These records provide evidence of title, facilitate transactions and prevent fraud. It means that there is an official record (the land register) of rights on land or of deeds concerning changes in the legal situation of defined units of land [55]. Out-dated land registry systems introduce delays in ownership verification, slow down legitimate transactions, and in the worst-case scenario, could enable land misappropriation [56]. Given their significance to individuals and society as a whole, it is important to guarantee that land transaction registers are created and stored in a way that allows their availability, accuracy and management according to the law. The transparency, public accountability, financial stability and human rights are peril in case of no suitable treatment and care of land transaction records [57, 58].

Recently there has been a global movement to add more accountability to land registry systems and particularly increase the validity of land titles. It is vital for present-day governments in terms of curbing corruption, reducing red tape, enhancing transparency, improving the speed of the stated public service and eradicating risks of possible disputes [36].

The potential of blockchains to authenticate ownership can legitimately be transferred without needing third-party verification [45]. Once the registrar affirms the land title transfer, smart contracts are triggered to update ownership data to the buyer and accordingly the corresponding transaction is saved on the blockchain, as a result, all ownership records history could be traced [45]. By introducing this technology in the land registration systems, blockchains could introduce an era of network computing where private value transfer [37] of money, assets and contractual preparations can be conducted in an automated and dependable mode through computational systems [30, 36]. Such capabilities reduce forgery and the risks associated with the transfer and distribution of land data [59].

Most of the literature that has been published is theoretical analysis of the potential of using BT in the field of land registration, theoretical proposals and conceptual models using different types of mechanisms and tools. Other research included empirical studies of this technology in several countries [14]. Fortunately, early blockchain land registry adopters, like Sweden, Dubai, Ghana and others, report excellent results, such as cost savings, a better quality of service and elimination of fraud and corruption [60]. On the other hand, there is a lack of the studies that organise BT adoption in land registration. This chapter, therefore, seeks to present a process of introducing BT as a social and technical implementation.

4.1 Land registration in Sudan

Sudan is a land-locked country whose e-government development index (EDGI) has fallen from middle- to low-EGDI level due to adverse political, socio-economic and natural conditions [61]. It is considered a low-income country.

The land policies have undergone transitions according to social standards from the pre-colonial era, during colonial times and post-colonial times [62]. Socially, land has a unique position in most communities in Sudan, particularly in the rural areas. It is a means of livelihood and a source of wealth, tribal identity and social peace [63, 64].

The land has also been a source of deep conflict. From the political perspective, the civil war in Sudan between 1983 and 2005 was often seen as associated with land tenure, which was both a cause of conflict and a factor in ensuring peace and social stability [62]. On the other hand, the ownership and use of land, especially among traditional producers in most low-income countries, is not just a source of livelihood but a symbol of identity, dignity, solidarity and peace. The World Bank devoted some of its resources to the interrelated issues of access to secure property rights, exchange and distribution of land in markets and the role of governments in land management [64].

This chapter seeks to theoretically represent and explore the networks and associations that underpin the situated land practices through the lens of ANT [15]. The next section uses the Sudan land registration systems for illustration.

4.2 Sudanese land registration current actors

In ANT, anything that modifies a state of things making a difference is an actor [21]. The current practices of land registration in Sudan involve several actors (human and non-human) who contribute to the flow of the process. They are distributed among different stakeholders to achieve various tasks (Table 3).

Actor	Definition
The land Actor	It is the land with the boundaries that identifies it as a property that is owned by a person.
The Registration Employee Actor	An employee at one of the land registration offices who helps citizens to register or check a land.
The Head of Registration Actor	A person who is responsible for confirming the process of the land registration. In addition, the head decides any procedures that must be conducted according to the case.
The Registration Payment Employee Actor	The person responsible to collect money and issue an invoice accordingly.
The Head of Engineering Affairs Actor	The person who grants the permission to check the land details.
The Survey office Employee Actor.	The person responsible to check the land location, area and coordinates.
The Engineering Affairs Payment Actor	The person responsible for the payment at the engineering affairs.
The Owner Actor	The person who owns land registered under their name or has some issues about land.
The Buyer Actor	The person who wants to have an agreement with a land owner through a trusted lawyer and wants to transfer the land ownership under their name.
The ownership document actor	Any document that proves that ownership of a land belongs to an owner, such as titles, certificate and/or statement.
The lawyer actor	The person who has academic experience in law and passed successfully all the conditions and standards of the justice’s authority.
Electronic System Actor	The electronic program that stores some of the land’s records. This is designed by the information technology department and distributed to some registration branches.
The General Ledger Actor	The program that stores some of the land’s records. Designed by the information technology department and distributed to some registration branches.
Lands Prosecution	The party where complaints are initiated due to forgery or frauds or any land ownership problems.
The judiciary authority and courts actor	The party that is responsible for resolving disputes to decide the property ownership.
The Bank Actor	The party responsible for issuing mortgages.
Civil Registry	The governmental body that issues or verifies the national IDs for the citizens according to birth, immigration or displacement. It also issues death certificates.

