This book provides a current analysis of how legal norms, economic power, and technological transformation interact to reshape regulatory frameworks in a rapidly evolving global order. It offers a coherent and interdisciplinary perspective on the tensions between compliance, sanction, and efficiency, highlighting how law both responds to and structures contemporary market dynamics.

At its core, the volume explores the evolving architecture of regulation at the intersection of international business law, economic governance, and technological innovation. The first part critically examines regulatory mechanisms governing markets, focusing on sanctions and counter-sanctions, labor standards within the WTO framework, the limits of EU worker protection directives, third-party litigation funding, and the effectiveness of criminal sanctions in combating tax evasion. These contributions reveal structural inconsistencies between formal compliance and actual enforcement, exposing how legal instruments can both enable and constrain economic actors in a fragmented global system.

The second part addresses the profound normative transformation driven by digitalisation and emerging technologies. It investigates the shift from traditional legal codes to algorithmic governance, the challenges of intellectual property in the age of AI-generated content, and the use of artificial intelligence in international arbitration. Further, it interrogates new legal dilemmas such as the right to disconnect in digital economies and the growing entanglement between climate security narratives and business law. Together, these analyses demonstrate how technological systems are not merely tools but active normative agents reshaping authority, accountability, and legal reasoning.

The book responds to a central problem: the increasing misalignment between traditional legal frameworks and the complex realities of globalised, digitised, and politically fragmented markets. By bridging doctrinal analysis with critical and transdisciplinary insights, it offers conceptual clarity and practical pathways for understanding regulatory effectiveness in contexts marked by uncertainty, power asymmetries, and rapid innovation.

This volume is intended for academics, researchers, policymakers, and advanced practitioners in international law, business law, economic regulation, and law and technology, as well as for those engaged in interdisciplinary studies of governance in the digital age.

Cătălin-Silviu Săraru is Professor Habilitated at the Faculty of Law, Bucharest University of Economic Studies, where he specializes in administrative law and comparative public law. He is an associate member of the Academy of Scientists in Romania, Head of the Doctoral School of Law at the Bucharest University of Economic Studies, arbitrator at the Vienna International Arbitral CentreCourt (VIAC), President of the Society of Juridical and Administrative Sciences and member in Société de législation comparée, Research Network on EU Administrative Law (ReNEUAL); organizer of numerous international conferences.

Cristina Elena Popa Tache is associate professor of public international law and communications and new technlogies law, Co-Chair in European Society of International Law - IG International Business and Human Rights, expert member in COST Actions-European Cooperation in Science and Technology and project member recommended by Institut national supérieur du professorat et de l’éducation de l’académie de Paris and Sorbonne Université. She is Dean of the Faculty of Law and International Governance at Danubius University in Galati, Romania. She continues to be a promoter of multi and transdisciplinarity in law, researcher promoter for international investment law in Romania and also scientific researcher at the International Center for Transdisciplinary Research (CIRET) Paris.

Maria Isabel Torres Cazorla is associate professor of Public International Law and International Relations (accredited to Full Professor), at the University of Málaga (Spain). She is Vice-dean of International Relations the Faculty of Law of the University of Málaga. During the years 2003-2006 she cooperated with the Special Rapporteur of the International Law Commission of the United Nations (Geneva, Switzerland), in order to enhance the codification and progressive development of the topic Unilateral Acts of States. She has been Editor in chief of the Spanish Yearbook of International Law (2009-2013). Former chair of the Interest Group of International Biolaw of the European Society of International Law, she has been visiting professor at the Universities of Paris-Nanterre (París), Università degli Studi di Urbino and Università degli Studi di Salerno, among others.

Corneliu Andy Pușcă is the President of Danubius University of Galați and President of the Board of Administration. Previously, he served as Rector of the institution. Dr Andy Pușcă is a member of the Advisory Board of AUAP (Association of Universities of Asia and the Pacific). He is also Vice-President of the American association AGAUC (Association for the Global Advancement of Universities and Colleges), President of HECSI (Higher Education Consortium for Social Innovation), and Vice-President of the Danubius Economic Consortium. Dr Andy Pușcă has served as a Lecturer at several prestigious higher education institutions, including SNSPA, the “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” Police Academy, and the National Institute of Magistracy. He currently holds the position of Associate Professor at the Faculty of Law of Danubius University of Galați.