Polity Atlas
05 · Future Observatory

Watching society transform

Research, technology shifts, AI governance, post-labour economics and digital statehood — each item tagged with its status and the claims it changes.

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2025-02-02NewsEU AI Act: bans on 'unacceptable-risk' AI start to applyFrom 2 February 2025 the prohibited practices in Article 5 of the EU AI Act, and its AI-literacy duty, apply. Social scoring, untargeted scraping of facial images and most emotion recognition at work and in education are banned; fines for breaches became applicable in August 2025.Official Journal of the European UnionEstablished2024-12-17BriefingUK makes algorithm transparency records mandatory for central governmentThe UK's Algorithmic Transparency Recording Standard was mandated across government departments in February 2024; a scope and exemptions policy published on 17 December 2024 defines which bodies and tools must publish records.Established2024-09-05NewsFirst binding international treaty on AI opens for signatureThe Council of Europe Framework Convention on Artificial Intelligence and Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law opened for signature on 5 September 2024 in Vilnius.Council of EuropeEstablished2024-08-01NewsEU AI Act enters into forceRegulation (EU) 2024/1689 entered into force on 1 August 2024. Many public-sector uses of AI, including in access to public benefits and the administration of justice, are classed as high-risk.Official Journal of the European UnionEstablished2023-12-07NewsEU court: an automated credit score can itself be an 'automated decision'In SCHUFA (C-634/21), decided on 7 December 2023, the Court of Justice held that an automated score can fall under GDPR Article 22 when a third party draws strongly on it for a contract decision.Court of Justice of the European UnionEstablished2023-07-07ResearchRobodebt: what a Royal Commission found about automated debt-raisingAustralia's Royal Commission into the Robodebt Scheme reported in July 2023 on a welfare-debt programme that relied on averaging annual income data.Established