This research aims to unpack how digital technologies can facilitate the flourishing of circular business practices in small- and medium-sized enterprises by structuring a detailed going circular path that explains businesses’ evolution toward circularity. In doing so, it outlines how the observed organizations have adopted – or are adopting – circular economy principles thanks to business digitalization. Following an inductive approach based on a multiple case study methodology, we investigated 16 small- and medium-sized enterprises operating in industries that put considerable pressure on the environment (e.g., manufacturing, chemical, construction, fashion, food, and beverage). Our findings confirm how digital technologies, as well as Industry 4.0 structures, play a fundamental role in shaping, enabling, enhancing, and refining circular products and processes development. Accordingly, we outline a generalizable step-by-step process to pursue circular economy by employing digital technologies. The present study represents a practical handout for guiding companies through their going circular path.

Rapid and radical digitalization and the “fourth industrial revolution” are generally associated with progress, but also pose significant risks to privacy rights and democracy. This article proposes a public law reading of the South African Constitution to respond to the dangers posed by disruptive technological change, in light of the constitution's rights-orientated and rule-of-law-centred approach to interpreting the right to privacy. It examines the legal resources available in the South African legal system and, specifically, its constitution. The article emphasizes the way South African privacy jurisprudence infuses the right to privacy with the value of dignity, and how this allows an interpretation that sees privacy as a public, as well as private, right. The article concludes that this rights jurisprudence, alongside the constitutional principles of proportionality, subsidiarity and supremacy, has established a working foundation to articulate the right to privacy in a way that is suitable in the digital age.

The unprecedented suspension of cultural events across Europe in March 2020 had a profound impact on the performing arts. Alongside the proliferation of digital and hybrid modes of theatre-making, the Covid-19 pandemic has also precipitated a substantive shift in how theatres operate at both institutional and organizational levels in an attempt to respond to the volatile economic impact of the pandemic on the culture sector. This has provided a decisive moment for the reinterpretation of the theatre landscape, raising fundamental questions relating to institutional transformation that challenge precarious working models and entrenched hierarchical divides. Drawing on wider transnational research as part of the ‘Theatre after Covid’ project, this article examines the institutional effects of the pandemic on theatre and performance in the United Kingdom and the German-speaking countries. It details the findings of a wide-ranging survey conducted in 2022 with theatre workers and organizations that address how the industry is adapting and transforming in response to the crisis. Using this new data as a starting point, it analyzes how new forms of artistic innovation have emerged during Covid-19. By focusing on these institutional and aesthetic developments, the article argues that the pandemic has produced a paradigm shift that has crucially reinscribed how theatre is created, programmed, and understood.

Globalization and robotics (globotics) are jointly transforming the world economy at an explosive pace. While much of the literature has focused on rich nations, the changes are quite likely to affect developing nations in important ways. The premise of the paper – which should be regarded as a thought-piece – is based on an extreme thought experiment. What does development look like when digital technology has rendered manufacturing jobless and many services freely traded? Our conclusion is that the service-led development path may become the norm rather than the exception; think India, not China. Since success in the service sector is based on quite different factors than success in manufacturing, development strategies and mindsets may have to change. This is an optimistic conclusion since it suggests that developing nations can directly export the source of their comparative advantage – low-cost labour – without having first to make goods with that labour.

In almost every country, government is the largest buyer of works, goods, and services from the private sector. Through the laws and practice of public procurement, governments create competition among firms, thus optimizing public expenditure. However, public procurement is often associated with inefficient allocation of resources and corruption. One method to reduce inefficiencies and abuse in public procurement is the use of e-government procurement (e-GP) platforms. Yet nearly 40% of countries—mostly low- and lower-middle income countries—do not have functioning e-GP platforms. Cost–benefit analysis is used to make the investment case for the development and integration of e-procurement systems in low- and lower middle-income countries. The costs of setting up an e- GP system include an initial investment of $9.03 million, on average, for the planning, design, and build phases spread over a 5-year period. Annual operating and maintenance expenses during pilot and deployment phases are estimated at $1.1 million annually. In total, it is estimated that the net present value of costs to design, build, test, deploy, and operate a robust e-GP system is $16.7 million for a typical low- and middle-income country (at an 8% discount rate). While there are many tangible benefits of e-GP, the benefit assessed here is the reduction in the prices of goods, works, and services paid by government buyers. Using the average percentage reduction in procurement prices of 6.75%, the savings from an e-procurement system are valued at $637.9 million and $5.2 billion for low- and lower middle-income countries, respectively. The benefit–cost ratio of implementing an e-GP system in the average low-income country ranges from 8 to 58 and is 142 to 473 for a lower middle-income country. The size of the procurement market, the reduction in procurement prices, the duration of the implementation process, and the penetration rate of e-GP throughout government are principal determinants in the return on investment.

