Law and Technology: A Methodical Approach

by Ryan Calo

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 A Methodical Approach offers a defensible and consistent approach to the legal analysis of technology, one capable of navigating technologyâs 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.

180 pages, Paperback

Published November 30, 2025