Claims as institutional objects : designing markets for coordination

Economic coordination is traditionally analysed in terms of markets and firms, with coordination treated as a derivative of exchange governance. Yet many contemporary economic systems—particularly in labour, credit, compliance, and social inclusion—exhibit persistent coordination failures despite clear willingness to transact. This paper argues that these failures arise because coordination is institutionally coupled to exchange, leaving coordination surplus either undersupplied or destroyed by enclosure. We conceptualise this dynamic as a coordination trap and theorise claims as institutional boundary objects that separate coordination from exchange while preserving alignment. We develop the institutional logic of an open market for claims, operationalised through a data wallet architecture, and present early implementations as proof-of-concept.