Excited to join TUM Think Tank as a Fellow of Practice!

From today and in addition to my role for Axel Voss, I will be Fellow at the Think Tank of Hochschule für Politik München (Technical University of Munich) on a project titled: "EU Digital Policy Reloaded: Scrutinising the Past, Shaping the Future."

🎓 Excited to join TUM Think Tank as a Fellow of Practice!

From today and in addition to my role for Axel Voss, I will be Fellow at the Think Tank of Hochschule für Politik München (Technical University of Munich) on a project titled: "EU Digital Policy Reloaded: Scrutinising the Past, Shaping the Future."

The idea is simple, but ambitious: Taking a closer look on how the European Union has approached hashtag#digital hashtag#policy over the past decade, starting with José Manuel Barroso’s 'Digital Agenda' in 2010, over the 'Digital Single Market Strategy' under Jean-Claude Juncker in 2015, to the 'Digital Decade Program' in 2020 under Ursula von der Leyen. Despite good intentions and solid planning, the outcomes of those overarching strategies have fallen short. As the recent hashtag#Competitiveness hashtag#Report of Mario hashtag#Draghi rightly pointed out, Europe’s digital underperformance poses a serious threat to both our economic future as well as democratic resilience.

That is why the project will identify what has worked, what did not, and most importantly why. Together with the TUM Think Tank, I will be analysing official documents, interviewing stakeholders, and try to draw lessons from those past attempts to accelerate the EU’s hashtag#digital hashtag#transformation. The project will then apply those general findings to a concrete case: the General Data Protection Regulation (hashtag#GDPR). We will assess how the role of 'data protection' has changed from strategy to strategy but also how effective the law did protect our citizens’ privacy over time and how it affected EU companies. Does the recent GDPR reform initiative presented by MEP Voss and Max Schrems maybe represent a superior type of context-driven regulation or should future EU laws look completely different?

After my studies in 2014, I was “done” with readings, essays, and deadlines and thinking I would leave academia for good 😃 Fast forward to 2025: I am back and super grateful TUM Think Tank for offering my this great opportunity to step back, reflect, and work on new ways to regulate the digital field. What makes me very excited is also to become part of the impressive digital ecosystem in hashtag#Munich that is connecting so well the public sector, industry, civil society and research in the region and far beyond. 

We will of course share our progress along the way and offer you many chances to voice your feedback, ideas, and challenges! Let’s work together to ensure that EU digital policy becomes more hashtag#futureproof, hashtag#effective, hashtag#innovationfriendly, and firmly rooted in hashtag#evidence. In today’s complex geopolitical environment, this mission seems to be more important than ever.

Many thanks to Markus B. Siewert, Boris Paal, Urs Gasser for the invitation as well as Axel Voss and the EP administration for approving the fellowship!

More info here.