Law into Code: EU Regulation of Digital Accountability Mechanisms for Responsible Business Conduct

Abstract

This article provides a legal analysis of digital mechanisms ensuring socially responsible business conduct in the context of economic digitalisation and the strengthening of regulatory requirements for sustainability, human rights, and environmental protection. It argues that contemporary digital technologies, such as algorithmic systems, digital ESG reporting, due diligence platforms, blockchain solutions, the Internet of Things, and platform accountability infrastructures, are no longer merely optional managerial tools. Instead, they increasingly acquire normative significance as integral components of compliance with legally binding obligations. The study applies a doctrinal, comparative, and functional methodology to examine digital mechanisms not only as technological solutions, but as functionally institutionalised forms of external control embedded in modern regulatory regimes. Particular attention is devoted to the regulatory framework of the European Union, including recent legal acts on corporate sustainability, due diligence, artificial intelligence, and digital services, which reflect a shift from ex post supervision towards preventive and continuous accountability implemented through digital infrastructures. The analysis demonstrates that digitalisation reshapes the functional structure of legal responsibility by transforming compliance into an ongoing, evidence-based, and technologically embedded process. The Ukrainian context is examined separately, with a focus on European integration and post-war recovery. The article identifies existing institutional preconditions for digital transparency in Ukraine, as well as systemic gaps hindering the formation of an integrated ecosystem of socially responsible business. It concludes that the integration of digital accountability mechanisms into legal regulation is a necessary condition for strengthening business responsibility, attracting sustainable investment, and aligning national regulatory frameworks with European Union standards.

Keywords: socially responsible management, sustainable development, legal regulation, business, supply chains, artificial intelligence, digital technologies (solutions), ESG, due diligence, blockchain.