This is an overview article regarding artificial intelligence (AI) and its potential normative implications. Technology has always had inherent normative consequences not least due to AI and the use of algorithms. There is a crucial difference between algorithms in a technical sense and from a social-science perspective. It is a question of different orders of normativity—the first related to the algorithm as a technical instruction and the second to the consequences springing from the first order. I call these last-mentioned norms algo norms. These are embedded in the technology and determined by the design of the AI. The outcome is an empirical question. AI and algo norms are moving targets, which call for a novel scientific approach that relates to advanced practice. Law actualizes primarily for preventive reasons in relation to negative aspects of the new technology. No major regulatory scheme for AI exists. In the article, I point out some areas that raise the need for legal regulation. Finally, I comment on three main challenges for the digital development in relation to AI: (1) the energy costs; (2) the singularity point; and (3) the governance problems.

This article uses a socio-legal perspective to analyze the use of ethics guidelines as a governance tool in the development and use of artificial intelligence (AI). This has become a central policy area in several large jurisdictions, including China and Japan, as well as the EU, focused on here. Particular emphasis in this article is placed on the Ethics Guidelines for Trustworthy AI published by the EU Commission’s High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence in April 2019, as well as the White Paper on AI, published by the EU Commission in February 2020. The guidelines are reflected against partially overlapping and already-existing legislation as well as the ephemeral concept construct surrounding AI as such. The article concludes by pointing to (1) the challenges of a temporal discrepancy between technological and legal change, (2) the need for moving from principle to process in the governance of AI, and (3) the multidisciplinary needs in the study of contemporary applications of data-dependent AI.

The paths to digital justice focus on the challenges of contemporary digital societies in reaching automated decision-making processes through software, algorithms, and information technology without loss of its human quality and the guarantees of due process. In this context, this article reflects on the possibilities of establishing judicial robots in substitution for human judges, by examining whether artificial intelligence and algorithms may support judicial decision-making independently and without human supervision. The point of departure for this analysis comes from the experience of criminal justice systems with software for judgment of the possibility of recidivism of criminal defendants. Algorithmic decision-making may improve the public good in support of judicial decision-making, but the analysis of current technology and our standards for due process of law recommends caution on the conclusion that robots may replace human judges and satisfy our expectations for explainability and fairness in adjudication.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and law is an AI research area that has a history spanning more than 50 years. In the early stages, several legal-expert systems were developed. Legal-expert systems are tools designed to realize fair judgments in court. In addition to this research, as information and communication technologies and AI technologies have progressed, AI and law has broadened its view from legal-expert systems to legal analytics and, recently, a lot of machine-learning and text-processing techniques have been employed to analyze legal information. The research trends are the same in Japan as well and not only people involved with legal-expert systems, but also those involved with natural language processing as well as lawyers have become interested in AI and law. This report introduces the history of and the research activities on applying AI to the legal domain in Japan.

The newly established judicial-transparency platforms, like China Judgements Online, have provided access to a new resource—judicial big data—making it possible to conduct empirical, big-data-based legal research. However, as is often the case with new products, these platforms—China Judgements Online, in particular—pose a few problems for big-data-based legal research: insufficient academic depth; immature technical methods; and lack of innovation due to flawed data, strict technical thresholds, and lack of theoretical ambition and ability. In the future, big-data-based legal research should make use of current data resources, continue to promote statistical science and computer science in research, and apply small-data research methods, and in the meanwhile pay attention to the combination of data and theory.

The singularity of artificial intelligence (AI), which transcends human intelligence to play the role of God, is imminent. In this context, the Chinese judicial system has gained some latecomer advantage, with the help of information technology, the Internet, big data, cloud computing, and AI to improve the efficiency and transparency of case handling. The trial process has undergone extensive and profound qualitative mutations. This represents a challenge to the institutional arrangements of the modern rule of law. At this stage, we should adopt a cautious and prudent attitude towards the design and application of legal-expert systems as well as machine learning. Especially from the aspect of computer sentencing, it is even more necessary to avoid a rush for quick results, and there is no need to completely exclude the judge’s discretion and free evaluation of the evidence through inner conviction. The finality of the judicial power is destined to choose a correct final solution through a debate on the survival of the fittest mechanism. In the face of such a modern rule-of-law system, big data, cloud computing, information technology, and AI are just auxiliary means to achieve legal justice. It is impossible to put the cart before the horses. This is a basic principle that we should always bear in mind.

