We are excited to share that LSTS researchers Simone Casiraghi and Niels van Dijk have just published a book chapter titled “Constituting a sovereign European identity through AI ethics: A critical Exploration”. The chapter is part of the edited book “Project Europe. The Making of European Digital Innovation, Policy and Society” published by Edward Elgar.
The chapter traces the role of ethics and values in constituting a European identity, from the Maastricht Treaty until today. Since the failure of formal attempts at European constitution-making, this political project of value-based identity building has been progressively delegated to the ‘sub-politics’ of institutionalized ethics in the form of expert group opinions and research programs, from biotechnology (1990s) and nanotechnology (2000s) to digital technologies (2010s). What is distinct about ethics in the digital domain is 1) the move of ethics back to the political level, sometimes portrayed as an alternative to traditional law-making, and 2) the purposeful program to distinguish an EU technological approach of embedding its common values in digital infrastructures and achieving technological sovereignty. The authors argue that, despite the ambition of the EU to create value-based technologies as global standards, this approach lacks both democratic representativity and procedural quality guarantees under the rule of law.
It can be found here https://www.elgaronline.com/edcollbook/book/9781800886629/9781800886629…