While there are several workshops and conferences planned for 2023, and some (quickly outdated) chapters and articles in diverse outlets, there is limited accessible published work on Artificial Intelligence (AI) from the vantage point of International Economic Law (IEL). This book is an excellent attempt at filling that vacuum.
The volume is coherently organized around four axes of work. The first axis deals with the necessary readjustments to IEL trade and policy arising from systemic shifts in trade, from a product-service dichotomy to a data and AI-driven commerce across borders. The second explores how the WTO law acquis can tackle some AI-specific questions, specifically those within the scope of the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) and Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Agreement. The third inverts the optics and evaluates how existing IEL may limit or affect national regulations and policies on AI. The final three chapters look into the future on IEL in connection to AI, from the creation of dedicated instruments for data-driven trade (Henry Gao) to AI-assisted operationalization of AI (Lisa Toohey).
I did not open this review with the conventional point on its potential audience. The discipline is complex, and knowledge from other domains is not easily transferable. Further, AI regulation and policy have steep learning curves, and finding a readership for the book may be challenging. A general trade law expert with some exposure to digital trade would probably benefit from a thorough read of its 352 pages.
Yet, I believe the authors and editors have created an excellent resource for experts in other areas (data protection, data ethics, automated driving systems, intellectual property protection) to gain knowledge about their intersections with trade law and international trade policy. For this group of readers, I can only encourage them to read the brilliant introductory chapter signed by the editors, which offers a comprehensive overview of the AI-IEL questions and Gregory Shaffer's excellent framing piece in Chapter 2. Further, the editors have achieved significant consistency by avoiding a mere collation of diverse regional experiences.
Its forward-looking approach, the quality of the scholarship, and being openly accessible will likely make this book an influential contribution to the field in years to come. Perhaps its main shortcoming is the lack of translational capacity into policy, as there are limited solution-driven proposals in its chapters, with the notable exception being Zufall and Zingg's chapter on data portability (although very focused on the EU) and Gao's insightful but perhaps too ambitious defence of a new targeted instrument, mentioned above.
Overall, I can only invite AsianJIL readers to peruse the text and congratulate the editors, authors, and the Erasmus+ Programme for making it accessible to all. Regardless of their country of origin, state representatives to the WTO and other regional agreements now have immediate access to solid scholarship on a topic of exponentially increasing importance for their work.
Conflicting interests
The author declares none.
