Digitalising the Global Economy and the Future of State Sovereignty: Towards a Theory of Multi-layered Networked Sovereignty

Arghavani Pirsalami, Fariborz; Nejati, Farzin; Mahmoudi, Mohammad Sadegh

doi:10.48308/jep.2026.243112.1261

Digitalising the Global Economy and the Future of State Sovereignty: Towards a Theory of Multi-layered Networked Sovereignty

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Associate Professor, Department of Political Sciences, Faculty of Law and Political Sciences, Shiraz University, Shiraz, Iran.

² Ph.d Candidate in Political Sciences, Department of Political Sciences, Faculty of Law and Political Sciences, Shiraz University, Shiraz, Iran.

10.48308/jep.2026.243112.1261

Abstract

This article examines how the digitalisation of the global economy, particularly within the Fourth Industrial Revolution, reshapes the meaning and exercise of state sovereignty in international politics. It asks how sovereign authority is reorganised through digital infrastructures, cross-border data flows, platform governance, cloud systems, technical standards, and transnational regulatory networks. The article adopts a qualitative, conceptual, and descriptive-analytical approach informed by network theory, and synthesises debates on digital sovereignty, infrastructural power, platform authority, data governance, fiscal sovereignty, digital taxation, and networked interdependence. It argues that digitalisation neither eliminates sovereignty nor leaves its classical territorial model intact. Rather, sovereignty is reassembled as a multi-layered networked capacity operating across infrastructural, rules-and-institutions, and legitimacy layers. The analysis shows that digitalisation can strengthen state capacity through regulation, public service delivery, cybersecurity, taxation, and infrastructure-building, while deepening dependence on private platforms, foreign cloud providers, external standards, payment infrastructures, and cross-border data regimes. Effective sovereignty in the digital economy therefore depends on states’ ability to secure critical infrastructures, shape rules and standards, manage platform power, diversify strategic dependencies, and sustain legitimacy across domestic and international arenas while preserving accountability and rights in digital governance.

Keywords

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