Table 3.

The main actors of land registration in Sudan.

4.3 Sudanese land registration current practices

4.3.1 The registration process

The registration is the process of documenting the citizen’s land ownership at the official authorities to ensure the rights when needed. Registration is conducted in case of land purchasing, granted land by the government, inherited land or gifted land or through a mortgage in the case of banks, large companies or legal entities.

This is the process of granting land by the government to a citizen.

1. The citizen accesses land’s office – planning authority.

2. The employee checks the identity and the land’s number.

3. The employee contacts the survey office and confirms all the land’s data.

4. The employee asks the citizen to pay the fees.

5. The land entitlement decision has been issued and signed.

6. The contract is issued between the lands’ office – planning authority and the citizen as an owner of this land.

7. Three copies of the contract are issued, one for the use of the lands’ office – planning authority, the second is for the owner, and the third is sent to the registration office.

8. At the registration office, the owner shows his/her copy to the employee to compare with the copy of the registration office.

9. The employee asks the owner to pay the fees.

10. The receipt details are appended to the land’s record.

11. The land’s record is revised and confirmed by the head of the registration.

12. The land’s record is signed by the head of the land registration, the head of the branch.

13. The land’s record is updated in the paper ledger and the computer (Figure 1).

Figure 1.

Land registration process.

4.3.2 The land ownership certificate for selling purpose

Once the owner has delivered the ownership certificate, he/she must access the land registration to request a land selling certificate in order to be able to sell his/her land to the buyer through the selling process.

This is the description of land ownership certificate issuance.

1. The owner accesses the land registration office taking a valid identity or passport and a recent photo.

2. The employee at the window of the head of the registration office checks the identity and asks the owner to fill a form and then sign and put a fingerprint.

3. The owner then is directed to the accountant to pay the computer fetching fees, then the documents are passed to the computer fetching employee.

4. The fetching employee finds the land data and compares it to the form’s name to make sure they are the same.

5. The fetching employee sends the land’s number to the employee who is responsible for fetching the papery records and asks him/her to bring the folder of the land.

6. The fetching employee inserts the form into the land’s folder and returns to the employee and asks him/her to issue a selling certificate.

7. The employee issues the land selling certificate and sends it to the head of the registration office for the final signature.

8. The certificate is then sent to the employee who is responsible for delivering the certificate to the owner after checking the identity, the payment receipt and ensuring that he/she is the same person who requested the certificate and asking the owner to put a fingerprint again for certificate delivery (Figure 2).

Figure 2.

Issuance of ownership certificate for selling purpose.

4.3.3 The selling process

The lawyer is the main actor who controls the process of selling the land. He/she is responsible for documenting and contracting to ensure that the agreement flows in a proper and legal manner.

This is the description of selling a land.

1. The buyer assigns a lawyer and holds his/her fees after ensuring that the lawyer stamp is valid.

2. The buyer asks to see the land title (ownership verification certificate).

3. The lawyer asks for a land selling certificate.

4. The lawyer ensures that the land selling certificate is valid as it works only for 1 week from the issuance date. If it is more than a week it should be returned to the registration office to be cancelled and to issue another one.

5. The lawyer checks the header of the land selling certificate, if it is (‘Hikr’ contract: Hikr is a property right that grants usufruct in return for a specific fee.) then he/she must ask for Ornic 3A.

