The role of the epistemic communities in the 'constitutionalization' of the Internet Governance: the case of the EU High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence.

In the last few years, digital constitutionalism has emerged as a novel Internet Governance approach aiming at ordering and limiting the exercise of power by both states and private operators, as well as promoting people's control over digital technology development. Although digital constitutionalism is encountering growing popularity, the prevalent nonbinding nature of its initiatives, the discrepancy between the jurisdictional border and transnational digital processes, and the technological embedment of governance mechanisms have hindered its effectiveness. This paper identifies epistemic communities as a crucial factor for the digital technologies' constitutionalization since they have the necessary technical expertise and policy commitment to translate normative provisions into architectural design. In order to illustrate this nexus, the article performs an in-depth investigation of the case of the European Commission High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence (HLEG-AI). The analysis revealed that the HLEG-AI effectively gathered an epistemic community strongly committed to fundamental rights promotion and capable of influencing the following policymaking activities of the European Commission, as well as of other non-state stakeholders, whose involvement is essential in order to embed digital constitutionalism principles within the design of AI systems.

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