Due to their success in routine tasks such as voice recognition, image classification, and text processing, extensive attention has been aroused on how to use artificial intelligence (AI)-based automation tools in the judicial-trial process to improve efficiency. Meanwhile, judicial trial is a complex task that requires accurate insight and subtle analysis of the cases, law, and common knowledge. Applying the results provided by AI-based automation tools directly to the judicial-trial process is controversial due to their irregular logic and low accuracy. Based on this observation, this article investigates the logic underlined in judicial trials and the technical characteristics of AI, and proposes an AI-based semantic assist approach for judicial trials that is logical and transparent to the judges.

As the growing number of cases is draining the limited court resources in China, how to scientifically measure the reasonable saturated workload of judges has become an urgent issue. This issue is the prerequisite of other important topics such as determination of judges’ quotas, measurement of the actual workload of a trial team, performance evaluation of judges, and resource allocation within courts. Data-driven measurement of the actual workload of China’s judges depends on various factors such as local economic development, public transportation, case-load in the past, and staffing of assistant positions. Therefore, traditional approaches that depend only on a single element, such as cause of action, do not work well. We proposed a modelling framework based on big-data and machine-learning technology to more accurately measure the actual workload of judges. This framework extracts the core elements of judicial cases, assigns target workload to the cases based on feedback from judges and analyzing case samples to create a standard training dataset, and trains machine-learning models using the data. A preliminary case-weight calculation model is built using the framework. Besides, the model is continuously evaluated and improved by comparing its output with the actual demand in a court through methods such as sampling, questionnaires, and expert evaluation.

While online dispute resolution (ODR) and online courts have become a global phenomenon, China is unique in its way of constructing a “smart-courts” system. This paper argues that the Chinese smart courts are embedded in China’s larger strategy of capturing new opportunities offered by the information and communications technology (ICT) revolution. Adoption of cutting-edge ICT by courts is not an initiative taken by the courts themselves; rather, it is a call from the party-state with strong policy push. The paper also makes two observations on the nature of smart courts in China. One is that Chinese courts are using ICT, especially artificial intelligence, both to enhance hierarchical control and to improve the formal quality of law. Another is that the “Internet courts” are established to solve disputes arising from online transactions, rather than serve as piloting courts with general implications for the shape of future courts in China. Therefore, while boldly experimenting new technologies (such as blockchains) in the judicial process, Internet courts in China are also charged with the responsibility of developing legal doctrines in cases within their jurisdictions. The case of China thus shows the profound interaction between law and technology. Whether technology is disruptive depends on human design and efforts.

Conducting the research, finishing the final draft, and then reflecting on the research and writing processes, whether on a conference panel or in print, often feel like disjunctive exercises. By the time this series of commentaries is published, at least eight years would have passed since my first visit with LGBT rights activists of Myanmar. I have moved on to new projects and walked with other people in the field in other lands.

A new paradigmatic shift in confronting the climactic endgame of the Anthropocene in Asia is in order. Scientific studies warned that Asia would become the epicentre of anthropogenic catastrophes and environmental disasters in the world. As the outgoing Asian Law and Society Association (ALSA) president, I wish to contribute to critical discussions on two issues: (1) Earth Jurisprudence and (2) the Rights of Nature. These legal concepts must be critically examined, discussed, and developed by socio-legal researchers and policy-makers in order to avert the impending crises of the Anthropocene in Asia. This report examines the recent development of a robust movement toward Earth Jurisprudence in multiple countries of Asia, the Americas, and the Pacific—that is, countries that have recently enshrined the concept of the Rights of Nature into their legal system through transforming nature into rights-bearing entities in order to protect them from harmful human activities. Failing any significant remedial measures, many Asian cities, shores, and coastlines, including the archipelagos of multiple island states in the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean may soon disappear due to the many decades of egregious human activities of industrialized countries and the corporate world. A robust system of Earth Jurisprudence must be established, in which the Rights of Nature must be imbedded in the centre of legislative and constitutional discussions and deliberations.