Henry Farrell
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- August 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780262042512
- eISBN:
- 9780262271936
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262042512.003.0296
- Subject:
- Information Science, Communications
This chapter examines global governance mechanisms designed to protect citizens’ privacy rights, with special emphasis on the relationship between the United States and the European Union (EU) and ...
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This chapter examines global governance mechanisms designed to protect citizens’ privacy rights, with special emphasis on the relationship between the United States and the European Union (EU) and their very different approaches to the issue. It argues that power relations are central to the transatlantic accommodation that has been reached, and to the EU’s efforts to push third-party countries toward higher levels of privacy protection. It also suggests that privacy regulation has always had a strong international component, but that the causal impact of international factors is likely to depend on two key intervening variables: existing national institutional traditions and state bargaining power. It then offers policy recommendations on how to protect privacy, such as extending privacy protections internationally, strengthening international mechanisms of privacy protection, and hybrid arrangements which involve increasing accountability requirements for public-private actor relationships.Less
This chapter examines global governance mechanisms designed to protect citizens’ privacy rights, with special emphasis on the relationship between the United States and the European Union (EU) and their very different approaches to the issue. It argues that power relations are central to the transatlantic accommodation that has been reached, and to the EU’s efforts to push third-party countries toward higher levels of privacy protection. It also suggests that privacy regulation has always had a strong international component, but that the causal impact of international factors is likely to depend on two key intervening variables: existing national institutional traditions and state bargaining power. It then offers policy recommendations on how to protect privacy, such as extending privacy protections internationally, strengthening international mechanisms of privacy protection, and hybrid arrangements which involve increasing accountability requirements for public-private actor relationships.