6. The owner goes to the land’s office – planning authority asking for Ornic 3A.

7. The employee makes sure that the land selling certificate is valid to issue Ornic 3A.

8. The documents are ready and the lawyer proves all of them and then begins preparing the selling contract.

9. The contract must be signed by four witnesses.

10. The lawyer fills his/her part on Ornic 3A and asks the owner for a signature and a fingerprint to be used with the land title in transferring the ownership at the registration office.

11. He/she also prepares a petition letter headed by the lawyer, asking the land registration authority to transfer the ownership from the owner to the buyer according to the attached documents (the selling contract, the land selling certificate, Ornic 3A).

12. The seller takes the money with thanks (Figure 3).

Figure 3.

Land selling process.

4.3.4 The ownership transfer process

By the end of the selling process, the owner takes his/her money and leaves, and the buyer continues the process of transferring the ownership until delivering his/her ownership certificate.

This is the description of transferring land ownership to the buyer.

1. The buyer or (the lawyer) takes (the selling contract, the land selling certificate, Ornic 3A and the petition letter) to the land registration office.

2. The buyer pays an initial reservation fee for the buyer’s name (for a period of 3 months).

3. The employee stamps Ornic 3A by reservation.

4. All the documents then are taken to the land’s office – planning authority at the researcher’s employee’s window.

5. The researcher employee then checks the reservation period and asks the buyer to fill a form.

6. The researcher employee prepares a letter to the survey office asking for the land’s details.

7. The buyer is directed to the survey office to pay the fees and bring an affidavit that contains the land’s details and the estimation of the mitre price.

8. The documents now are complete, and a photocopy of all the documents and a computer update is done.

9. The documents are sent to the head of the land’s office – planning authority who will sign by the acceptance of ownership transferring to the buyer and send the documents to the land’s registration authority.

10. The head of the registration checks the identity and the documents and sends the documents to the registration specialised employee.

11. The registration specialised employee inserts the documents into the land’s file and calculates the fees of the last reservation then takes the calculations to the accountant.

12. At the accountant, the buyer should pay 3% if the land is (Hikr), and 4% if the land is (Ain).

13. Once the buyer pays the fees, the ownership is then transferred to the buyer and he/she is able to ask for any land’s certificate (Figure 4).

Figure 4.

Land ownership transfer.

4.4 The proposed blockchain land registration

BT could guide the private value transfer of assets, and contractual preparations in an automated and dependable mode [30]. BT in Ref. to the land registry system can be described as a distributed ledger with functions, such as storing all the transaction records, land owners for a certain period and transaction times [48]. Therefore, digitising land transactions via BT could enable secure confirmation by all parties in a land transaction before a transaction is completed, possibly leading to credible and reliable land transactions. The blockchain register is also tamper-proof and not subject to discretionary or inadvertent modifications by those who have access to it (Figure 5) [44].

Figure 5.

The proposed land registration system using blockchain technology.

5. Mapping the land registration system using ANT and blockchain

5.1 Actors of land registration

The BT equivalent of actors is the nodes of the blockchain. There is always a need to define the actors [65] within the network and consider their culture level, interests, views and ability to use the technology. An actor is not just a ‘point object’ but an association of heterogeneous elements themselves constituting a network, so each actor is also a simplified network, which means that any changes affect this actor and the networks it simplifies [18]. Technology artefacts can transform networks by influencing relationships between human actors as the active role of the land registry record in mediating social relationships between land registration staff.

The list of actors (Figure 6) includes the legal, technical, professional staff, managers and the general registrar as human actors; the courts, ministry of finance, ministry of engineering affairs, and the information system are the non-human actors. The system user interface such as a mobile application or the internet browser could be considered a non-human actor granted access with view-only privileges. Such an interface is needed to avail open data that connects sellers and buyers without the need for a third party.

Figure 6.

An ANT view of the actors (institutional stakeholders).

5.2 Actor networks

ANT is formed of several actants that join an alliance to achieve their different goals. Every actant tries to enrol new actants and attempt to convince them to support their own goals. Those networks get stronger and more durable as long as more actants are being enrolled [19]. Each of the actants can be enrolled as a blockchain node with different types of access and authorisation privileges. This can be done using the consensus mechanism according to the private blockchain using one of the consensus algorithms that assists to share the exact same copy of the data on the network [31].

