Digital Sovereignty: For What and For Whom? An Analysis from the Brazilian context

OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT 

The project seeks to qualify the academic and public policy debate on digital sovereignty, starting with an analysis from the Brazilian context, exploring its socio-technical dimensions and technological and legal challenges. To this end, it seeks to conceptually and empirically identify the contours of sovereignty imaginaries constructed from stakeholders’ narratives from different sectors in public documents, taking into account legal, social, economic, and political implications connecting the local, regional and global levels. 

WHY IS THIS PROJECT IMPORTANT? 

The debate on digital sovereignty represents an increasing challenge to equate the transnational character of digital technologies and the growing number of laws and regulations aimed at the sovereignty of national states in cyberspace. Authorities from different countries and regions have guided the debate and their decision-making process based on arguments of security and national autonomy, which in turn lead to political-regulatory tensions and uncertainties about the global impacts of specific measures adopted or intended on a local or regional scale. Considering the increasingly connected world and its dependence on the structure and functioning of the Internet as a critical resource, digital sovereignty became a global struggle, affecting the future of digital infrastructures, individuals and entire societies, regardless of borders. 

This project generates insights into these matters. Through an analytical effort (mapping the discussion on the strategies that permeate the defence of national digital sovereignty through legislative and regulatory instruments), this research seeks to promote a better understanding of the different meanings that make up the concept of digital sovereignty in the Brazilian context, and raise awareness that its indiscriminate use can represent significant unintended risks, some of them connected to other equally complex concepts, such as the fragmentation of the Internet.  

MEDIA AND PUBLICATIONS 

See below for publications and other articles related to the project. 

https://www.intgovforum.org/en/content/igf-2023-%E2%80%93-day-1-%E2%80%93-launch-award-event-187-digital-sovereignty-in-brazil-for-what-and-for-0 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkBl7e9RBSE 
https://www.isoc.org.br/noticia/curso-livre-soberania-digital-conceitos-perspectivas-e-impactos-para-a-internet-no-brasil 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmfwGsZ5mKg