| Abstract [eng] |
This article aims to examine the concept of French digital sovereignty, as an outcome of France‘s grand strategy change, which affects France’s bilateral relations with China and United States. The main goals of this article are to identify the main objectives and principles of the current French grand strategy; to reveal France's grand strategy change taking place due to systemic changes and whose outcome is the new concept of digital sovereignty; to define the French concept of digital sovereignty – its origins, goals, main actors, implied dependencies, implementation instruments and problems associated with its implementation at the national and EU level; to reveal the manifestations of digital sovereignty in France's hedging strategy in relations with the United States and China. The article proceeds in three main parts – first the concept of grand strategy is presented, and the French case is described, identifying the grand strategy’s main objectives and values. In the second part, the evaluation of grand strategy change is conducted using Rebecca Lissner’s change model to assess whether digitization and new technologies as variable provoke a grand strategic change in France’s strategy. Then, the concept of digital sovereignty is analyzed by establishing the objectives, existing dependencies, instruments, actors, and problems it implies. In the final part France’s relations with its two main competitors in technology area are analyzed in order to explain ‘counteracting’ measures employed by France regarding the U.S. and China using hedging as a strategy. |
