The Many (Digital) Faces of the EU Vol. 2
Dear Reader,
The conclusion of the EU parliamentary elections has elicited mixed emotions. Some have rejoiced at the far-right’s gains falling short of projections, while others continue to be worried about its ominous and persistent rise. The impact of these shifts for the Union’s digital economy will only be clarified over time, however, early analysis suggests the strong momentum to reform and regulate the tech sphere may dwindle under new arrangements. As these new political realities begin to settle, this month we continue our focus on the EU’s digital ambitions, zoning in on questions about its internal dynamics and outward stances.
But first, a quick look at the month gone by…
In the artificial intelligence (AI) space, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) helmed the ‘AI for Good’ Summit, while the UK and Korea co-hosted the Second Global AI Summit in Seoul. Both events saw a flurry of announcements and commitments with respect to the future of international cooperation and stressed the need for international standards and guidelines to protect against the technology’s many potential hazards. However, it is important to juxtapose these discourses of AI regulation with the tumultuous fortunes of chip maker Nvidia’s stock value in June. Indeed, it briefly eclipsed Microsoft to become the world’s most valuable company, and then rapidly shed more than USD 500 billion. These excessive swings point to the principle that is effectively shaping this space, one where calls for restraint have little hold: AI’s perceived returns to capital.
Meanwhile, there was also a burst of antitrust activity in June. Japan passed a new law to challenge anti-competitive behavior online, while the US FTC has put the scanner on Microsoft, Nvidia, and OpenAI for their dominant roles in the AI industry. Turkey’s competition authority proceeded to fine Google for anti-competitive behavior with respect to the domain of hotel searches. Parallelly, London’s Competition Appeal Tribunal also ruled to allow a new lawsuit—worth nearly USD 14 billion—to be initiated against the same company. In the EU, it looks as though Apple is going to be first of the Big Tech companies to have charges brought against it under the Digital Markets Act.
Finally, the WSIS+20 high-level event, which concluded at the end of May, provided a barometer of stakeholder sentiments in the lead-up to the pivotal UN Summit of the Future to be held later this year. As statements and reports following the event indicate, the forum was marked by strong interventions from civil society, highlighting the stark distance that has arisen between the contemporary realities of the internet, and the people-centric, emancipatory visions for the technology that were forged in the original WSIS summits. Stressing the short time away from the deadline for the UN’s sustainable development goals, these voices brought home the urgency of decisive intervention to alter course and create the conditions for substantive equality and digital justice, pointing to the upcoming Global Digital Compact negotiations (as well as WSIS+20 itself next year) as key sites of intervention in this regard.
Bringing the focus back to our current issue, this month we continue our exploration of the intriguing contradictions of the EU’s digital policies. Our first piece takes a look at a year of the Digital Markets Act and what it has delivered. Our second piece probes into the inner workings of the EU Commission’s bureaucracy, drawing out some of the tensions that constrict the bloc’s ambitions to enact stronger industrial policy in the coming cycle. Last, though certainly not least, we look at the fragmented dynamics driving the EU’s standard-setting maneuvers within the tech policy space, and what they portend for the future.
The DataSyn Team
THE POLICY TABLE
DMA, One Year On: Taking Stock of the EU’s Attempts to Rein In Big Tech
Margarida Silva
When it was enacted in 2022, the Digital Markets Act (DMA) was hailed as a proactive intervention to finally take on the monopolies of the tech space. As the first example of such a legislative framework for the digital sphere, DMA marked a pivotal moment in platform regulation, and has since inspired similar proposals around the world. Yet, how has it fared over the course of its first year in operation, and what lessons can one glean from its successes and challenges? Margarida Silva examines the record to offer an answer.
Read on.
THE NEW DIVERGENCE
‘Competitiveness Without Competition’: What EU’s Proposed Digital Economy Reboot Gets Wrong
Roland Kulke
The EU’s digital policy rhetoric has been read as a sign of its ambition to assert sovereignty and secure its economic interests within the field. Yet, under this posturing, there lies the complex and messy politics of the Union itself. Roland Kulke provides a sharp and perceptive overview of the financial burdens, intra-regional tensions, and institutional constraints that are likely to stifle the EU’s supposed pivot to strong digital industrial policies.
Read on.
THE BIG EXCESS
European Introspection Standing in the Way of Global Leadership
Amelia Andersdotter and Rohini Lakshané
Tracing the tangled historical development of Europe’s path to sovereignty, and the turmoil of its inner bureaucracy, Amelia Andersdotter and Rohini Lakshané question the continued power of the ‘Brussels effect,’ with signs emerging that the EU’s much-vaunted capacity to take the lead in standard-setting and legal frameworks is not keeping pace with the changing technological landscape.
Read on.
The Sins & Synergies Lounge
In the context of the erosion of worker rights across Europe, the Digital Research Programme’s policy study, Computer in Command, provides crucial insights into algorithmic management in the warehousing and customer service/telemarketing sectors in Northern Europe.
Also, as the G20 revisits issues of international digital cooperation under Brazil’s presidency, there is a window of opportunity to put a progressive agenda on the table. To this end, check out IT for Change’s policy briefs, which push the envelope on key fronts, from the governance of computational infrastructures to the gender dimension of information integrity efforts.
As the proliferation of GenAI models and use cases continues to grow at a great pace, the outlines of the larger economic dynamics that this industry has unleashed are starting to come to the fore. Read through this lucid paper by Stuart Mills that seeks to furnish a conceptual framework for thinking about the political economy of foundation models. Moreover, for those keen to take such work forward, we also want to put on your radar the European AI & Society Fund’s call for proposals on AI & Market Power to support investigative research and critical analysis into the political economy of large-scale AI systems.
Not to lose sight of the question of under-resourced languages and multilingual AI, tune into this session from the AI for Social Good Speaker Series by LIRNE Asia and this interview with Hugging Face’s head of global policy. Also, check out this clever primer by the Diplo Foundation on AI seeking to address the explainability of AI capabilities to the wider public.
Post-script
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