Digital constitutionalism: a new systematic theorisation

Abstract

‘Digital constitutionalism’ is an appealing concept to explain the recent emergence of constitutional counteractions against the challenges produced by digital technology. However, the existing scholarship does not offer a unitary picture of this notion. This paper carries out a literature review of the topic and suggests a new systematisation of the theoretical framework surrounding the concept of digital constitutionalism. It is argued that digital constitutionalism is the ideology that adapts the values of contemporary constitutionalism to the digital society. It does not identify the normative responses to the challenges of digital technology, but rather embodies the set of principles and values that informs and guides them. Conversely, the emerging normative responses can be regarded as the components of a process of constitutionalisation of the digital environment. In light of the adopted definitions, the paper ultimately illustrates a new way of mapping the constitutional responses that have emerged to address the challenges of digital technology. They not only include the constitutional tools that we could define as ‘classic’ in the context of constitutional theory, such as the binding legal texts produced in the state-centric dimension, but, significantly, also new instruments, which are developed in the transnational dimension of private actors.