Published in: Außerschulische Bildung 3-2024 (in German language)
Focus topic: Artificial Intelligence and civic education
Online: https://fachzeitschrift.adb.de/ausgabe/kuenstliche-intelligenz/
The broad lines of digital policy are drawn in Europe, which is why its European context must become the subject of digital citizenship education. The following also applies to German digital policy: if one wants to understand it and accompany it pedagogically, one should understand the European goals and developments and the actions of German politicians and German actors in Germany, Brussels and Strasbourg. This article outlines the European strategy, its framework, which is derived from the European treaties, and, building on this, some key political projects. It focuses on the European Union. An examination of the digital policy projects in the Council of Europe would merit similar attention, but would go beyond the scope of this article.
By Nils-Eyk Zimmermann
The Digital Decade
The EU’s policy program “for the Digital Decade” formulates the objectives of digital policy until 2023 in terms of “empowering citizens and businesses through the digital transformation” (EU 2022/2481). This is about
„promoting a human-centred, fundamental-rights-based, inclusive, transparent and open digital environment where secure and interoperable digital technologies and services observe and enhance Union principles, rights and values and are accessible to all, everywhere in the Union.“
This is then outlined in more detail:
Education: Promoting the “development of basic and advanced digital skills and qualifications, including vocational education and training and lifelong learning” with the aim of “reinforcing Member States’ collective resilience and bridging the digital divide, achieving gender and geographic balance”.
Digital sovereignty as an important strategic objective addresses the global independence and competitiveness of the EU “in particular by secure and accessible digital and data infrastructures capable of efficiently storing, transmitting and processing vast volumes of data”. The transformation of the economy “in particular of SMEs and the resilience of value chains” and the strengthening of start-ups are emphasized.
Use of data and promotion of platformization: Data is seen as a decisive lever: “Promoting the deployment and the use of digital capabilities with a view to reducing the geographical digital divide and granting access to digital technologies and data on open, accessible and fair terms, in order to achieve a high level of digital intensity and innovation in Union enterprises, in particular start-ups and SMEs.” This is summed up in the European Data Strategy: “To unleash Europe’s potential, we need to find our own European way by channeling the exchange and wide use of data while maintaining high standards of data protection, security and ethics.” (EC COM 2020/66 final)
Research: Research funding is about the development of efficient infrastructures and digital high technology within the EU, which should meet “with high security and privacy standards”.
Public Private Partnership: „Stärkung von Synergien zwischen privaten und öffentlichen Investitionen und der Verwendung von Unionsmitteln und nationalen Mitteln, und durch die Entwicklung vorhersehbarer Regulierungs- und Unterstützungsansätze, die auch die regionale und die lokale Ebene einbeziehen.“
Participation and the state: Participation is primarily understood as accessibility – “participation in democratic life is possible for everyone”. When it comes to digitalization in the public sector, the focus is on broad accessibility of public services and the optimization of “health and care services”, including in rural areas.
Sustainability: This means “ensuring that digital infrastructure and technologies, including their supply chains, become more sustainable, resilient, and energy- and resource-efficient” as a contribution to the European Green Deal announced by the Commission in 2019 (which aims to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by 55% by 2030) (EC COM 2019/640 final).
Public Private Partnership: “Strengthening the synergies between private and public investments and the use of Union and national funds, and by developing predictable regulatory and supportive approaches that also involve the regional and local levels.”
Security: In particular, “resilience to cyber-attacks” and “increasing the efforts of public and private organisations” are mentioned here as priorities.
Goals relating to democracy provide the regulatory context in that they are formulated in the preceding considerations, but not in the goal definitions themselves. For example, the following are mentioned here: participation of all “interested parties”, “focus on education” and the qualification of skilled workers, as well as the fact that “improvements in democracy, good governance, social inclusion and more efficient public services” must go hand in hand with the digital transformation.
These aspects legitimize the specific regulatory projects discussed below. The “European Declaration on Digital Rights and Principles for the Digital Decade” (EU 2023/C 23/01) also declamatorily summarizes the ideas of the EU and its member states on the nature of the digital transformation and its objectives.
