The age of digitization : did the European Union’s regulation of the digital single market impact Malta becoming the ‘Blockchain Island’?

Abstract

We are moving into a new technological revolution (i.e. a 4th Industrial Revolution) that seeks to transform the world, how we live and relate with one another. This revolution of digitization, since the internet, is seen to continue with blockchain technology by numerous states, corporations, and citizens. This dissertation aims to provide further insight into this revolution, where so little has been written on the topic, especially in the case of Europe and the European Union in particular as a focus continent for this study by using the theory of multi-level governance, combined with the concept of polycentric coregulation. The EU’s interest in this innovative technology began as a reaction to its Digital Single Market Strategy (2015) as a partial route to its achievement, and has since 2016 shown great interest and effort in seeking to regulate the technology and create a sustainable data economy and marketplace of 500 million individuals. Various primary and secondary sources, as well as interviews with six participants, aim to highlight the interest, development and impact of the EU with regards to blockchain and its member states, taking Malta as the primary case study for this dissertation due to the recent adoption of its blockchain laws in July, 2018, as well as due to the fact that Malta lacks any focus in the literature available on the topic of blockchain technology and has not seen any focus from the EU in any statements so far. This may be due to the indirect links in the EU impacting Malta’s regulation of blockchain, which is the result of the study, and has produced recommendations into further research on the space opened by the EU to regulate blockchain, as well as observing the underlying causes for the EU’s interest, be they of an internal or external cause.