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Artificial intelligence and legal disruption: a new model for analysis
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Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly expected to disrupt the ordinary functioning of society. From how we fight wars or govern society, to how we work and play, and from how we create to how we teach and learn, there is almost no field of human activity which is believed to be entirely immune from the impact of this emerging technology. This poses a multifaceted problem when it comes to designing and understanding regulatory responses to AI. This article aims to: (i) defend the need for a novel conceptual model for understanding the systemic legal disruption caused by new technologies such as AI; (ii) to situate this model in relation to preceding debates about the interaction of regulation with new technologies (particularly the ‘cyberlaw’ and ‘robolaw’ debates); and (iii) to set out a detailed model for understanding the legal disruption precipitated by AI, examining both pathways stemming from new affordances that can give rise to a regulatory ‘disruptive moment’, as well as the Legal Development, Displacement or Destruction that can ensue. The article proposes that this model of legal disruption can be broadly generalisable to understanding the legal effects and challenges of other emerging technologies.
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ADM causes disruption to administrative and constitutional law that would allow deeper re-thinking of suitable control mechanisms.
“the disruption that ADM causes to the administrative and constitutional law would allow even deeper re-thinking of suitable control mechanisms (Liu et al. 2020).”
From Just accountability structures – a way to promote the safe use of automated decision-making in the public sector (2024) · cites this paper as Liu et al. 2020
Section 6 says AI-related legal disruption can prompt a re-evaluation of existing law, and section 2 argues against merely reactive regulation. The paper does not specifically say that automated decision-making disrupts administrative and constitutional law or identify suitable control mechanisms for those fields. (LLM, conf=0.84)
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredThe U.N. High-Level Advisory Body on AI published its interim report titled 'Governing AI for Humanity' in December 2023.
“In December 2023, the U.N. High-Level Advisory Body on AI published its interim report titled 'Governing AI for Humanity.' 10”
From Responsibility in the Field of Artificial Intelligence Systems Usage: Features of Private and Public Law Regulation (2025) · cites this paper as [10]
The Introduction discusses AI’s potential to disrupt law, and the concluding section discusses AI governance, but neither addresses the claimed report. Searches for “Governing AI for Humanity,” the U.N. High-Level Advisory Body, and December 2023 found no relevant passage in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.78)
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Research works printed but not linked: 9
- Harvard Journal of Law and Technology 209; See generally Gregory N Mandel, 'Legal Evolution in Response to Technological Change' in Roger Brownsword, Eloise Scotford and Karen Yeung (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Law, Regulation and Technology (Oxford University Press 2017) 233-234 http:// www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199680832.001.0001/oxfordhb-97801996808 32-e-45 (accessed 26 September 2018). 124 On the other hand, at least within the common law system, cases dealing with telegraphs or other out- moded forms of communication may nonetheless have continued relevance. In such cases, these laws might be only partially obsolescent. 125 cf. Maas, 'International Law Does Not Compute' (n 70) 42. 126 Of course, it is also an open question whether such 'dead letter' obsolescence truly requires categorical cessation or obsolescence of certain behaviour, or whether 'virtual' disappearance suffices. 127 cf. in the context of blasphemous libel, Jeremy Patrick, 'Not Dead, Just Sleeping: Canada's Prohibition on Blasphemous Libel as a Case Study in Obsolete Legislation' (2008) 41 · DOI
- U.B.C. Law Review 193. 128 cf. the discussion in Graham McBain, 'Abolishing Some Obsolete Common Law Crimes' (2009) 20 King's Law Journal 89. 129 Crootof, 'Jurisprudential Space Junk' (n 70). 146 Nikolaos Aletras and others, 'Predicting Judicial Decisions of the European Court of Human Rights: A Natural Language Processing Perspective' (2016) 2 PeerJ Computer Science e93;
- Masha Medvedeva, Michel Vols and Martijn Wieling, 'Judicial Decisions of the European Court of Human Rights: Looking Into the Crystal Ball' 24. 147 See for instance: Frank Pasquale and Glyn Cashwell, 'Four Futures of Legal Automation' (2015) 26 UCLA Law Review Discourse 23; Frank A Pasquale, 'A Rule of Persons, Not Machines: The Limits of Legal Auto- mation' (2019) 87 George Washington Law Review 1; Mireille Hildebrandt, 'Law As Computation in the Era of Artificial Legal Intelligence. Speaking Law to the Power of Statistics' (Social Science Research Network 2017) SSRN Scholarly Paper ID 2983045 https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=2983045 (accessed 9 July 2018). 148
- Rebecca Crootof, '"Cyborg Justice" and the Risk of Technological-Legal Lock-In' [2019] Columbia Law Review Forum https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=3464724 (accessed 18 November 2019). 149
- Woodrow Hartzog and others, 'Inefficiently Automated Law Enforcement' (2016) 2015 Michigan State Law Review 1763. 150
- Rogier Creemers, 'China's Social Credit System: An Evolving Practice of Control' (Social Science Research Network 2018) SSRN Scholarly Paper ID 3175792 https://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=3175792 (accessed 16 May 2018). 153
- Benjamin Alarie, 'The Path of the Law: Towards Legal Singularity' (2016) 66 University of Toronto Law Journal 443;
- Anthony J Casey and Anthony Niblett, 'Self-Driving Laws' (2016) 66 University of Toronto Law Journal 429;
- Anthony J Casey and Anthony Niblett, 'The Death of Rules and Standards' (2017) 92 Indiana Law Journal 1401. 154 See the discussion by Brian Sheppard, on how machine learning systems in legislation and adjudication, and specifically the trade-offs they may force between intelligibility and results, may lead us to reject concepts of legality that require critical officials (Hart), reason-based tests of legitimacy (Raz), or justifi- cation for coercion (Dworkin). Brian Sheppard, 'Warming up to Inscrutability: How Technology Could Challenge Our Concept of Law' (2018) 68 University of Toronto Law Journal 36. 155 Lessig, 'The New Chicago School' (n 31); Lessig, 'The Law of the Horse' (n 31). Notes on contributors Hin-Yan Liu is Associate Professor and Coordinator, Artificial Intelligence and Legal Disruption Research Group, Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen.
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Metadata
- Authors
- Liu, H.-Y., Maas, M., Danaher, J., Scarcella, L., Lexer, M., & Van Rompaey, L.
- Affiliations
- University of Copenhagen (DK)
- Ollscoil na Gaillimhe – University of Galway (IE)
- University of Graz (AT)
- Artificial Intelligence and Legal Disruption Research Group, Faculty of Law, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Corresponding author
- Liu, Hin-Yan
- Venue
- Law, Innovation and Technology
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2020-07-02
- Volume
- 12
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 205-258
- ISSN
- 1757-9961 (ISSN-L)
- 1757-997X
- OpenAlex
- W3091941851
- Cited by
- 62
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 8 · 2025: 14 · 2024: 9 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 10
- FWCI
- 50.69
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- Licence
- other-oa
- Locations
- Law Innovation and Technology (publishedVersion)
- Research at the University of Copenhagen (University of Copenhagen) (publishedVersion, other-oa)
- PhilPapers (PhilPapers Foundation) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Law › Digitalization, Law, and Regulation
- Social Sciences › Law › Artificial Intelligence in Law
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Ethics and Social Impacts of AI
- Keywords
- artificial intelligence, AI regulation, conceptual model, cyber law, emerging technologies, legal developments
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