Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Relations as a Challenge for Democracy: book launch & evening debate

On Wednesday, 28 June 2017 from 17h00 till 19h00 the Muntpunt in Brussels will host a book launch and an evening debate on Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Relations as a Challenge for Democracy. This book, co-edited by Dan Svantesson and Dariusz Kloza, is a fruit of collaboration of 30 authors from all over the world, who have provided their views on (the protection of) data privacy in relations between Europe and Americas as a challenge for democracy, the rule of law (Rechtsstaat) and fundamental rights.

“This book includes contributors of international stature who deal with Snowden and Safe Harbour, but also go beyond them to address some of the key topics affecting privacy at the international level. The topics are timely and the authors highly qualified, and the book will be of interest to anyone interested in privacy and data protection law and policy” – recommended Dr Christopher Kuner, Co-Director of the Brussels Privacy Hub.

“The editors decided to put Bruegel’s ‘Landscape with the Fall of Icarus’ on its front cover, which definitely can be considered as a little bit provocative. In this painting, the fall of Icarus, an important event known from the Greek mythology, remains ignored by the onlookers. Icarus is drowning, but nobody notices it. The editors, by juxtaposing the topic of EU-US data privacy relations and the symbolic meaning of the ‘Fall of Icarus’, are clearly sending a warning that these issues should not be ignored” – commented Michał Czerniawski, one of the authors contributing to the present book.

The foreword, introduction and the table of contents can be previewed here.

This is already the 4th volume in European Integration and Democracy series, edited at the Centre for Direct Democracy Studies at the University of Białystok (Poland) and published by the Belgian-based and increasingly well-known publishing house Intersentia. It has become a tradition that with each new volume in the series, a dedicated seminar is organised – shortly after each book is out – to celebrate its launch.

This book launch will take shape of panel discussions amongst its many authors as well as invited experts. It will look into these relations through the lens of the human rights protection and the role of the new data privacy law in the European Union. Wojciech R. Wiewiórowski, Assistant European Data Protection Supervisor, will join with a keynote on ‘The Ocean that Connects Us. Trans-Atlantic Perspectives on Privacy‘.

The event is jointly presented by the Centre for Direct Democracy Studies, University of Białystok; Research Group on Law, Science, Technology & Society, Vrije Universiteit Brussel; and the Centre for Commercial Law, Bond University in cooperation with Brussels Privacy Hub and Intersentia.

The programme is available here.

Attendance is free of charge, yet due to limited capacity, registration is required. There are still a few places available. Please contact at info@brusselsprivacyhub.org.

Venez nombreux!

Applying Cognitive Linguistics to Conceptual Change in the Digital Age

picture by victor keegan (@flickr)

On Tuesday 13 June 2017 researcher Jake Slosser, of the University of Kent, will give a presentation titled ‘Understanding European Data Privacy Law: Applying Cognitive Linguistics to Conceptual Change in the Digital Age‘. His work investigates the journey from privacy of the home and body to digital privacy using the guiding hand of cognitive linguistics; namely, conceptual metaphor to explore the intertextual and conceptual justifications judges make to interpret older concepts to new realities. When? Tuesday June 13 2017, 12:30 Where? Room 4B302, 4th Floor, Building C, Pleinlaan 2, 1050 Brussels.

 

Understanding the Risk-based Approach to Data Protection

picture by matt northam (@flickr)

On Thursday 15 June 2017 Raphaël Gellert will publicly defend his PhD thesis ‘Understanding the Risk-based Approach to Data Protection: An Analysis of the Links between Law, Regulation and Risk‘ at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). The event will start at 18:00 and take place at Auditorium D.2.01. Please find the official invitation (including the email address to contact in order to confirm attendance) here (pdf).

Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Relations as a Challenge for Democracy

picture by matt hintsa (@flickr)

The book ‘Trans-Atlantic Data Privacy Relations as a Challenge for Democracy‘ has been published by Interesentia. Co-edited by Dan Svantensonn and LSTS Researcher Dariusz Kloza, the collective volume focuses on the protection of data privacy in relations between Europe and America as a challenge for democracy, the rule of law and fundamental rights. More information can be found here.

Windows into the soul of Gary T. Marx

On 22 May 2017 will take place at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) a seminar around the magnus opus of and with Professor (MIT) Em. Gary T. Marx. In this event, Prof. Gary Marx will give a short summary of the main findings of his last book – Windows into the soul. Surveillance and society in an age of high technology (Chicago U.P. 2016) – after which four selected respondents will open a discussion with the author and the audience. The discussants will be Prof. Tugba Basaran (Visiting Scholar, Princeton University; Associate Researcher, CCLS Paris), Prof. Marieke De Goede, (Universiteit van Amsterdam, Department of Political Science) Dr. Joris Van Hoboken, (Universiteit van Amsterdam, IVIR, and Affiliated Researcher, LSTS, VUB) and Dr. Kristof Verfaillie. For more information, please read the official invitation (pdf). Registration is possible until 16 May 2017.

2nd European Data Protection Law Summer School: The GDPR is Now

The Brussels Privacy Hub is proud to announce the 2nd European Data Protection Law Summer School, which will take place from 26 to 30 June 2017 at the Institute of European Studies (IES), in Brussels. Building on the success of the inaugural 2016 session, and under the title ‘The GDPR is Now’, the 2nd European Data Protection Law Summer School will equip participants to deal with the many challenges that lie ahead when the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) enters into force in May 2018. This practical dimension will be combined with a more general exploration of the evolving global and European privacy landscape, with a particular emphasis on transatlantic issues, and current policy debates (including the ongoing review of the EU E-Privacy Directive). Early bird registration is possible until 21 April 2017. For more information, please visit the Data Protection Law Summer School page.

From Law as Information to Law as Calculation

On 9th March Mireille Hildebrandt will be speaking at the Innovation Policy Colloquium of New York University, invited by Helen Nissenbaum and Katherine Strandburg on ‘From Law as Information to Law as Calculation’. Building on her book and her Chorley Lecture she will discuss how the idea of computational law or jurimetrics stemmed from a previous wave of artificial intelligence, based on an algorithmic understanding of law, celebrating logic as the sole ingredient for proper legal argumentation. She will confront Holmes’ famous adage that the life of the law is experience rather than logic with the new wave of artificial intelligence, based on co-called machine learning, that builds on machine experience. Noting that current development of computational law build on (machine) experience rather than logic, Hildebrandt predicts (sic!) that such computational law may be far more successful in terms e.g. predicting the content of positive law. She will, however, argue that such computational law does not qualify as law, but rather as public administration or as a commodity on the market for legal services. This raises a number of questions about the interaction between legal machine intelligence, the law and the Rule of Law. Notably when it comes to ‘speaking law to power’. The Lecture concerns a paper that will be presented on 25th March at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Law, for the Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Technology and the Future of Law, in the panel on ‘Will Technology Challenge the Conceptual Foundations of the Law?‘