Regulation by Design: Reshaping the Relationship between Technology Development and Law

In a rapidly evolving world shaped by technological innovation, traditional regulatory frameworks—based on reactive oversight or static rule-making—often lag behind the pace of change and fail to ensure policy goals. One emerging solution to this challenge is the concept of regulation by design, an approach that embeds regulatory principles into the design, development, and deployment of technologies from the very outset. Regulation by design offers a way to embed ethical standards, safety protocols, privacy protections, and environmental considerations into the very fabric of technological creation. After an overview of the different meanings in which the term design is used in the legal field, the chapter investigates foundations, effects, and purposes of regulation by design, pros and cons of technological normativity, and delegation of legislative power to technology. The chapter shall also analyze its application in various sectors, ranging from data protection to the regulation of platform economy and green transition