The new balance between data circulation and data protection in the Digital Single Market

This article examines the profound transformation of the European Union’s approach to data regulation, arguing that the shift from a purely protective model toward a governance-based framework centred on regulated data circulation has acquired constitutional significance. While EU data law was initially built around personal data protection as a defensive fundamental right, contemporary digital societies—shaped by platformisation and artificial intelligence—require a model that also enables the responsible use and sharing of data as a condition for the effective exercise of rights.

Through a constitutional analysis of EU data legislation, the article reconstructs the evolution from Directive 95/46/EC and the GDPR to the more recent regulatory package, including the Data Governance Act, the Data Act, the European Health Data Space, and the Artificial Intelligence Act. These instruments collectively mark a paradigm shift: data circulation, including the circulation of personal and sensitive data under strict safeguards, is no longer treated merely as an economic tool, but as a structural requirement for innovation, social welfare, and the realisation of fundamental rights.

The article argues that in key domains such as healthcare, education, mobility, social security, and justice, access to and interoperability of data are indispensable for ensuring substantive equality, solidarity, and effective citizenship. Regulated data circulation thus emerges as a constitutional necessity, closely linked to dignity, autonomy, democratic participation, and judicial protection.

Ultimately, the European Union is portrayed as a constitutional actor in the digital sphere, moving beyond the traditional opposition between data protection and data free flow. By framing data circulation as a precondition for the effective enjoyment of rights, EU law contributes to a new “constitutional grammar” of data and to a de facto process of European constitutional integration in the digital age.