The European Court of Justice, the E.U. Supreme Court, ruled
on May 13, 2014 that Google must defer to the right of users to have links
about themselves deleted. Google’s management had sought to obviate any
obligation to act on such requests. The
New York Times points out that the decision indicates “that such companies
must operate in a fundamentally different way than they do in the United
States.”[1]
The ring of fundamentality has implications for the international strategies of
internet companies and affords us a better look at how business plays out in
society differently in different societies.
Depending on the impact of cultural differences between a
given company’s home and host markets impact the management of the company as a
whole, either a global (i.e., one-size-fits-all) or multidomestic (culture-specific
managements) international-business strategy is optimal. Although it might seem
that a “market-making” function like providing a search engine or social-media
medium would naturally fit the global approach to international strategy, the
impact of differing societal values bearing on relevant rights and obligations
can render the multi-domestic approach superior. The ECJ’s decision may push
Google’s management further in this direction—the root cause being the
differing power and attitude toward business in the E.U. and U.S.
Mina Andreeva, a spokesperson for the E.U. Government’s
executive branch, noted that the court’s decision switches the obligation from
users to the internet companies like Google and Facebook to prove that
user-data is still needed to be kept online. “Today, it’s up to consumers to
prove this, but this is not very easy or effective,” she said. “We have
reversed the burden of proof.”[2]
Put another way, consumers face the uphill battle in the U.S. whereas managers
do in the E.U. This difference reflects a basic, or fundamental, difference
societally in terms of how much business is valued in society.
Put in terms of a theorem, the more societal values reflect
or value the values that are held in the business sector, the more likely it is
that societal institutions place obligations on customers (or the general
public) and rights on companies. The case of Google suggests that the E.U. and
U.S. societies differ fundamentally in
the extent to which business values have stature as societal values.
1. James
Kanter and Mark Scott, “Google
Must Honor Requests to Delete Some Links, E.U. Court Says,” The New York Times, May 13, 2014.
2. Ibid.
