What's the meaning of "It also helps to clarify these understandings and to distinguish licensing from other forms of governance"

In the following sentence, I’m confused about how to understand the sentence "It also helps to clarify these understandings and to distinguish licensing from other forms of governance".

Does "It" refer to "Pierre Issalys and Denis Lemieux’s definition" or does "It" refer to "to distinguish licensing from other forms of governance." as an impersonal pronoun?

If the latter one is correct, is it grammatically correct in that it has no object in the sentence.

Thank you in advance.

I have therefore adopted Pierre Issalys and Denis Lemieux’s definition
of a license as “a permission, often subject to conditions, given by a
public authority to a natural or legal person, to carry out an act or
to exercise an activity that would otherwise be illegal.” I have
chosen this definition because it largely corresponds to commonsense
understandings. It also helps to clarify these understandings and to
distinguish licensing from other forms of governance.