Meta, formerly the Facebook Company, faces immense pressure from users, governments, and civil society to act transparently and with accountability. Responding to such calls, in 2018, it announced plans to create an independent oversight body to review content decisions. Such a forum is now in place in the form of the Oversight Board. To Meta’s credit, the speed at which the Oversight Board has been established is remarkable. Within two years, a global consultation process was completed with input obtained from users as well as experts, the regulatory infrastructure for the Oversight Board built, its members selected, and the first decisions of the Board already rendered in January 2021. With its institutional structure in place, and plenty of resources to tap into, the Oversight Board could have a real effect on how some transnational disputes are resolved. Thus, the Oversight Board may very well be setting the direction for how tech companies in particular, and multinational corporations in general, go about providing grievance mechanisms to individuals who their actions adversely affect. Through a study of the Oversight Board, this article considers whether we are witnessing the birth of a special type of “transnational hybrid adjudication” that could have a systemic impact on international law, or an experiment with limited relevance.

The Article explores the transformations triggered by digitalization in the domain of global trade law and seeks to evaluate the nature and the effects of the unfolding legal adaptation in this field of international law. For this purpose, the Article starts by mapping the sweeping effects of digitalization on trade and trade policies. It then turns to the current regulatory framework for digital trade—first, by sketching the state of affairs in the multilateral forum of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and second, by analyzing the more deliberate regulatory responses to the challenge of digitalization formulated in free trade agreements (FTAs), with a particular focus on some more recent advanced models of digital trade regulation. The Article finally seeks to contextualize and assess the impact of the existing legal framework and its adequacy for the contemporary data-driven economy, pointing also at some current deficiencies and potential setbacks going forward.

The article provides a meta-analysis of the structural impact of digitalization on international law. It synthesizes the contributions of this special issue, showing how their findings are interrelated and which cross-cutting trends we can observe. It uses an analytical framework designed to assess structural changes in international law by analyzing the impact that digitalization has on key reference points: Actors, norms, and values. From this assessment, it draws the conclusion that digitalization is changing, and will continue to change structural features of international law.

This article explores the systemic impact of digitalization on the use of force regime. It identifies two types of impact: (i) legal uncertainty; and (ii) the replacement of international law. The article discusses legal uncertainty in relation to the content of the rules on the use of force and their application to digital uses of force as well as in relation to the facts that underpin digital uses of force. It then goes on to discuss the replacement of international law as a regulatory tool of the use of force by considering the impact of digitalization on the creation of customary law, legal personhood, and international law’s regulatory modality. The article’s findings are not limited to the impact of digitalization on the use of force regime but extend to international law in general.

Does digitalization reduce corruption? What are the integrity benefits of government digitalization? While the correlation between digitalization and corruption is well established, there is less actionable evidence on the integrity dividends of specific digitalization reforms on different types of corruption and the policy channels through which they operate. These linkages are especially relevant in high corruption risk environments. This article unbundles the integrity dividends of digital reforms undertaken by governments around the world, accelerated by the pandemic. It analyzes the rise of data-driven integrity analytics as promising tools in the anticorruption space deployed by tech-savvy integrity actors. It also assesses the broader integrity benefits of the digitalization of government services and the automation of bureaucratic processes, which contribute to reducing bribe solicitation risks by front-office bureaucrats. It analyzes in particular the impact of digitalization on social transfers. It argues that government digitalization can be an implicit yet effective anticorruption strategy, with subtler yet deeper effects, but there needs to be greater synergies between digital reforms and anticorruption strategies.

Although research has shown that business model innovation (BMI) is an effective means to remain competitive in the digital age, many firms do not respond appropriately and often fail to exploit new digital opportunities. In this study, we adopt a microfoundational approach to understand the role and effects of dynamic capabilities (DCs) on BMI in the context of digitalization. Furthermore, we test how this relationship is influenced by contextual factors. Our results from a survey of German manufacturing firms demonstrate the importance of building strong DCs for effective BMI in the context of digitalization. We also highlight the advantages of an entrepreneurial leadership and mindset in this context. The study further suggests that environmental turbulence in the digital context acts as an antecedent to DCs and BMI, rather than moderating their relationship. While strategic factors indirectly affect BMI as antecedents of DCs, we found no evidence of an influence of the organizational structure.