Book Review: Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence and the Law

Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence and the Law, edited by Henrique Sousa Antunes, Pedro Miguel Freitas, Arlindo L. Oliveira, Clara Martins Pereira, Elsa Vaz de Sequeira, and Luís Barreto Xavier, is a substantial and highly relevant contribution to the growing field of AI and law. Published by Springer in 2024 as part of the Law, Governance and Technology Series and  brings together scholars from law, computer science, ethics, medicine, philosophy, and technology to examine how artificial intelligence is changing society and how legal systems can respond to these changes. 

The central strength of the book is its genuinely multidisciplinary approach. Rather than treating AI as simply a legal problem, the editors recognize that effective AI regulation requires an understanding of the technology itself, its social consequences, ethical questions, and the institutions through which it is deployed. The book therefore begins with the technological and societal development of AI before moving into ethical and legal challenges and, finally, questions of law, governance, and regulation. This structure allows the reader to understand why legal systems are facing new challenges as AI becomes increasingly integrated into everyday life. 

The first section provides useful technological and social foundations. It includes discussions of the history and state of AI, language technologies in the legal domain, recommendation systems, healthcare applications, security, and privacy. This is particularly useful because many discussions of AI regulation assume that readers already understand the technology. By explaining some of the underlying developments and their social implications, the book provides a foundation for understanding why particular legal problems arise. The discussion of language technologies is especially relevant given the rapid growth of generative AI and large language models.

The second section, dealing with ethical and legal challenges, is arguably the most important part of the book. It considers autonomous robots, AI recommendation systems, accountability, legal personhood, medical decision-making, and liability. The chapter on “Metacognition, Accountability and Legal Personhood of AI” raises one of the most fundamental questions in AI law: whether increasingly sophisticated AI systems could ever be considered accountable or possess some form of legal personhood. The authors explore the difficulty of assigning responsibility when an AI system performs actions that have significant consequences for human beings. 

The book's discussion of AI in medicine is another major strength. Several chapters examine AI-assisted medical decision-making, autonomous AI physicians, patient consent, algorithmic opacity, and medical liability. These issues demonstrate the practical consequences of AI law particularly clearly. If an AI system contributes to a medical decision that harms a patient, for example, determining responsibility may involve the physician, hospital, software developer, manufacturer, or another actor. The book therefore illustrates why traditional legal concepts of responsibility may need to adapt to complex AI systems.

The final section focuses directly on law, governance, and regulation. It examines AI and European law, AI-supported judicial reasoning, judicial decision-making, and liability for AI-driven systems. The chapter on judicial decision-making is particularly significant because it addresses the possibility of using AI in courts and criminal justice. AI systems can potentially improve efficiency and consistency, but their use also raises serious concerns about bias, transparency, due process, and the preservation of human judgment. 

One of the book's most important contributions is therefore its recognition that AI governance cannot be reduced to technological regulation. Questions of accountability, privacy, human rights, legal responsibility, and social justice must be considered alongside innovation. The book demonstrates that law has an important role in determining not only what AI systems are permitted to do, but also what standards developers, companies, governments, and users should follow when deploying them. This makes the book particularly useful for researchers examining AI governance and responsible innovation.

There are, however, some limitations. Because it is an edited collection, the chapters differ considerably in subject, methodology, and depth. Readers looking for one unified theory of AI law may find the book somewhat fragmented. Furthermore, although published in 2024, several of its chapters were first made available online in December 2023, meaning that some discussions predate the rapid development of generative AI following the widespread adoption of ChatGPT. Consequently, the book should be supplemented with newer literature concerning generative AI, foundation models, deepfakes, and the most recent AI legislation.

Overall, Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Artificial Intelligence and the Law is an excellent academic resource for understanding the relationship between AI and contemporary legal systems. Its greatest strength is its ability to connect technological development with ethics, law, governance, accountability, privacy, healthcare, and human decision-making.

Download the complete book — Springer Open Access