cum ratione and the Software Innovation Lab at Paderborn University present recommendations for action
In the face of growing geopolitical tensions, how can Germany and Europe strengthen their digital capacity to act, reduce critical technological dependencies and promote greater local digital value creation? The non-profit organisation cum ratione and the Software Innovation Lab at Paderborn University, based at the SICP – Software Innovation Campus Paderborn, provide answers in the form of a joint policy paper. The authors do not view digital sovereignty as technological isolation, but rather as the ability to use digital technologies in a self-determined manner and to retain genuine choices.
The recommendations for action contain a wide range of approaches towards greater digital self-determination in the economy, government and society. These include, amongst other things, strengthening alternatives to the products of major digital corporations such as Microsoft, Apple and Meta. The aim is to offer citizens, businesses and public institutions attractive, secure and long-term viable options. The paper also calls for the further development of media law, the introduction of a European digital tax and significantly more ambitious enforcement of existing legislation. Furthermore, concrete measures in the areas of security, the economy, education and society are presented.
“With this paper, we aim to draw specific attention to the unfair competitive advantages enjoyed by Big Tech over traditional media. Existing regulations must be enforced more consistently, and the major digital corporations must be subject to stricter regulation in line with their actual influence,” explains Kerstin Haarmann, Managing Director of cum ratione. “German media associations and publishers must campaign much more vigorously to ensure that, in future, the major digital corporations bear media-law responsibilities and liabilities commensurate with their massive influence. Otherwise, traditional media will not be able to survive in the long term in the face of such unequal competition, and this will jeopardise our democracy,” Haarmann continues.
“Digital sovereignty means remaining capable of acting, even in crisis situations,” explains Dr Simon Oberthür, Head of the ‘Digital Sovereignty’ innovation division at the Software Innovation Lab at Paderborn University. “To achieve this, we must understand our critical technological dependencies and design digital infrastructures to be secure and resilient from the outset. Anyone investing billions in infrastructure today must therefore be required to co-fund the necessary IT security – otherwise we risk creating the vulnerabilities of tomorrow.”
“In addition to effective regulation, digital sovereignty also requires high-performance technological alternatives, open standards and the ability to design and further develop digital systems ourselves. It is crucial that research and innovation yield practical solutions that businesses and public institutions can use in the long term,” says Prof. Dr Stefan Sauer, Professor of “Human-Centred Software Engineering” and Managing Director at SICP.
The policy paper and further information on the series of events from which the recommendations emerged can be found on the cum ratione website and on the Software Innovation Campus Paderborn website at www.sicp.de.
This text was translated automatically.
