Framing the Artificial Intelligence Threat : Institutional Discourse and the Securitization of Digital Policymaking in the European Union

Sammanfattning

With Artificial Intelligence’s growing significance in every sector of life, the struggle between regulation and innovation becomes evident in the EU’s institutional discourse around the Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA). Existing studies have identified the EU as a normative power; however, its digital agenda suggests that geopolitical motivations outweigh normative ones in digital policymaking. This thesis is concerned with official EU narratives that aim to legitimize the AIA by constructing threat scenarios following a securitization logic. A mixed-methods approach combines Reflexive Thematic Analysis (RTA) and Speech Act Analysis (SAA) to examine speech acts by EU officials concerning the AIA and parts of the more recent Digital Omnibus process (DOB). Two prominent threat constructions have been found that follow the logic of securitization to legitimize EU AI policies. The first is a traditional security threat to EU citizens emanating from the harmful use of AI technologies. The second threat scenario is constructed more unconventionally as a competitive economic threat, identifying a threat by foreign powers dominating the AI race and increasing the EU's dependence on foreign technologies. This thesis reframes the use of securitization theory in International Relations to be adapted to supranational actors like the EU.