Master European Law School - LAW & AI

Advanced European Law

6 ECTS

The course proposes an integrated study of EU law, in the sense that it emphasizes the interaction between the two traditional subdivisions of ‘Institutional EU law’ (which deals with decision-making processes and the role of the judiciary) and ‘Substantive EU law’ (which deals with the content of EU law in the various policy areas). The course will thus explore both how substantive EU law is influenced by the structure of the EU Treaties and institutions, and how the EU’s institutional framework has evolved in response to new social, political and economic challenges.

This integrated study will take the form of a weekly general lecture for all participants, combined with interactive tutorial meetings at which, each time, one specific and current legal problem area will be examined from both institutional and substantive perspectives. The course also seeks to integrate legal analysis with the social and political context in which the law emerges and operates, which involves the use of non-legal literature.
 

The Foundations of European Institutionalisation

6 ECTS

This course analyses the rationales and normative justifications of the two major institutions that dramatically changed the European legal and political landscape after the Second World War. How can they be understood as purposeful social and legal creations?

As a whole, we take the study of the relative novel European legal institutions – the EU (and its predecessors), and the Council of Europe (including the ensuing EC(t)HR)) as a starting point to rethink age-old legal phenomena. Where Advanced European Law, the other course in the first block of this Masters’ program, primarily analyses European Union law as positive law, this course has a more legal-philosophical disposition. It analyses the normative foundations of European integration and seeks to answer questions about the justification, nature, and the desirable forms of supranational state cooperation.
 

Introduction to Modern Computing and AI

6 ECTS

For you to become legal experts in the digital domain, they need a profound understanding of the underlying technology. This is often not sufficiently emphasized in existing curricula at other universities, nor is it visible in contemporary debates around digitization. Deep digital education remains lacking in legal education, and this course will help fill this digital literacy gap by equipping you with the foundations for computational thinking and digital competencies as well as illustrating their relevance for legal practice and policy making. You will learn the core principles of modern computing, starting at theoretical concepts (e.g., What is an algorithm?), over to the core hardware level of computers (e.g., What does a computer consist of?), reaching over operating systems and software components (e.g., How does a computer know what to compute?) to modern-day AI systems based on agents and machine learning, including deep learning (e.g. How does a computer become “intelligent”? What’s the Turing test?). Once armed with the ability to understand, explain, and apply important concepts and methods of computer science, you will be well-positioned to become thought leaders in the digital legal space.

Intellectual Property Law

6 ECTS

This course covers the substantial legal aspects of industrial and intellectual property law with specific relevance for the Information Society as well as the management of Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs). As such the economic rationale of IPRs is covered in respect of the creation and the regulation of markets in information. In order to get a full grasp of legal entitlements for creators in the information age, copyrights, database, patents and trade mark law will be juxtaposed with technological developments, such as multimedia, (open source) software, file sharing, domain name grabbing, and placed in the economic context of competition, management of IPRs and electronic commerce. Knowledge of the legal and economic rationale for the protection of intellectual and industrial creativity through acquisition of the fundamentals of intellectual and industrial property rights, (unfair) competition law, and management of intellectual property rights (IPRs) on an international, European, and national level.
 

Regulation of Data, AI, and Digital Services

6 ECTS

You will learn how data and digital services, content, and markets are regulated in Europe. The course focuses on the history of the regulation of the Internet, addressing disruptive innovation (such as AI), data governance in relation to States and (other) public and private actors, intermediary liability, content moderation regulation, competition law, and regulation of disruptive technologies (e.g., generative AI). At the end of this course, you will understand current and projected developments such as decentralization or new Internet business models.
Selected illustrations to address legal and policy issues from a comparative and European law perspective will be discussed and analyzed.

Legal Data Analysis and Ethics

6 ECTS

Building on Introduction to Modern Computing and AI, you will learn how legal data can be analyzed in a certain context. An understanding of what data is and how it can be analyzed responsibly (ethically, legally, and socially) is pivotal for policy making, the legislation of data, and the use of data (in legal practice and beyond). This course familiarizes you with data analysis techniques such as data analysis techniques for general purpose data (e.g., general machine learning) and more domain-specific techniques (e.g., computer vision and natural language processing) as well as the regulations on the use and deployment of such techniques (notably the AI Act). To do so, this course works with use cases from different legal domains that will serve as examples for students to learn the different data analysis techniques. Applications in different domains or for different topics are discussed from both a technical as well as legal perspective, and responsible data analysis frameworks are presented to the students. At the end of this course, you will have an understanding of the possibilities, challenges, and limitations of data analysis and their ethical, legal, and social responsibilities with respect to data analysis.

European Data Protection and Privacy Law

6 ECTS

Privacy and data protection are the fundamental rights that have gained salience not only as values protected within the European multi-level human rights protection system, but also as rights and obligations that provide framework for activities of entities using data as a basis for their economic activities (as if it were, in a slightly dated and over-used terms, ‘new oil’). This means that data protection as a discipline is complementary to data management and lies at the intersection with other major disciplines of law, both applying to private and public actors. What is more, it seems that the regulatory paradigm underlying GDPR has become a blueprint not only for data protection laws worldwide, but also for the legislative attempts to ensure ethical and fundamental rights compliant development of new technologies. The Digital Services Act or the proposal for the future AI Regulation only herald European Union’s ‘Digital Decade’ importance of which has been underlined by the radical change of our work-and lifestyles during the past years’ Covid-19 pandemics and through the employment of cyberwarfare in the course of 2022 Russian-Ukrainian war.

With the above in mind, during European Privacy and Data Protection Law course we will explore the European privacy and data protection system presenting it against the inter-disciplinary background and, subsequently, in the context of international and comparative law.

Networks, Security, and Regulation

6 ECTS

We live in a connected world, and the underlying networking infrastructure and data transmitted over it must be secured from unauthorized access and misuse. Ensuring proper governance and protection of IT, the networks, and data are vital for individuals, non-profits, corporations, and the public sector. Hence, the topic of security—ranging from IT to network security and cybersecurity—is a rapidly growing and evolving area that different regulations (including standards) address. This course introduces you to the ever-important field of information and network security, the technical tools developed to remedy certain challenges, the organizations in charge of security, and the regulations in place to address mishaps and attacks. Building on European Data Protection and Privacy Law, you will learn about key areas in cybersecurity surrounding the CIA triad (confidentiality, integrity, availability). By means of examples, you will learn how encryption algorithms like RSA function and how they can safeguard data, as well as methods to anonymize data. At the end of the course, you  will not only understand how encryption algorithms, authentication, and authorization can contribute to network and data security but also how these concepts affect data governance overall.