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Jun 2025
As Denmark takes over the EU Council Presidency, digital sovereignty is rising to the top of Europe’s agenda. In this context, we spoke with Caroline Stage, Denmark’s Minister for Digital Affairs, about how open-source solutions, interoperability, and European cooperation can strengthen digital resilience – and why bold decisions are needed now to reduce dependency and build a sovereign digital future.
What motivated the Ministry of Digital Affairs to test open source system, and how does this decision reflect Denmark’s broader vision for European digital sovereignty and strategic resilience?
Digital sovereignty has only become more important during my time as minister. In a world of trade tensions, geopolitical uncertainty, and rising license costs, it’s clear that we can’t just talk about digital independence – we have to start acting on it. Therefore, we chose to test open-source solutions because we believe it's time to walk the talk. If we want more openness, flexibility and control in our digital infrastructure, we need to take the first steps ourselves – and learn from them. It’s a long-term journey, but we need to start now: test what works and what doesn’t. And yes, it takes courage to change habits that have shaped our systems for decades. But this is a strategic priority. We need to reduce our dependency on a few global providers and ensure that Europe can shape its own digital future.
How do you see the role of open-source software in strengthening transparency, data control, and long-term resilience in public institutions?
Open-source solutions are one of several important approaches when we talk about digital sovereignty. It’s not realistic – or even desirable – to cut ourselves off completely. But it is both necessary and realistic to reduce our dependence on a handful of tech giants. This isn’t about isolation – it’s about creating more alternatives and better competition.
And we need to explore how open-source systems can enhance transparency, control and resilience in the public sector. Last year, all political parties in Denmark agreed to launch a review of how open source is used in the public sector, and what it takes to promote its use more broadly. Once that work is completed later this year, I look forward to discussing the results with the Danish Parliament. We need to ensure that public authorities have real choices – and are not locked into a single vendor’s ecosystem.
How could stronger EU legislation on interoperability support competition and innovation, especially in challenging the dominance of major tech platforms?
When we push for stronger interoperability rules in the EU, it’s really about making sure that digital systems can work together, regardless of who built them. That gives both public authorities and businesses the freedom to choose the solutions that suit them best. It also supports fairer competition and helps reduce Europe’s dependency on just a few dominant platforms. That is also why we explore the opportunities in open source.
As Denmark prepares for its upcoming EU Council Presidency, how do you hope to influence the European agenda on digital sovereignty?
Our goal is to set a clear, shared direction for Europe: to stand stronger on our own, become more competitive, and reduce our dependency on a few dominant tech providers.
That means creating clear and fair rules across the EU – not rules that put European innovators at a disadvantage, but ones that reflect our values and demand openness, transparency and trust. This is a long-term effort, and Denmark can’t do it alone. That’s why we need Europe to move together toward a more sovereign and resilient digital future.
If Europe wants to set the standards for others, we can’t just write the rules – we have to build the game too.
This Q&A was published in an edition of Decoding, our monthly briefing on the latest trends in government technology. Read the issue in full here.
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