Under the banner of “digital sovereignty,” significant investments are currently being directed toward digital infrastructure projects "made in Germany.” In this context, corporations are increasingly intervening in AI development, academia, and education, while invoking notions of national (digital) identity.
When tech corporations are criticised, attention typically centres on US giants such as Amazon, Google, Meta, Tesla, or Palantir. Yet Germany is pursuing a parallel trajectory. In response to geopolitical tensions and perceived authoritarian shifts, the EU and Germany are investing heavily in digital infrastructure framed as sovereignty projects: data centers, corporate subsidies, and deregulation.
The Schwarz Group, one of Germany’s largest retailers, illustrates this dynamic. It is building “sovereign” cloud infrastructure, investing in AI, funding academic positions, and operating its own educational campus. This reflects a broader politics of isolation, in which vertical integration enables corporations to extend control across multiple layers of production and governance. What is presented as sovereignty often reinforces dependence on corporate infrastructures.
But who, ultimately, becomes sovereign over what? This raises the question of socialisation: through which ownership structures can digital infrastructures be organized in ways that are accountable, democratic, and collectively shaped?
