The risk-based approach under the new EU data protection regulation: a critical perspective

Abstract

The first broad reform of personal data protection legislation in the European Union entered into force in May 2018 (Regulation (EU) 2016/679, the General Data Protection Regulation). Remarkably, with this reform a risk-based approach has been introduced as the core data protection enforcement model, while data protection authorities see their regulatory role significantly weakened. The risk-based approach is to be implemented by the data controllers (i.e. the operators) via data protection impact assessments (evoking the established environmental impact assessment procedure) and notification of breaches, among other procedures. Hence the scope of both the concepts of risk and risk regulation spread beyond conventional domains, namely the environment, public health or safety, i.e. physical risks, to encompass risks to intangible values, i.e. individual rights and freedoms, presumably harder to assess and manage. Strikingly, the reform has been accompanied by a confident discourse by EU institutions, and their avowed belief in the reform’s ability to safeguard the fundamental right to data protection in the face of evolving data processing techniques, specifically, big data, the Internet of Things, and related algorithmic decision-making. However, one may wonder whether there isn’t cause for concern in view of the way the risk-based approach has been designed in the data protection legislation. In this article, the risk-based approach to data protection is analysed in the light of the reform’s underlying rationality. Comparison with the risk regulatory experience in environmental law, particularly the environmental impact assessment procedure, is drawn upon to assist us in pondering the shortcomings, as well as the opportunities of the novel risk-based approach.     

The Political Economy of Policy Vacuums: The European Commission on Demographic Change

ABSTRACT

Supranational organisations can only confront politico-economic issues that are recognised as important. Typically, issues gain recognition either when they provide an external shock to the system, shaking political actors into action, or when they are framed as important in policy networks concerned with developing the appropriate scientific approach. Ideally political and scientific actors align in creating pressures to recognise the issue as salient and to mobilise organisational responses. Issues differ in their capacity to be driven by both political and scientific pressures, creating crisis management, technocratic, and reform agenda outcomes. Here we explore a further variation, where pressures around an issue are insufficient, creating a policy vacuum. We examine one such policy vacuum in Europe: demographic change. This issue belongs to no particular Directorate-General in the European Commission, but is subject to policy frames from DG EMPL and DG ECFIN. Without sufficient political and scientific pressures, no particular policy position is occupied and advocated despite recognition of the issue’s importance. We discuss the role of policy vacuums and the need for their identification in political economy research.     

Putting ‘merchants of debt’ in their place: the political economy of retail banking and credit-based financialisation in Germany

Why did household debt in Germany not increase after the year 2000? This article offers a supply-side explanation for this deviant debt trajectory by tracing the historical evolution of retail banking in the German political economy. It argues that at the end of the 1990s and in the light of European Monetary Union, profitability issues and banking fragmentation became severe enough to interrupt the path towards credit-based financialisation as prevalent among other capitalist economies. These factors interacted with a traditional lack of tools and incentives for rapid credit expansion, even though they were renegotiated in the processes of financial liberalisation, internationalisation and innovation. By employing historical-qualitative as well as statistical evidence for the argument, the paper’s contribution becomes twofold. First, it introduces and conceptualises retail banking as a focal point in the analysis of national financial systems and their transformation. Second, it complicates the standard accounts of German non-financialisation and reveals the ‘contested’ character of financial reform.     

关于新疆设施农业又好又快发展的思考

加快发展设施农业是新时期新疆推进现代农业建设、促进农业增效、农民增收的一项重大决策,研究解决设施农业发展中存在的问题,对于更好地发挥设施农业的作用具有重大意义。本文分析了新疆发展设施农业的必要性,以及设施农业发展中存在的一些问题,进而提出了推动设施农业又好又快发展的几点措施和建议。     

工程建设施工阶段的质量控制

工程施工过程中的质量控制是工程质量控制工作中的重点,是保证工程质量的关键。工程质量的好坏,不仅与设计选型有关,而且与施工质量有关。因此,要对工程建设各个施工阶段的质量控制做到层层把关,环环紧扣,争创优质工程。     

Reforming the Taxation of Multijurisdictional Enterprises in Europe

In 2001, the European Commission proposed replacing the currentsystem of taxation of multinational companies by the taxationof a consolidated base, computed at the level of all the Europeanentities of a multinational enterprise, and then distributedfor taxation purposes among the various jurisdictions in whichthese entities operate, according to pre-established criteria.In this article, we propose a discussion, especially focusingon two related issues, the choice of the formula and the compositionof the consolidating area—either the entire European Union(EU) or some Member States within an Enhanced Cooperation Agreement—,as well as on their impact on the size and distribution of taxrevenue and economic activity, and on the intensity of tax competition.Our tentative policy conclusion is that the reform deservessupport provided that (i) the formula puts emphasis on criteriathat the firm may not too easily manipulate, (ii) the activitiesof the multijurisdictional enterprise are enough mobile, (iii)the consolidation is made compulsory within the consolidatingarea and (iv) the consolidating area protects its capacity toactually levy tax by adopting a crediting system vis-à-visthe rest of the world. (JEL code: H32, H73, H87)     

欧洲2020战略旗舰计划：创新型联盟（上）

“创新型联盟”是欧洲2020战略七大旗舰计划之首,由欧委会2010年10月公布,欧盟理事会2011年2月批准,是欧盟未来10年的科研与创新战略文件。该战略以10年内把欧盟建设成为“创新型联盟”为目标,要求欧盟把创新作为首要和压倒一切的政策目标,提出了加强研发投入、提高资金使用效益、实现教育现代化、4年内建成统一的欧洲研究区、简化科研计划管理、促进成果产业化、实现欧盟单一专利、启动“欧洲创新伙伴”行动、推动社会创新、加强国际合作等十项工作重点,并提出部署相关配套措施,开展欧盟层面的科研与创新绩效监测工作,确保“创新型联盟”各项目标的实现。本文是“创新型联盟”旗舰计划的译稿,供国内相关部门参考。     

欧美债务危机对我国电子商务业的影响及策略探析

尽管欧美债务危机的肆虐使得我国电子商务业面临业务扩展受限,行业盈利率下降,融资困难等问题。但同时也为国内电子商务业提供了市场机会增加,转型意识得以提升,获得定向宽松政策扶持,海外投资和效益凸显等机遇。因此,国内电子商务业应积极通过转变发展方式,审慎选择融资渠道,提高非系统风险防范力度等措施实现自身又好又快发展。