Data Governance
Data collection activities increase in speed, scale and variety, and the analytic techniques used to process these datasets become more sophisticated. These innovations promise significant social benefits, but also pose substantial challenges that could hinder social progress through digitalisation, and require societies to navigate significant choices and dilemmas. As major countries across the world develop their own governance models for digital innovation, there is now an opportunity and need to define a European approach to the governance of data management and data use.
Programme of Action
A pan-European ALLEA-Royal Society conference “Flourishing in a data-enabled society” delved into these conundrums during a two-day event held in the UK in November 2018. In a set of keynotes, panel discussions and breakout sessions experts explored major opportunities and challenges that come with new uses of data, and discussed the potential trade-offs that stem from such use across various sectors in society, from academics to governments, from civil society actors to the tech industry.
Outcomes of the conference have been released in a discussion paper that seeks to inspire and shape the discourse around a data-enabled Europe.
Following up on this groundwork, it is envisaged to present the topic in a scoping paper to the European Commission’s Scientific Advice Mechanism (SAM) via SAPEA (Science Advice for Policy by European Academies) in order to produce a comprehensive evidence review report to inform future European data governance policies, drawing on the expertise of European academies.