Warwick Law School News

On 11 December 2025, Warwick Law School welcomed Professor Ryan Calo of the University of Washington School of Law to deliver an invited lecture on the challenges of regulating emerging technologies. This topic is explored in his new book, Law and Technology: A Methodical Approach (Oxford University Press, 2025). The online talk was held as part of the LA319/LA919 Regulation and Technology Governance module, which is led by Dr Svitlana Lebedenko.

Ryan Calo explains why technology is difficult to study, let alone regulate. While law is uniquely positioned to channel technology toward human flourishing, technology poses special challenges to law and governance, obscuring human will and responsibility, stalling regulatory action, and putting rights and values into constant defense. The consequences can be dire. The United States spent three decades without a plan for nuclear waste disposal and still lacks comprehensive privacy laws, many years into the information revolution. Law and technology as a field, meanwhile, has yet to cohere.

In light of these challenges, Law and Technology: A Methodical Approach offers a defensible and consistent approach to the legal analysis of technology, one capable of navigating technology’s capacity to confuse and confound. Ryan Calo puts forward a step-by-step methodology for thinking about and ultimately challenging technology to meet society’s demands. The book demonstrates that, no less than health law or law and economics, law and technology deserves a field of its own. To this end, it helps formalize legal analysis of physical and digital artifacts and systems, sowing the seeds for the concept of law and technology itself.

Ryan Calo is the Lane Powell and D. Wayne Gittinger Professor at the University of Washington School of Law, where he specializes in law and emerging technology. He holds joint and adjunct appointments across the university and is widely recognized for his scholarship on privacy, robotics, and artificial intelligence. His work has appeared in leading academic and technical publications, informed national policy through Senate testimony, and garnered media attention both nationally and internationally. A former law clerk and practicing attorney, Calo combines legal expertise with a strong interdisciplinary approach to technology policy.