Digital Sovereignty in the European Union: Five Challenges from a Normative Perspective

In this chapter, I aim to make sense of ‘digital sovereignty’ in the European Union by examining both its meanings and its obstacles. I start by unpacking the term through a brief exploration of its use in European discourse, and reflect on two of its dimensions that are prevalently highlighted, which I conceptualise as ‘economic digital sovereignty’ and ‘normative digital sovereignty’ (section 2). Focusing primarily on the latter, I subsequently examine five challenges that European digital sovereignty currently faces, and that must be tackled if the EU wishes to maintain its ability to exercise its sovereign powers. These include the significant role of private actors in the public digital sphere, interference by foreign actors, Europe’s rule of law crisis, the risk of poor digital governance, and the lack of digital literacy (section 3). Finally, I offer some concluding remarks, acknowledging the difficult balances the EU will need to strike in its digital policies (section 4).