The general format of a research question from an ANT perspective – “What is the network, and what phenomena are emerging from it?” – offers broad and flexible scope for mapping the relevant terrain [53]. The Sudanese land registration could be considered a network in a larger network of politics and other organisations. Actor-networks are concerned with the information flow between actors without changes inside domains specified by the networks and can change dynamically [8]. For example, the availability of internet services throughout the country changes the relationship [66] between the urban and rural areas by enabling illiterate farmers to use land registration systems to track their land records [7]. The adoption of BT comes as a consequence of the actions of everyone in the chain of actors who has anything to do with it, and in the same way, each of these actors shapes the blockchain to their own ends [18].

The next section illustrates land registration through the four moments of translation: problematisation, interessement, enrolment and mobilisation [24].

6. Translation process

ANT suggests that successful social networks of aligned interests are created by enrolling actors and translating their interests so that they are willing to participate in particular ways of thinking and committed acting that will maintain the network [26]. This alignment is achieved through ‘translation’, which includes four phases of a problem definition for that a specific technology could solve, convince the others to consent to this solution, determine the main roles and practices in the network and at last distribute others to perform the roles, commence the practices and connecting with others in the network [53].

6.1 Problematisation

Problematisation defines the problem or opportunity with which an actor proposes a solution. The proposed solution acts as the obligatory passage point [20]. In the context of Sudan land registration, the process of land registration, or the procedures for extracting the testimonies, or the stages of selling the land, all involve many repeated steps for scrutiny, review, verification and confirmation within each party and in the interaction between the parties with each other. Despite all that, there are losses, fraud, forgery and other manipulation cases that lead to conflicts. Therefore, the top management of the authority would seek to introduce BT to guarantee transparency, immutability, persistency and auditability through decentralisation peer-to-peer and information sharing. Therefore, the challenges of corruption would be dealt with, accelerating the process, reducing fraud cases, bringing transparency with smart contracts, eliminate forgery and allow openness of the land registration data. According to the above, the top management would be responsible for pulling other actors to adopt this solution.

6.1.1 Obligatory passage point

The obligatory passage point (OPP) can be initiated by facilitating communications with the stakeholders. Each stakeholder would have to pass through the OPP to gain their desired interests. However, in passing through the OPP, they may have to experience some changes and need to adjust their situations to suit the new network [15]. For example, the Sudanese land registration would need to initiate the BT development as OPP to imply the concepts of decentralisation and information sharing that support the process of BT adoption. Therefore, a radical change of the key organisational processes in the organisation would be necessary [67].

6.1.2 Focal actor

The focal actor determines the problem, related actors and clarifies the influence of this problem to those actors, therefore figures out strategies to handle the problem. This focal actor sets itself as an OPP among the other actors and the network to make itself ‘indispensable’ [68]. This could be achieved by understanding the organisational process of land registration and figuring out all its stakeholders. Different focal actors are identified in the land registration network but mainly the top management decision-makers who are the most aware of the organisational rules. The other focal actors are the BT developers who are familiar with the BT properties and behaviours. The enrolment of the top management can be seen as the first focal factor that represents the emerging network and a change process, carrying the responsibility of identifying and enrolling other key actors [25]. The second focal actor would be the land registration blockchain, which defines the set of rules through algorithms. Accordingly, the decentralisation, information sharing and anonymity concepts are then also reflected.

6.1.3 Actors

ANT focuses on the actors within the socio-technical network and their contributions. Each human and non-human actor has interests and features that must be met (Latour, 2017) to obtain smooth adoption within a network. The current socio-technical network in Sudanese land registration includes the index technology; other technical systems which could be interoperable; the individuals (registration employees, citizens, administrators, surveyors) who provide and use the registration services; a specific alignment of policy makers, technical professionals and technical elements whose infrastructure and its data models were established; civil servants, monitoring and evaluation top management and decisions makers (general registrar, head of branches).

