Data Privacy in the Digital Economy Agreement (DEA): Balancing Economic Growth with Individual Rights in Rwanda

Rwanda’s digital economic integration via Digital Economy Agreements (DEAs) presents a challenge: balancing economic growth with data privacy. This study rigorously analyzes Rwanda’s data protection framework, assessing alignment with international standards and identifying vulnerabilities and ethical dilemmas arising from digital trade. Employing qualitative methods, including document analysis, comparative evaluation, and AI-assisted text mining, we juxtapose Rwanda’s Data Protection and Privacy Law (2021) against global benchmarks, notably the GDPR, and regional African norms. Findings indicate that while Rwanda has legislated key data subject rights and principles, effective implementation is hindered by resource constraints at the Rwanda Data Protection Authority (RDPA), low public awareness, a stringent data localization mandate, and weak cross-border data governance, potentially exposing data to exploitation. Deviations from international best practices in data portability and enforcement penalties, alongside a centralized supervisory structure, raise concerns about regulatory independence. Ethical challenges include conflicts over data sovereignty, digital colonialism risks, algorithmic labor exploitation, and tensions between global privacy norms and local communitarian values. These are analyzed through the lenses of Digital Sovereignty, Postcolonial Tech Ethics, and African Communitarianism. To address these issues, we propose strategies such as adaptive data governance with flexible transfer mechanisms, investment in privacy-by-design and technological sovereignty, AI-powered regulatory intelligence, embedding ethical values in data projects, and asserting international leadership for African-aligned data governance models. This study contributes novel methodology (AI-driven comparative analysis) and theory (integrating Digital Sovereignty with African Communitarianism) to data governance literature, providing a roadmap for Rwanda and other emerging nations to navigate the complexities of the digital economy, protect individual rights, and foster sustainable growth.