The Idea

GovLoss is Giacomo Tagiuri's ERC Starting Grant project, The Governance of Loss in the European Union. In his own words, from two interviews with UvA:

"The project is motivated by the observation that interrelated processes of economic transformation (globalization; technological change, including digitization and AI; and climate change, including efforts to mitigate it) generate intense loss in our societies."

"When I use the word 'losers' I seek to describe those who lose out in economic transformation: the businesses and workers who rely on an economic arrangement that becomes outdated."

"I'm Italian. When you drive across Italy, you see the negative effects in small towns. A small supermarket closes, and it's not just someone losing their business, but there is also a collective loss: people no longer have easy access to a shop and the meaningful experiences that come with it. These types of examples inspire me in terms of what the law can do to ease the blow."

"I theorize based on case studies from the primary (agriculture and fisheries), secondary (automotive) and tertiary sector (consumer services like commerce and tourism), so as to rely on a somewhat comprehensive representation of the economy."

"In agriculture and fisheries the effects of climate change and the green transition are most prominent; in the automotive industry, the effects of technological change (automation) and the green transition; in consumer services, I look at trade liberalization (EU induced liberalization) and digitization."

"As I hypothesize, strategies for governing loss emerge not only in the welfare state or labor law, but a much broader array of areas of the law and regulatory interventions: consumer and competition law; private law; market regulation; forms of participatory governance in administrative law, among others."

"The economy is not just about buying things: it is also about creating meaning."

Full interviews: ACES, Nov 2025 · UvA Faculty of Law, Sept 2025

The project is still taking shape. This page will be updated as the research develops.