Nathalie Smuha

Nathalie A. Smuha (PhD, LL.M.) is a legal scholar and philosopher at the KU Leuven Faculty of Law, where she examines legal and ethical questions around AI and other digital technologies. Her research focuses particularly on AI’s impact on human rights, democracy and the rule of law. She is the academic coordinator of the KU Leuven Summer School on the Law, Ethics and Policy of AI, and a member of the Leuven.AI Institute and the Digital Society Institute. She has also held visiting positions at New York University (2024), the University of Chicago (2023) and the University of Birmingham (2021). She is the author of Algorithmic Rule By Law: How Algorithmic Regulation in the Public Sector Erodes the Rule of Law (Cambridge University Press, 2024).

Besides her academic activities, she regularly advises governments and international organizations on AI policy. She worked at the European Commission, where she coordinated the work of the European Commission’s High-Level Expert Group on AI. She was also scientific expert in the Council of Europe’s (Ad Hoc) Committee on AI, launched several policy initiatives as part of AI4Belgium’s Ethics & Law Working Group, and is part of the OECD’s Network of Experts on AI. Previously, she also worked as a lawyer in private practice, being a qualified attorney at the Brussels and the New York Bar.