In a speech delivered at the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Action Summit in Paris on February 10-11, US Vice President JD Vance called for AI discussions to be imbued with a "deregulatory flavor." A few months earlier, in November 2024, the president of the Paris region, President Valérie Pécresse (Les Républicains, right wing), rejoiced on X about the "axe-like" cuts to US federal bureaucracy announced by Elon Musk, in charge of "government efficiency." The deregulatory wind from America seems to be blowing across Europe. The principle that public power defines the rules of the game and ensures their implementation is being challenged.
Today, digital technology is shaping the regulation debate and highlighting the European Commission's ambiguities on the subject. Since the early 2000s, it has oscillated between a fascination with Big Tech and the imperative of reining in those major companies. On the one hand, the never-realized idea of the emergence of a "European Google" fueled the implementation of a "digital single market" project as early as 2012, under the highly liberal Commission presidency of José Manuel Barroso. On the other hand, European competition law has been used as an instrument of discipline, with a first fine of €497 million imposed on Microsoft in 2004.
The Commission eventually took the path of regulation, which saw an acceleration under President Ursula von der Leyen's first term [2019-2024], from the General Data Protection Regulation in 2016 to the Artificial Intelligence Regulation in 2024. Faced with the refusal of Musk (X) and Mark Zuckerberg (Meta) to comply with European legislation, the von der Leyen II Commission nevertheless seems to be responding with... less regulation. The institution has, as part of its simplification policy, withdrawn its draft directive on AI-related liability. And just after Vance's pro-deregulation speech, von der Leyen announced a €200 billion artificial intelligence investment plan.
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