By introducing BT, a set of actors under different categories is also proposed and divided into four divisions as follows:

• Acceptors: Human (owners, buyers, participants)

• Providers: Human (blockchain miners, practitioners, professionals, employees, surveyors) and objects (registration branches, court, information system, banks)

• Supporters: Human (blockchain developers, administrators, legal professionals, technologists, accountants) and objects (maps, records, contracts, software tools)

• Controllers: Human (managers) and objects (government, land registration authority, land record blockchain)

6.2 Interessement

Interessement is the process of getting others to accept this problem-solution [53]; it is when the primary actor recruits other actors to assume roles in the network, roles that recognise the centrality of the primary actor’s role [65, 68]. The process involves convincing other actors to have interests that are aligned with the focal actor [25]. This would allow each actor to identify all the actors and resources needed to accomplish their tasks and achieve their goals [18, 25, 67]. Moreover, incentives are created for actors such that they are willing to take a detour from their earlier charted paths and pass through the OPP defined by the focal actor [25]. In other words, Interessement aims to attract other actors in the proposed solution to favour a new opportunity that confirms the problematisation phase [20]. Managers could be enrolled and empowered to achieve the aims of the changes. Those managers, in turn, would have to enrol individual groups within the organisation so that established networks can be reorganised. Those separate groups may also utilise software or tools to enhance the tasks executions in different procedures. As a result, power relationships would shift from ‘top-down’ implementation strategies led by the government to horizontal and distributed. The focal factor could do this through devices that seek to lock that commitment in place, blocking the actors from alternative courses of action. The signing of the formal agreement between the Sudanese lands’ registration, the judiciary authority and the ministry of urban planning is one part of this. It commits them to the blockchain framework project as the only technological choice and the only course of action.

At a general level, interessement involves ‘actions by which an entity attempts to impose and stabilise the identity of other actors it defines through its problematisation’. It includes locking new allies into place and cornering entities not yet enrolled. Successful interessement ‘confirms (more or less completely) the validity of the problematisation and the alliances it implies’ [69].

BT consensus mechanism could be considered as OPP because the data authentication processes are being verified directly before acceptance. It would be necessary to amend some procedures, dispense others; and in some cases, replace a group of tasks with only one procedure. For example, any number of service requests could be accepted at any time using a web or mobile application.

6.2.1 Alignment

Alignment involves all the strategies through which an actor identifies other actors and arranges them in relation to each other [18]. In ANT the actors’ interests could differ in a way that they may support or constrain the technology. Therefore, the technology needs the alignment of actor interests in order to stabilise the network [7]. Translation involves negotiations among human actors and representatives of material actants. Negotiations establish common sets of definitions, conditions and meanings for understanding the network’s phenomena. The outcome of successful negotiations is an ANT characterised by aligned interests. The degree of alignment is the degree of convergence of an actor-network [19]. Translation implies that an actor reinterprets or appropriates the interests of other human actors and the interests embedded in non-human actors according to one’s own and has these interests represented in the inscription. Actors must identify the other actors who may react to it differently. They may modify it, deflect it, betray it, add to it, appropriate it or let it drop [18]. As for the land registration case, each actor has to define the chains of tasks and resources that determine the processes and the other participants who are needed to achieve this task. If conflicts arise, they must be addressed by adjusting some process.

The actors’ interests are flexible and can be translated, enabling the interest alignment and the maintenance of an actor network [70]. For instance, the procedures that the owner should do to transfer land ownership are a task of multiple actors and different resources. Each of them has various processes that are needed to be done in a particular order starting with the owner’s request until the buyer delivers. For example, the owner’s interest may focus on reducing the time of the overall process, while the buyer’s interest may focus on the accuracy of these procedures. Due to these contrasts between the interests of actors’ groups, actors’ networks in the Sudanese land registration authority should be updated to include the concepts of information sharing, decentralisation and transparency. The alignment of all interests could lead to a clear visualisation of the proper data flow and necessary changes in the organisation’s business process.

6.3 Enrolment

Enrolment is the moment when roles are defined and actors formally accept and take on these roles [68]. It is a negotiation process to exhibit how the interessement meets the actors’ interests and needs and persuades them to accept the new actor-network [20]. This process involves defining the accepted roles of each actor in the new actor-network. As a part of the enrolment process, the enrolment commitments can be recorded in a shared memory through inscription. This is considered as the foundation of a settled actor-network and needs suitable enrolment strategies that could handle attitudes, power and politics. The goal is to boost lock-in, in which digital land registration becomes socially acceptable, has a positive social texture and socially solidify as a safe feasible interaction between the actors [7]. The process involves defining the accepted roles of each actor in the new actor-network. As a part of the enrolment process, the commitments of enrolment can be recorded in a shared memory through inscription [71]. The actors’ interest’s alignment within the actor network happens by enrolling others into the network by the actors who are known by cooptation [19]. However, it should be noted that enrolment is temporary and a betrayal by enrolled actors is a possibility. Actors enlist other actors into their world and they bestow qualities, desires, visions and motivations on these actors [18]. For instance, an owner may encourage another to use the land registration blockchain system and, if successful, enrols them into the actor-network. In doing this, the owner may also call on other actors to support his case [11]. The owner may call on texts (land registration authority literature), stories (of successful use and benefits gain) and the technology itself (through demonstrations).

