The Role of Privacy in Forming the European Union's Normative Power through Regulation

The question of privacy has long been an integral part of the debate on human rights and fundamental values, which national governments should ensure. The rapid technological development of last decades brought the topic of privacy protection even more to display mainly because of the rising digital economy and new challenges that are connect with it. This thesis discusses the role of privacy, as a fundamental right, in forming the European Union's role as a global power, specifically, the thesis builds on two theories: The Normative Power Europe and The Brussels Effect. Digital economy of the European Union has been growing exponentially over the last two decades. Given the increased importance of the digital economy since the 1990s the European Union started to gradually implement laws to regulate the flow of the personal data online. These new regulations often had influence on global markets and big tech companies operating on the European single market but residing outside of Europe. Apart from analyzing the development of the European data protection laws, and the role that was played by the European Courts in forming the European global power, the thesis overviews the debate surrounding the incentives to introduce new regulations to protect the right private life of European citizens