Jason G. Allen (Singapore Management University – Centre for Digital Law; CCAF) and Florian Gamper (Singapore Management University – Yong Pung How School of Law; Maastricht University – Faculty of Law) have posted Artificial Intelligence, Liability and Agency on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
This paper examines how artificial intelligence (AI) technologies intersect with traditional legal frameworks governing liability, legal personality, and public law accountability. Rejecting proposals to grant AI systems legal personality as well as the simplistic view of AI as “mere tools,” the authors propose a four-part conceptual framework—artifactuality, affordance, agentivity, and attribution—to analyse machine behaviour without untethering responsibility from human control.
The authors argue that liability must ultimately attach to natural or legal persons, evaluating how features such as autonomy, opacity, and unpredictability impact both fault-based and strict liability regimes. Through a multi-dimensional matrix, they illustrate how varying degrees of transparency, supervision, and predictability dictate appropriate legal responses—ranging from conventional fault-based liability to strict liability and regulatory prohibitions.
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