6.3.1 Inscriptions

‘An inscription is the result of the translation of one’s interest into material form’ [24]. They are common procedures such as managerial practice, employee contracts, standards, regulations or software requirements documentation [20]. Inscription devices (for example, pull-down menus in a piece of software) may help to stabilise the network and thus shape and constrain land registration work [53]. All the interest within the network is translated using inscriptions attached to the technology [7, 70]. These inscriptions may involve maps, programs, user requirements, regulations, documents and even the messages and marketing related to the technology and the technology services, which typically impact actors’ roles.

A Sudanese owner would be interested in increasing the price of land and reducing the intermediaries’ roles in selling land. The government is interested in increasing the registered lands through land registration authority with owners of unregistered lands. Inscriptions are typically provided with more concrete content to record actors’ interests within a material that varies in their flexibility, for example, policy and regulations. Therefore, the strength of the inscription may be determined by the possibility of irreversibility [20].

Smart contracts are one of the BT features that could be considered as inscriptions as they are scripts that reside on the blockchain that allows for the automation of multi-step processes [72]. Smart contracts are therefore an essential feature that supports utilising BT in land registrations. They offer a third way to perform contracts, a new paradigm, wherein legally binding agreements are backed up by real-world agreements, and can be built to run within a network of computers without any single party sabotaging parts of the agreement [45].

For instance, the lawyer actor could be disappearing in the new network. Only his/her actions could be digitised in a smart contract that checks all the conditions at the different stakeholders to conduct the selling process and automatically executed to transfer the ownership to the buyer. This can eliminate several steps that may cost the owner and the buyer much time, effort and money.

Figure 7 depicts the relationship between translation and inscription to address a phenomenon (the formation of an actor-network) through various interests and to establish an irreversible network [20].

Figure 7.

Relationship between translation and inscription [20].

6.4 Mobilisation

Mobilisation is necessary to ensure that actors represent other actors’ interests [20]. Mobilisation describes network elements that display strong properties of irreversibility and are mobile across time and space; various software standards provide illustrations of immutable mobiles elements [11]. If actors enrolled in the network adequately represent the masses, enrolment manifests as active support and mobilisation occurs [24]. Primary actors assume a spokesperson role for passive network actors (agents) and seek to mobilise them to action [68]. Mobilisation could include the process of migrating records from the traditional system to the blockchain system, which leads to the same expected results.

6.4.1 Black boxes

Actor-networks could be seen as heterogeneous, and developed open systems, however, the stability of an actor-network is a kind of pact, fulfilled via ‘black boxes’ – settings of actors (human and non-human) that are being taken for granted and therefore they are no longer enquired [53]. A black box is a technical term for a device, system or object when it is viewed in terms of its input, output and transfer characteristics without any knowledge required of its internal workings. Latour [19] defines a black box as a term ‘used by cyberneticians whenever a piece of machinery or a set of commands is too complex’. When the actor-network determines and accepts the standards, it would be challenging to inverse them, and the actors become locked-in under these restrictions. The standards related to technology and communication are locked into a black box, and there is no need to consider the contents and the processes in this black box [15]. When the digital land registration is admissible, there is no need to inquire about how it works or seek if it follows the best method to do it. Black boxes are not necessarily restricted to physical artefacts or technologies; instead, black boxes consist of knowledge that is accepted and used regularly as a matter of fact [65]. Making a black box does not require consensus.

The actors join or quit, or even alliances changes may lead to the ‘black boxes’ of the network to be opened in order to revise and reconsider their contents [18]. Fortunately, the black boxes can be opened [7] to check, revise, and alter their contents, because ANT allows for such dynamism [19]. For example, land ownership transfer under the inheritance clause could have been taken for granted. However, if legal or social issues are raised according to different owner’s religions, new texts issued based on the Personal Status Law based on the owner’s religion may become part of actor-networks as different potential standards. At that point, the land transfer process has to be queried, and the black boxes should be opened. The reality of institutionalisation status of digital government system functions can be represented and measured via the ANT construct of black-box behaviour [15].

