Legal speed limits: Law and the diffusion of transformative technologies

• Department of Law

This event features a discussion with Nikita Divissenko (Utrecht University).

Abstract

This interdisciplinary project builds on innovation studies and diffusion literature to examine the role of law and regulation in the processes of innovation adoption and implementation across different sectors of the economy, and focuses on transformative technologies such as AI. The first part of the paper outlines the key features of the innovation diffusion process that can be impacted by legal norms and regulations. Building on Rogers' diffusion of innovation (DOI) theory, the paper explores the dynamic models of diffusion that emphasise the pace, malleability, and co-evolution of innovation within the diffusion process. The second part of the paper analyses the ways in which law and regulation interact with innovation diffusion. While, admittedly, ‘legal speed limits’ may reduce the pace of technological diffusion, they are also indispensable for governing socio-technical change. The paper delineates the instances where law prescribes the architecture within which the processes that enable diffusion occur, distinguishing between constraints that inadvertently slow down adoption of technology and its diffusion, and those institutional and policy aspects that ensure ‘legal speed limits' enable diffusion. The third part of the paper discusses the policy implications.

Speaker

Nikita Divissenko is an Assistant Professor in Law and Technology at the International and European Law (IER) Department of the Utrecht School of Law. He is also a researcher at the Utrecht Centre for Regulation and Enforcement in Europe (RENFORCE) and the research platform Interdisciplinary Studies on Data, AI and Law (DAI). Nikita is the author of Regulating Innovation in the Digital Age: A Demand-Centred Toolbox for the Data-Driven Economy (Hart Publishing, 2025). Nikita obtained his PhD from the European University Institute (EUI) in 2022, and prior to joining Utrecht University, he was a research associate at the Florence School of Banking & Finance (Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies).