As the world becomes increasingly interconnected, the rules and norms governing technology no longer remain confined to their jurisdictions of origin. Instead, they ripple outward, creating what scholars have labelled national and regional effects that reflect both governance philosophies and geopolitical ambitions. They represent the process of norm externalization—whereby regulations, standards, and governance approaches developed in one jurisdiction influence or are adopted by others, either through market mechanisms, deliberate policy diffusion, or in response to capacity constraints and power asymmetries.
These effects are not merely academic constructs, but powerful forces reshaping the global digital order: They enable mapping pathways of policy transfer across borders, and shed light on how external influences interact with domestic politics in regulatory outcomes. Further, norm externalization characterizes geopolitical influence and economic and technological leverage of exporting countries, and reveals normative alignments between socio-political systems that seek to adopt these governance models.
When the European Union (EU) implements stringent data protection standards through the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), companies worldwide often find it more efficient and cost-effective to apply these standards globally rather than maintain separate systems for each jurisdiction, as witnessed when Microsoft extended GDPR rights to all users worldwide. As China extends its Digital Silk Road (DSR) through infrastructure investments across the Majority World (e.g., the cross-border cable projects), its technological standards and governance approaches could be transferred to recipient countries. Similarly, as India develops and exports its digital public infrastructure (DPI), it exerts influence over other countries in the Majority World to adopt similar population-wide digital welfare schemes that are based on open-standards and operationalize interoperability.
The competition between different regulatory models is particularly consequential for countries in the Majority World, which find themselves navigating competing governance frameworks while attempting to assert their own digital sovereignty. As Majority World countries seek technological advancement, the regulatory governance they adopt increasingly reflects broader geopolitical alignments and values. Due to capacity constraints to undertake detailed studies on drafting and formulating tech regulation, when other jurisdictions with similar political or demographic systems create regulations, it becomes easier to find linkages and adopt them, either wholly or in modified form, rather than invest in developing local expertise. This policy learning takes various forms: some countries become adopters who largely import frameworks, others emerge as hybridizers who blend approaches, while a few act as innovators creating unique models. Countries may also align their laws with others to remain favorable for trade and geopolitical relationships. Moreover, formal capacity building programs—from the EU’s Digital4Development initiatives to technical assistance from international organizations—further facilitate learning and alignment.
While regulatory externalization has been well analyzed in the context of the EU, particularly through the well-established Brussels Effect, the enabling conditions and mechanisms of influence from two emerging global powers—China and India, representing a third of the global population—remain underexplored in global policy discourse. Moreover, different forms of norm externalization beyond adoption of formal regulatory standards are still insufficiently studied.
This essay seeks to address these gaps by examining the conditions and mechanisms through which the Beijing Effect and the Delhi Effect might manifest. First, the tech-developmental models embraced by both countries, which enable initiatives like China’s DSR and India’s DPI focusing on digital infrastructure, create demonstrable frameworks that address concrete development needs in recipient countries. Second, both China and India’s strategic positioning as sovereignty-centered alternatives challenging Global North dominance greatly aligns with many Majority World countries’ own aspirations. Third, shared history, cultural associations, and—particularly in the case of India and South and Southeast Asia—postcolonial resistance creates ideological alignment that facilitates norm adoption beyond mere technical considerations. Finally, the adaptive, non-binding implementation approaches in the Beijing Effect and the Delhi Effect offer greater flexibility and feasibility compared to the adoption of stringent regulatory standards, particularly valuable for countries with limited regulatory capacity.
By comparing these two effects with the Brussels Effect, the analysis reveals how different governance approaches translate into distinct pathways of norm externalization, with profound implications for whose values and priorities will shape the collective digital future, particularly in the Majority World.