6.4.2 Irreversibility

A network becomes durable when actors feel no need to spend time opening and looking inside black boxes, but just accept these as given [18]. The optimum state of the actor-network should be to become stable which is known as irreversibility state. If this is not achieved, then it can die out as fast as it began which leads to the failure of technology adoption. Digital land registration has to be an essential part of society to reach the irreversibility state and become indispensable in the context of the land registration actors and the government [11].

Below is the discussion of the potential contributions of ANT and the practical applicability to BT adoption in land registration in Sudan.

7. Discussion

7.1 Changed relationships

BT, guided by ANT, offers an approach to technology adoption that organises information and human action in a decentralised as well as offering more credibility between organisations and their stakeholders. One of the most interesting challenges of BTs is the transition of trust from institutions and social interactions to semi-automatic and semi-autonomous technological systems. ANT offers a smooth approach to transitioning through the concept of interest alignment, which includes a comprehensive discussion between the actors to figure out how to identify the motivations to adopt BT to guarantee easy adaptation.

ANT illustrates how such a network may, for example, look like in relation to the introduction of a digital land registration system using BT. The integration of the new land registration system requires the formation of new norms and other established network components that reorganise around a new actor. ANT offers deeper insights into the change processes involved in the new relationships. This can then result in recommendations on how to make the new network more stable and in so doing facilitate the effective integration of the technology into the land registration environment.

7.2 Transformative effects

The ANT attempts impartiality towards all actors, whether human or non-human and makes no distinction in approach between the social, the natural and technological. Introducing such innovative approaches using BT technologies that change the current social and political system will probably be resisted initially. This resistance includes the beneficent, the owners and buyers in the case of the Sudanese land registration, the intermediaries and the critics who would reject the new. The resistance could be attributable to different reasons such as legal, social, cultural or even educational reasons. Offering some awareness upfront through the ANT lens to the actors regarding the BT implementations could reduce the expected resistance (Figure 8).

Figure 8.

An ANT view of the intended land registration network after the blockchain adoption.

Some digital government practices can be accurately captured via the ANT construct of obligatory points of passage. The associated strategies of the stakeholders who attempt to reconfigure networks of artefacts in order to institutionalise digital government systems are usefully analysed via ANT translation stages. However, achieving full enrolment in the blockchain network could require more time and effort from the actors to have full interests’ alignment for all the participants. The parallel implementation of the blockchain network with the current network could make the adoption smoother in the future as the existence of reassurance factor regarding the potential of incidence in the current work which boosts confidence with the new artefact with continuous progress.

7.3 Flexibility for social context

The approach presented attempts to organise the new technology’s structure using ANT basis to facilitate its mapping process with the real-world actor-network through negotiation and dialogue sessions, leading to compatibility. ANT illustrates BT’s flexibility according to actor social desires through negotiated smart contracts. For example, the ability to dynamically open black boxes to take into account local and situated contexts in BT means that actors can gradually make transactions that are mutually acceptable and move towards a shared view of land tenure. This shared view is important for social and financial stability in reducing land challenges that often arise from over- or under-valuing, and as collateral for needed finances.

7.4 Persistent records and transparency

ANT illustrates the importance of having a full and transparent history of records about land using BT, and the reasons for land transfers. This transparency and persistence of records further contribute to a stable social system around the land. The appeal of BT revolves around the smart networks theory which posits that value replication is conducted by the network itself where smartness is created within the network’s tasks using a sophisticated protocol that validates, confirms and controls transactions through the network [30].

7.5 Dismantling technocentric assumptions and power relations

ANT brings to the surface the technocentric assumption that transparency is always desirable by all actors. Power changes that are often not easily given up without resistance occur naturally. ANT, therefore, allows for a balanced implementation approach that considers the important social, political and technical negotiations that accompany the introduction of transformative digital technologies. The challenge of studying the introduction of new technologies in a highly institutionalised field of land registration, and especially in emerging economies such as Sudan, brings to the surface strong power, cultural and social structures that enable and constrain human action.