Democracy – Economy – Education
The strategic aspects presented describe the larger vision which, in addition to the measures and sub-goals described, should itself become the subject of critical citizenship education and against which political education can measure real developments and implementations of digitalization: Causes, constellations of actors and social conditions from which digital policy is developed, its (ideological) justifications, its effects on people and groups and how the paths of digital transformation can be co-designed and changed (cf. Lösch/Eis 2024, p. 40).
The above vision is in turn embedded in the wider context of the European treaties. The Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU; EU 2007) differentiates between exclusive, shared and supporting competences of the EU. Because competition rules and trade policy belong to the exclusive area (Art. 3 TFEU) and other economically relevant aspects to the shared competences (Art. 4 TFEU) – such as the internal market, social policy (relating to living conditions, promotion of employment or working conditions, for example), consumer protection, trans-European networks, economic/social/territorial cohesion – European digital policy is to be understood as a project strongly driven by market considerations.
The EU only provides support in the areas of education and training, youth and sport, culture and healthcare. It can make suggestions and provide incentives for improvement. In this sense, the EU does not formally focus on digital education. However, it can open up scope by referring to EU programs and objectives when it comes to promoting digital skills, empowering citizens to exercise their fundamental rights or accompanying digital policy projects (civic education as an actor for citizen participation, as a place for information and judgment …).
In addition, the EU policy program for the Digital Decade 2030 also results in demands from civic education and civil society for the federal government to better involve them in their capacity as relevant stakeholders. This also applies to EU education policies: The Digital Education Action Plan (EC COM/2020/624 final), for example, formulates the recommendations to be implemented by the member states to promote digital skills for change, particularly among skilled workers, or that the digital expansion of education is progressing (and incidentally also the development of national education platforms). [Note: the formulation in the original text gave the impression the member states would have to implement the DEAP, in fact it is a recommendation]. In principle, civic education has something to contribute here that vocational and general education cannot. With reference to this, it should make its voice heard more clearly in Berlin and Brussels.
While education is therefore primarily a matter for the member states, the EU has a more important role in relation to the rule of law and fundamental rights (shared competence). In particular, Article 2 of the Lisbon Treaty (TEU/2016) refers to “respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights” and Article 3 defines the EU as an “area of freedom, security and justice without internal frontiers”. Article 6 (1) of the Lisbon Treaty also recognizes the European Charter of Fundamental Rights as binding and declares the EU’s accession to the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (of the Council of Europe).
European digital policy is therefore bound by fundamental rights and human rights. However, in contrast to the Council of Europe, whose highest level of objectives in the development of instruments for steering and framing digital policy are human rights, the EU has a different weighting due to its constitution and its limited mandate.
Taking these framing conditions into account, European digital policy can nevertheless be appreciated for its systemic ambition. It integrates digital policy projects into a larger strategy that also includes the EU’s relations with other global players (particularly in contrast to the USA and China). It has also recognized that a sustainable model can generally only work for and with citizens, i.e. it cannot be a purely technology-optimistic strategy that ignores the persistent criticism and unease among the population in terms of politics and industrial policy.
Since the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), Brussels in particular has been sending out a signal: We are not surrendering to the instrumental logic of data capitalism, but are working to regain political steering capability. At its core, however, digital policy is aimed at a digital market and building European competitiveness. This is also explained in the European industrial strategy (EC COM/2020/102 final).
The existence and intensive use of data in particular are central to the European digital vision. The separately formulated European Data Strategy (EC COM 2020/66 final) declares that the EU’s share of the global data economy should at least match its economic strength in the future. It sees data as the decisive fuel (“The value of data lies in its use and re-use”; EC COM 2020/66 final) and attempts (most recently with the Data Act; EU 2023/2854) to balance the digital economy’s desire for data with fundamental rights. This can be illustrated by the European Health Data Space: On the one hand, the further use of health data for business and research is to be accelerated, while on the other, individuals are (also) to be given control over their data.
The following sections outline some European digital policy projects.
Further:
- Digital Services Act (DSA)
- Digital Markets Act (DMA)
- AI Act
- New rules for ecodesign
- European Union Dogital Identity (EUDI)
- Digital Euro, cashless payments
- Chat control – Adressing sexual abuse of children
- Conclusions