In a technological world where the dominance of a few global players in the field of artificial intelligence seems almost absolute, Poland is trying to define its own path. A recent study by the Breakthrough Technologies Committee of the Polish Chamber of Information Technology and Telecommunications(PIIT) sheds new light on how a national-sized economy can retain its subjectivity without falling into the trap of digital isolation.
Instead of unrealistic dreams of full self-sufficiency, PIIT experts propose a model of systemic sovereignty. This pragmatic approach assumes that the key to security is not cutting oneself off from Silicon Valley, but the ability to manage technologies efficiently on one’s own terms. The foundation is to be laid by so-called multisourcing, i.e. diversification of suppliers and basing systems on open standards. Such a structure avoids the phenomenon of vendor lock-in, in which the state becomes hostage to the solutions of one corporation.
The most intriguing element of the proposal is the establishment of an ‘operations bastion’. This is to be a specialised structure responsible for overseeing critical computing infrastructure and running innovation sandboxes. From a business perspective, this signals the state’s intention to move away from being a passive consumer of technology to being an active curator of the ecosystem. The change from the National Interoperability Framework to the National Technology Sovereignty Framework, on the other hand, is expected to force providers to be more transparent and components more easily replaceable.
PIIT’s president, Andrzej Dulka, notes that sovereignty is all about intellectual potential and the ability to shape AI development in line with the public interest. For the private sector, especially in strategic industries such as energy or health, this means building a competitive advantage based on secure and predictable foundations.
However, the challenge remains the same: how to reconcile the increasing regulatory pressure coming from Brussels with the real implementation possibilities of Polish companies. The PIIT document is an important step towards a substantive dialogue between administration and business. Poland does not have to build its own language model from scratch to be sovereign. It must, however, have the tools to “pull the plug” or change providers when the interests of the state require it. In the new digital order, it is this flexibility that will be the most valuable currency.