7.6 The potential of using ANT in Bitland

ANT sees that broad, multi-stakeholder engagement is key; therefore, networks, meet-ups, building expertise etc. are essential to guarantee the implementation and promulgation of the technology [43]. Bitland records can be disputed if the official institutes do not accept the legality of these records that is why Bitland was not supported and preserved through law. Regardless of how property is registered, a dispute over land titles must always be facilitated by some form of the court system. Moreover, the engagement of governmental actors is essential to get the accuracy and legitimacy of the asset because land registration utilises the concrete assets that should be confirmed by professionals. The government is considered as an organisational body that has the supervising and setting rules and regulation role for all actors like transactions costs reduction and increase information symmetry.

The government cannot be ignored as it is one of the necessary actors to register land in an official manner approved by the official, executive and judicial authorities. For example, Bitland records would be at risk in case of a dispute or gain financial loans. The legality of the land registers is probable to be enquired, particularly in statutory courts, where some titles were not recorded via the official government channel and were not dealt by Lands Commission surveyors. Legitimacy in the registration process regarding the conformity of formal rules for land registration is debatable since it has not involved formal surveyors from the government. The translation stage proposed by the theory can provide some arrangements between the official authorities and Petland, which affects the gradual entry of the new system into the official records. If the community does not trust the system, it would continue using unwritten agreements with the chiefs. In that case, the registry has little durability in securing that their right of use is tracked, and records are secured from tampering [52].

7.7 Challenges and limitations of ANT

As with all other approaches to social-technical theory, in attempting to answer the question of how social orders are created and maintained, ANT faces epistemological, ontological and methodological challenges. Indeed, ANT’s applicability has resulted that it does not seem to be a theory, because the approach is so descriptive and unable to offer any details of the way actors should be seen and how their actions should be interpreted. However, it is important to take into account the classic concept of theory to more scout this issue. A theory should answer the questions ‘how and why’ things take place by scouting their connections. ANT can offer a straightforward illustration of how things take place, but it is hard to use ANT to describe why things take place. More challenges meeting ANT such as hard to be used to examine empirical evidence because it is so wide and then hard to refute. It can, therefore, assist in illustration and offer an interpretation vocabulary [73]. To some extent, researchers are affecting the way that actors choose which is important to be considered, as it is expected that researchers who are using this approach are likely to use this sort of question. Therefore, researchers in the land registration field most probably will be part of the actors’ network. They will affect this network and affected by the network according to the relations during research, particularly if the study includes a qualitative approach. Researchers should have enough knowledge of the way decisions are made [73].

Another weakness of ANT is describing it as a ‘flat ontology’. It seems that no previous layers existed, instead only ‘a single plane of endlessly entangled translations’. ANT’s black boxes show a group of stable-for- now interconnections that may vary at any time – with no more theorisation [53].

One more defect is ANT’s proposition of ‘symmetry’ between humans and things. ANT’s reduction of humans as compared with technologies puts human impulse, wishes and morals out of the analytic scope and avoids ethical questions.

ANT application in developing countries is not necessarily a challenge, particularly the practical part, but it is important to work on the methodological constraints and the analytical challenge. ANT, therefore, presents an alternative view about the main blockchain operations that must be considered, and the way that networks can be composed. ANT enables the effective role of technology in digital government operations while at the same time aligning the interests and identities of different actors [67].

8. Conclusion

The study addressed the potential of using ANT as a tool to organise the introduction of BT in the context of digital government. This chapter highlighted the literature of both BT and ANT, and used the Sudan land registration system as an illustration.

The adoption of BT without taking into account, the many active actors in the network of relations related to it fails to explain the roles of human and non-human actors. ANT enables the roles to become clear and moves away from technology determinism to reveal important boundaries between BT’s embedded social and technical characters. The flexibility in ANT to illustrate the flexible smart contracts based on local interests can help in reforming stable new and transformative networks that are persistent over longer periods.

By illustrating the necessity to negotiate actor interests in the process of enrolment, ANT could reduce the expected resistance against changing the existing power structures that favours a minority. ANT, therefore, allows for a balanced BT implementation and adoption approach that considers the important social, political and technical negotiations that accompany the introduction of transformative digital technologies.

The study was limited in using an illustration for one country. Further research is required to empirically test the use of ANT to introduce BT in digital government.